by Jeffrey J. Selingo.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve concluded that I want to post short summaries of the books I\u2019m reading, partly as \u201ccontent\u201d and partly for my own benefit, and I\u2019m not going to do this in any elegant way, more in the form of notes, so\u00a0I can recall the content later.<\/p>\n
Three sections:\u00a0
How We Got There
The Disruption
The Future<\/p>\n
How We Got There<\/strong>:\u00a0 1999 to 2009 was the Lost Decade \u2014 a boom in high school graduates, which colleges should have been preparing for the future but went on a building spee instead.\u00a0 Growth in new majors, programs, \u201ccredential creep,\u201d universities chasing higher rankings in the US News & World Report rankings.\u00a0 18 new law programs (big moneymaker \u2014 tuition subsidizes the rest of the university budget).\u00a0 <\/p>\n The customer is always right:\u00a0 power shift from professors to students, due to rising tuition (students want to get something for their money), increase in adjunct professors, focus on retention in US News metrics, and the Millennial generation\u2019s expectations = focus on making students happy, resulting in more lenient grading, less concern with whether students are learning.\u00a0\u00a0 Academically Adrift<\/em> = students aren\u2019t studying and aren\u2019t learning.<\/p>\n Some further explanations for the cost of college:\u00a0 spending on employee benefits, especially healthcare.\u00a0 Rise in numbers of administrative staff.\u00a0 Amenities (a Lazy River?) = $3,400 per student on IM sports, career services, student organizations, counseling.\u00a0 Fundamental supply and demand = when demand outstrips supply, prices increase.<\/p>\n Marketing and advertising costs?\u00a0 Statistics not available.<\/p>\n Discounting:\u00a0 average discount at a private college = 42%; researcher says that \u201cmost of the increase in tuition prices at private colleges since the Great Recession has got to pay for discounts.\u201d\u00a0 (p. 29)<\/p>\n The resort campus = amenities arms race; universities rebuilding their dorms as luxury suites, other building projects paid or by bonds.\u00a0 Debt taken on by colleges has doubled since 2000 \u2013 > $300 billion now.\u00a0 <\/p>\n Student debt:\u00a0 \u201cColleges want to hook prospective students on emotion first in hopes they will enroll at any cost.\u201d\u00a0 Anecdotal evidence of parents taking on unaffordable loans to avoid disappointing their children, of students taking on loans with no awareness of the debt load.\u00a0 Colleges don\u2019t help with cryptic financial aid info, not even clearly distinguishing between grants & loans.\u00a0 The amount of PLUS loans have doubled in the last decade (can\u2019t tap home equity any longer).\u00a0 <\/p>\n Some cases of university administrators discouraging students from attending when the financial burden is too great, but they\u2019ve bought into \u201cfollow your dream\u201d and aren\u2019t dissuaded.\u00a0 <\/p>\n The Disruption<\/strong> Schools such as Arizona State implementing programs such as Knewton software for math, flipping the classroom.\u00a0 MOOCs!\u00a0 <\/p>\n why do colleges continue to offer traditional lecture-only intro classes?\u00a0 Money \u2014 which subsidizes other university expenses.\u00a0 <\/p>\n University of Central Florida \u2014 tremendous growth in online learning.<\/p>\n Overall, 31% of overall higher ed enrollment is in online classwork.\u00a0 <\/p>\n The Future<\/strong> Accreditation protects existing colleges from start-ups.<\/p>\n Image of the university is a fresh high school grad packing up and moving into the dorm.\u00a0 But only 2 in 10 undergrads attend a residential 4 year college full-time.\u00a0 A sometimes circuitous path \u2014 and even wealthy families send their kids to community college (23% of students from $100,000+ households attend community college in 2011-2012, up from 12% 3 years prior.)<\/p>\n Some movement towards measuring competency, rather than time spent in a chair.\u00a0 Western Governor\u2019s University \u2014 100% online, 4 disciplines (education, business, IT, health professions).\u00a0 begun in 1995, now 25K students, 40% incr per year.\u00a0 <\/p>\n One unresolved problem:\u00a0 the online learning is there, but the credential \u2014 the institution that packages the learning into a single identifiable achievement \u2013 isn\u2019t there.<\/p>\n [the book continues for a further 50 pages or so with an orientation towards advising future students]<\/p>\n Bottom line:<\/strong> by Jeffrey J. Selingo. I\u2019ve concluded that I want to post short summaries of the books I\u2019m reading, partly as \u201ccontent\u201d and partly for my own benefit, and I\u2019m not going to do this in any elegant way, more in the form of notes, so\u00a0I can recall the content later. Three sections:\u00a0 How We Got […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
The 5 disruptive forces that will change higher education forever
1)\u00a0 a sea of red ink \u2014 colleges in debt
2)\u00a0 disappearing state subsidies
3)\u00a0 fewer full-paying students \u2014 public and private colleges now competing for full-pay students from abroad (China); fewer students from wealthy families, more wealthy parents skeptical of high tuition bills.
4)\u00a0 unbundled alternatives improving \u2014 e.g., Khan Academy, earning \u201cBadges\u201d
5)\u00a0 the growing value gap \u2014 questioning the value of traditional higher ed<\/p>\n
StraighterLine \u2014 take intro classes for $99\/month + $39 per class, in order to use these as transfer credit elsewhere (if the \u201celsewhere\u201d accepts it)<\/p>\n
The author is a lot more optimistic than I am!\u00a0 There are a lot of IFs before the college of the future will arrive:\u00a0 Will online learning be a viable replacement for a traditional university, or at least enable students to earn parts of their degree more affordably?\u00a0 Will traditional universities accept online credits for transfer?\u00a0 Will employers look beyond traditional universities for their entry-level staff?\u00a0 Will traditional universities see their enrollments decline and drop tuition in response?\u00a0 <\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"