[yummyfajitas]

"We want to do a highly selective, fully online, credit-bearing program on a large scale - and that has not been done," said UC Berkeley law school Dean Christopher Edley

There is absolutely no reason to be selective in an online college unless you are trying to create artificial scarcity.

This quote shows just how pointless college is.

[rick888]

"There is absolutely no reason to be selective in an online college unless you are trying to create artificial scarcity."

If every college let everyone in, it would be worthless. Colleges need to be selective. They should base admission on grades.

[anigbrowl]

Surely the test of individual ability is not whether they can participate, but whether they can graduate? Of course, open admissions would result in a lot of washouts after the first semester, but since a good many of these will be self-selected they'll arguably be providing a small subsidy to the more capable students.

(edit: I wonder if rick888's view results from the popularity of 'grading on a curve' - ie, grade as a measure of class ranking, rather than objective ability? In that case, it makes more sense...but then I think GoaC is a bad idea to begin with)

I do find it a bit ironic that this proposal comes from the dean of Berkeley's law school, but doesn't address the question of teaching that subject online. Legal education is thought by many to be at a crossroads right now: the number of nationally accredited schools is increasing, costs are at a record high, but job prospects at a record low. Online instruction is considered anathema by many in the legal educational establishment - ie, schools accredited by the ABA - since it's incompatible with the traditional Case/Socratic method of teaching law (Q & A in class about study assignments rather than lecturing). Many law firms complain that this system is better at producing law school professors than lawyers, and a much-discussed 2007 report from the Carnegie Foundation seems to back up their claims (http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/sites/default/files/public...).

Of course, Boalt Hall (Berkeley's law school) regularly scores in the top 10 national rankings, and its graduates are correspondingly well-positioned for career success, so the dean has no economic incentive to mess with success as regards his own department. I don't mean to cast any negative aspersions here; I was just surprised to see him advancing the argument for distance learning in any context.

(Disclosure: I'm planning to study law, but don't have a strong pro or con feeling about any particular instruction method)

[aaco]

"If every college let everyone in, it would be worthless."

I think that HN, while not a college, might be a counterexample for this idea.

Here everyone can join and communicate, and yet we can maintain a high level of communication. The ones who don't fit are quickly flagged or simply won't come back again.

I think selectivity is good, however it doesn't need to be enforced in the admission step, it will happen in the middle of the process. People who would not be able to follow the course requirements would quickly drop out.

I'm not arguing that this idea would work (I don't really know), but based on the HN experience I think it should be considered.

[rick888]

"Here everyone can join and communicate, and yet we can maintain a high level of communication. The ones who don't fit are quickly flagged or simply won't come back again."

Universities aren't run by the students. There is only so much space in a university.

I think selectivity is good, however it doesn't need to be enforced in the admission step, it will happen in the middle of the process. People who would not be able to follow the course requirements would quickly drop out.

"I'm not arguing that this idea would work (I don't really know), but based on the HN experience I think it should be considered."

A forum is easily moderated by the people that go there. The forum owner only has to pay for the bandwidth and make sure the system us running. This isn't the case for a university.

A university has a finite number of spaces. Even an online university needs to have people grading/teaching the class (and they only have so much time in the day).

They don't need to limit it. However, would you like to go to a university that is just a glorified forum that is taught by people that might no the subjects, but not necessarily a professor?

[awongh]

However, would you like to go to a university that is just a glorified forum that is taught by people that might no the subjects, but not necessarily a professor?

Isn't that kinda how it is now? At least the part about your teachers being TAs and not professors.... At least a forum has some level of interaction.

[noelchurchill]

They could let everyone in, they don't have to pass everyone. Let the cream rise to the top and let everyone else drop out. As long as the courses were rigorous enough then the degree would maintain it's credibility.

[rick888]

"They could let everyone in, they don't have to pass everyone. Let the cream rise to the top and let everyone else drop out. As long as the courses were rigorous enough then the degree would maintain it's credibility."

Most colleges just don't have room for everyone. If they opened up the flood-gates of admission, many people, whom would otherwise be able to get into college, would be left out in the cold because they allowed everyone in (even people that do not qualify and or will eventually drop out).

[anigbrowl]

many people...would be left out...because they allowed everyone in

Logical paradoxes aside, surely the benefit of online teaching is that you can do basic filtering as easily as you can disseminate the coursework. Of course, that means employing crude metrics like multiple-choice tests, but such metrics play a large part in the existing admissions process.

[woodall]

I had to take an online course last year. I found it interesting because the instructor had questions on the exams where we had to write essays on a certain topics. The online course I took before that, 3 years earlier, only consisted of multiple choice and True/False.

I talked to the professor after the course just to make sure I understood the content, and one of his remarks was that student's essays where too short. The problem, I think, was that text boxes were ~10 rows, so the students would fill in those 10 rows and think they were done.

Online learning is still new, but I think there are tons of improvements that can be made in order to make it a bit easier for everyone to understand.

[noelchurchill]

It's a virtual college they're talking about. You take the courses from your living room or whatever. You don't actually go to the college. So yes, there IS room.

[woodall]

There is physical/virtual room, however, the professors may not have the ability to handle all the students. This does not differ from the 200 student classes at a regular university, but many on-line professors do all the work them selves- no student aides.

I have heard mixed reviews from many academics on the subject of online instruction. Some think it "spoils the crop", while others think it helps those in difficult situations- where going to a university is not an option.

I feel that education is education, in that person will only get back what they put in. Hybrid, IMO, provide a nice middle ground. There types of programs allow a student to do readings, tests, and other assignments online, but at some point require them to meet with the professor to go over- in more depth- some of the subject content. Again, a person will only get out of this what they put in, so if they meet with the professor and ask no questions they will get little in return.

[yummyfajitas]

There is physical/virtual room, however, the professors may not have the ability to handle all the students.

A single, quality professor is needed to generate content. Content scales.

An army of cheap drones are needed to grade, assuming all grading is done manually. You could probably get a grader for 50 students for $3000-5000 [1]. That's less than $100/student. As long as students pay more than $100/course, online classes will scale.

[1] This is the pay a PTL will receive for teaching a single in-person math course.

[gte910h]

It wouldn't be worthless. It would be worth what the students learn. That plus policies tossing out those who don't get good enough grades (like real colleges have) and you've got no problem offering infinite online attendance.

[SamAtt]

For that to be true you have to argue that College grades are meaningless (because if you base your judgments on College grades you can let everyone in and judge them based on how they do once they're in). To take your logic a step further you're saying the worth in a degree is based on a person's ability to get into an institution.

So essentially what you're saying is we should judge people in the job market based on their High School performance which, IMHO, is kind of ridiculous.

[rick888]

"So essentially what you're saying is we should judge people in the job market based on their High School performance which, IMHO, is kind of ridiculous."

No, I'm saying that letting everyone into a university is a bad idea because most universities don't have the resources to properly teach this amount of students at a college level. It will also cheapen the experience for the people that do attend.

I also don't really see a problem. If you don't care enough about your life to get moderately good grades in high school (which isn't that difficult), you shouldn't be going to college.

[lsc]

if colleges teach you no valuable skills, and only function as a way for employers to 'pre screen' candidates, sure, you are right. (of course, if schools don't teach anything that increases a worker's productivity, then they are pretty useless as a 'pre screen' too.)

However, one would hope that college would actually teach something, and would make the students more productive.

"But" you say "If everyone is more productive, won't their wages stay the same?"

sure, if everyone doubles their productivity, in a fair market, nobody will get a larger cut of the total economic output than they were getting before the productivity increase

However, if everyone's productivity doubles, there will be more economic output to divide. even if your percent of the pie stays the same, it's a bigger pie.

Of course, I'm ignoring inefficiencies here. Obviously, all groups try to maneuver such that they get a larger piece of the pie, but that happens all the time, not just in times of economic growth.

[jey]

Why grades? Do they actually measure anything coherent?