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Pandemic Making College Students Question the Price of Their Education (wsj.com)
11 points by blnqr 2119 days ago
4 comments

Prior to the pandemic, most jobs were not remote. Now something like 40% of them are. Our schools were set up originally to train obedient factory workers, and to serve as daycare centers that allow mom and dad to go to the office. I can't help but to think that schools will have to change to reflect the new permanent situation.

What will happen to teachers? I suspect that over time, there will be fewer of them, but people will learn more than ever. In 1900, 12 million Americans were farmers. 120 years later, we have four times as many people to feed, and only 2 million of us are farmers.

Seeing as a large portion of tuition costs come from the need to pay to fund large numbers of administrative staff which are employed to support and operate the glitzy, college life experience crap, that students can't use now I would say a full re-evaluation of college costs are in order.
Should teachers and administrators get full pay when a lot of the campus is shut down and instruction is virtual? If I were a student or parent of a student, I wouldn't be too happy with that.
Most instructors are paid so little if you cut their pay they wouldn't even make minimum wage.
Good point. And the ones in the bottom quartile on the pay scale are doing most of the work. The more senior profs don't teach much and get paid a lot more.
The article doesn't mention it, but you wonder if the all-online model, sometimes with non-traditional funding (like Lambda School) will gain in popularity.