[ghufran_syed]

Do universities offer full refunds for the whole 4 years of a course if they had to change the curriculum while a student was studying there? If not, why such elevated expectations for a school that’s trying to align their interests with that of their students (school only gets paid if the student is financially successful), but not for other institutions that leave their students with massive debt that is not contingent on their student’s success?

[FemmeAndroid]

University credits are transferable in a way a partial education from Lambda School is not, and you can pause at any time. Universities do let you stop part way through your education. Most universities do have options to get partial refunds that are more reasonable than the ones Lambda school seems to offer. Instate tuition across the US is also a fraction of Lambda School, with multiple options if you want to transfer credits.

For what it’s worth, major changes in curriculum do lead to refunds at schools. There have been two examples in my education where mid-year I had a graduate level class need to be rescheduled from a night class due to a professor’s illness. Both were fully refunded when I couldn’t fit the class into my work schedule. That seems to be pretty analogous here, and I wasn’t charged a percent based on how many weeks I attended the class before the change. I was just refunded the total amount of the course because I wouldn’t be able to gain its value. It wasn’t even a difficult process to get the refund, unlike the weeks of trying to get support it seems like the person in this situation attempted.

I think I would place ‘elevated’ expectations for refunds on a founder due to the elevated risk of trying a Startup’s unproven, expensive, and risky education model. I don’t think the expectations are ‘elevated’ but I also think your baseline for doing good for students shouldn’t be ‘it’s only as bad as I perceive the alternatives.’ I think we should strive to do better.