[anonimamente]

That we only need to abolish PhD programs is like shaving the foam off the top of a spoiled bear and thinking that fixes it. The whole premise of college has been rendered obsolete by the Internet a long time ago. What does a University provide that you cannot find online? You are paying to read textbooks and listen to someone quote from those textbooks. Do you need someone to tell you that you must study X for N hours a day and then pass a test for it? Follow your curiosity and enforce your own discipline. Other than that, colleges are merely social clubs. In the USA, the job requirement for a University degree has become part of the grand grift for profit: you are billed outrageous amounts for babysitting and then pay more in interest on the loans that you will be saddled with for decades. This, like so much of our society, has become a scam.

[osrec]

I wholeheartedly agree. In the UK, I find it especially irritating that the biggest selling point touted for going to university by a lot of people is the "social experience", not the education!

Either way, most of the education seems to happen when you're locked away in your dorm room. I could have honestly done that studying anywhere with a bit of peace and quiet.

[sigmoid10]

To be fair, while this works great for certain subjects like computer science, there are things you can't learn online. Medicine, chemistry, biology, experimental physics and most of engineering require labs and tools and a level of personal oversight or interaction that's just not accessible to young people otherwise. You might be able to get rid of lecture halls in the long run, but you'll never get rid of labs.

[anonimamente]

This makes a great case for community-based labs. There have been some startups doing this for mechanical engineering, at least. A big issue is the monopoly over labwork by the university system and then industry. The first requires your money, the second requires that you give money to the first.

[sigmoid10]

The thing is, these things don't generate money. A first year lab course in physics, chemistry or biology will only cost you money. It's all about the students learning and it will be years before they are able to do something that generates money. There's a reason why companies don't train their own chemists out of high school. Universities run these labs anyways and if a single student drops out they don't lose a huge investment. I'm all for more dedicated in-house training and less academic requirements, but the reality is that the economy is not suited to handle that.

[danielscrubs]

“ What does a University provide that you cannot find online? ”

Motivation and likeminded students who put in effort for years.

Programming happens to be very addictive but this is rarely the case in other types of work.

[anonimamente]

Do you think that in the hypothetical absence of the formal education system, the vacuum would be filled by the collaboration of a likeminded community? Social communication among groups with common interest is easier now than it has ever been, particular across vast geographies. This is a least one positive effect of social media, notwithstanding all its negative societal impacts.