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Can the Internet lower college costs?

By Larry Dignan | August 3, 2010, 4:07 AM PDT

Chris Lehmann, principal of the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, has a lot of good ideas on what needs to be done to revamp the educational system. One area that’s going to need a serious overhaul is colleges and universities. Why? The current model just isn’t sustainable.

Speaking at the Supernova conference last week at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, Lehmann said:

I doubt my kids will have the college experience the same way we did. Most of us just can’t afford it and the system is going to break. College will be a hybrid online/offline experience.

Lehmann, speaking on a panel about restructuring legacy institutions to innovate better, was referring to the costs of a college education. Year after year, college tuition outpaces inflation by a wide margin. Toss in economic malaise—potentially the new normal in the U.S.—and it’s no surprise that the return on investment for colleges is being scrutinized.

Lehmann recalled a meeting with a family that made $50,000 a year and was told they need to spend $15,000 for a college education. That can’t add up for the parents and Lehmann also questions why college is so unaffordable that massive grants and aid are needed just to get students. Should kids take on $100,000 in debt?

The gist of Lehmann’s idea was that some online hybrid education could bring costs down. In theory, tuition could be lowered as classes scale virtually. Meanwhile, things like room and board wouldn’t be needed.

It’s an interesting concept and one that just might work. How would you bring college costs down?

Other thoughts from Lehmann:

The education system should focus on creating good citizens first. The education system today is focused on testing, but needs to push multiple disciplines. “I don’t know what the world holds for these kids. Anybody want to guess what the curriculum needs to be in 2023? What will the content be?” asked Lehmann.
According to Lehmann, the major requirement should be to teach kids to harness every resource they have at their disposal.
The cult of efficiency that business obsesses about may not apply to the education system. “The goal of education isn’t to be just like business,” said Lehmann. Business can change that conversation by bringing ideas to the education system with some humility.
Teachers need to join the profession for something other than altruism. “Leave the save the world stuff at the door because it’s not sustainable,” he said. “We need to make the job sustainable and it’s not just about paying more. We need to reform the profession.”
Lehmann’s school has a one laptop per student policy, but technology isn’t everything. “Technology needs to be ubiquitous, necessary and invisible,” he said.

Related:

Payscale’s college ROI rankings

Paying for College: Is Your Education a Good Investment?

And a Lehmann talk at TED in June:

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About Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan is editor-in-chief of SmartPlanet.

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one more thing

In my previous comment I left out a huge part of the problem: gov't agencies and private employers that REQUIRE a 4-year college degree before they will hire you for positions that don't actually require such a degree to perform the job. These positions never used to require a college degree, and they haven't changed significantly. So what has changed? Two things: 1) the percentage of people with college degrees; and 2) the value of a high school diploma.

Congress should pass a law forbidding agencies from imposing a BS/BA requirement. Instead, agencies should be required to use the "knowledge, skills, and abilities" (KSA) list, which is generated for every federal job listing, as their screening tool. Along with this, agencies should be required to indicate which exams would satisfy their criteria. Create the need, and the certifying exams would appear. People could choose to study on their own, or pay someone to walk them through it, but in the end they'd all have to pass the same exam.

Far-fetched? Not at all. Many employers are already doing this with various computing certifications, because 1) the colleges can't stay current enough; and 2) BS degrees in fields like computer programming have a shelf life of about 5 years (even if the college was up-to-date). Ditto for many health-care jobs like ultrasound technician, radiographer, and medical records management.

Our employers, both public and private, should be lowering the bar on education for entry-level positions, while simultaneously raising the bar for continuing education for career employees.

Posted by dmm99

6th Jun

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And why is it so unaffordable?

Could it be that there is an "education bubble" that closely
resembles the "housing bubble", where the vast availability of loans,
grants and parents willing to pay any price has bid up the price of a
college education to unsustainable levels?

The dirty secret of academia is that the cost of teaching undergrad
level students is but a small fraction of the money spent by
universities.

Posted by JohnMcGrew@...

3rd Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

No one seems to ask the obvious question. "Year after year, college tuition outpaces inflation by a wide margin." Why does college tuition outpace inflation? Who's getting money. Do college presidents think they should be overpaid like CEO's?

Posted by kittykathy

3rd Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

The primary and secondary education system needs to stop with the grade inflation, dummying down tests, and teaching to the tests in order to pass everybody. By doing this it becomes more difficult to determine who should be continuing to college and who should be considering other alternatives. This results in abnormally high demand for college admissions. Many of these people will wind up not finishing because they never should have been there to begin with. In the meantime, the schools have had to build larger facilities and create catch up courses and the like in order to cater to these people. That costs huge amounts of money.

The government needs to back off on the amount of aid being provided to students on the basis of income alone without any (or very little) regard to academics. The schools factor this money in and charge accordingly which a) drives up costs, and b) makes the grants of limited value to anybody.

Posted by sullivanjc

3rd Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

when universities stop trying to think and act as a business and realize that their endowment funds are to be used for their major purpose, the education(meant in the broadest sense) of students so that they can become worthwhile citizens in our society, intellectually able, knowledgeable, relatively immune to both the panic and fear and the lies given them by their leaders, the ability to think clearly and rationally about all the aspects of their lives, and enough self confidence so they can go through life without a need for the drugs and psychoanalytical help that so many do require, then the universities will become places where this education can be achieved by all that have the necessary brain power without the greed of the universities that so beset the system now. we have a nation now for which' a little knowledge is a dangerous thing' and that can be seen every day by just reading the polling results of any groiup of people on any subject or by listening to the man on the street or any number of pundits on tv 'news' programs.

yes online courses can help but they will never replace the college experience; being taught by a nobellist, having the chance to personally know and learn from people who you know and respect as great intellects, to sit in class lkistening to a world known intellect in his field who cannot connect with his students on any level leaving them puzzeled as to what their peers find so elegant, and wondering what he is saying and teaching.
being at a university gives students the chance to meet those people that you would never expect to meet in your life and to try to understand why they are what they are, both good and bad, and at times ferrible. i think serving in the military is also a similar experience.
i have had all of this and would not want to change any of it for the world. college is far more than just texts or someone lecturing.

the universities will price themselves out of the market to the detriment of themselves and all of society. the university administration has become big business and have begun to believe themselves as 'masters of the universe' and like those today in finance will bring the house down because 'they can do no wrong'.

Posted by stilt21

3rd Aug 2010

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Academic ability not indicator for college success

I laugh at anybody who believes the old stereotype that smart people should go to college and less-smart people should not. The real determining factor in college success is Drive, not ability. I have met many people who were very smart - and unsuccessful in college as well as people who you wouldn't have thought could scape up two connected brain cells who had 4 year degrees.

I think that generally speaking, interest is at the root of drive - people do better at things they find interesting. Many high school graduates get bundled off to college with No Clue as to what they want to do with their lives and end up wasting their time and money. Parents and society should back off a little and give the kids a chance to try some things - perhaps take classes in a wide variety of different disciplines at a community college, or take a couple of years to work in entry-level positions in various career fields. Once they've figured out what they want to do, the path will be self-evident, their interest will be strongly engaged and the chances of a successful and rewarding career will be much higher.

Posted by dmclean@...

3rd Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

Colleges need to rid themselves of athletic departments and return tuition to affordable levels. Congress should offer fully-funded tuition to deserving students. In exchange for the "full ride" undergrads should have to complete at least year of national service - no exceptions. Dr. Murray Sperber said it better and more often.

Posted by cb77305

3rd Aug 2010

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Reasons why so expensive

1. Textbooks: frequent changes, always the latest edition, color photos and diagrams. Solution is to use open source texts and ebooks (pdf) whenever possible.
2. Computer networks: Used to be only in library. Now it's campus-wide wifi. Sure, it adds value, but it adds cost as well. Solution is to scale that back.
3. Overpaid administrators, coaches, and big-name profs: Sorry, you people are not actually worth that much. Solution is to change salary scales so that nobody makes more than 10x what the grad students get paid. It's supposed to be a non-profit, and it gets tons of gov't support.
4. Swanky dorms: I know that no college student will think his dorm is "swanky," but dorms used to be for sleeping and bathing. (Hence the name, from the French "dormir," "to sleep.") Everything else took place elsewhere. Studying was done in the library. Socializing was done in the student center. Cooking was done by the cafeteria. Solution is to cram more students into rooms instead of building new dorms.
5. Swanky food service: Yeah, I know all the current college students are laughing. But you used to get one or maybe two choices at each meal. If you didn't like those, tough, you went hungry. Solution is to simplify, and get rid of those extra fast-food places in the student center that devour parents' money.

College should not be a fun place to spend 5 or 6 years messing around. It should be miserable enough that students only will put up with it because they REALLY want that education. Sort of like a yogi's ashram, or a monastery, or sports training camp, or a dance troupe.

Posted by dmm99

3rd Aug 2010

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Mixed up on things.

The number one expense of education is faculty and administrative staff salaries. That is barely ahead of infrastructure maintenance.

And the number 1 goal of a school system is to teach kids.

Except for certain states that mandate testing, our national school systems as a whole spend way too much time on feel good activities than solid learning.

Have you seen our international education rankings? They are a sad joke. No wonder we are getting our butts kicked in industry and commerce.

Posted by Hates Idiots

3rd Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

There is an idea floating around that EVERYONE should have a college degree. This is absurd as not everyone is prepared, or is better suited to other skills for their life work.
e.g. The Law schools turn out myriads of half baked graduates that end up on TV or the gov't. payrolls doing what any reasonably intelligent young person could do with a little traning and OJT.

Posted by WSHBaker@...

3rd Aug 2010

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In todays school systems...

a collage diploma is just a piece of paper. If you can sign it you can gradute. It all depends on how much you pay because the effort is about the same.

4 years, $200,000 and a lot of feel good fluff later or print one online for $40.

Posted by Hates Idiots

4th Aug 2010

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RE: Can the Internet lower college costs?

Actually I think a "collage" diploma would be made up of multiple pieces of paper. happy

Posted by riverat1

5th Aug 2010

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one more thing

Posted by dmm99

6th Jun

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