Well, by attending a traditional institution you're really paying firstly for experts to take partial responsibility for your learning, enough to stake some of their reputation on it, and secondly for entrance to a club of peers of similar ability to learn with.
With more and more material available online, I can see how taking full responsibility for your own learning is less daunting than it once was. I'm still curious as to what will replace the role of peers of similar ability in this self-learning model.
In my experience at one of those traditional institutions, those experts often couldn't care less about any responsibility to undergrads. Their job is to do research, and to get grants to support that research. The number of professors for whom teaching was clearly a nuisance was one of the most depressing parts of the experience.
Having similarly capable peers is really the primary advantage, especially if those relationships carry on after you finish.
I agree completely, particularly with undergrad educations. Professers aren't picked on their teaching ability. They really don't have an incentive to improve the education of their students, other than personal diligence.
You could give pre-tests to people and organize them into "classes" which they will stay with for four years... along with ways of sharing personal info with each other (Facebook friends perhaps)... with a once-a-year in-person meetup weekend.
Comments
Well, by attending a traditional institution you're really paying firstly for experts to take partial responsibility for your learning, enough to stake some of their reputation on it, and secondly for entrance to a club of peers of similar ability to learn with.
With more and more material available online, I can see how taking full responsibility for your own learning is less daunting than it once was. I'm still curious as to what will replace the role of peers of similar ability in this self-learning model.
In my experience at one of those traditional institutions, those experts often couldn't care less about any responsibility to undergrads. Their job is to do research, and to get grants to support that research. The number of professors for whom teaching was clearly a nuisance was one of the most depressing parts of the experience.
Having similarly capable peers is really the primary advantage, especially if those relationships carry on after you finish.
I agree completely, particularly with undergrad educations. Professers aren't picked on their teaching ability. They really don't have an incentive to improve the education of their students, other than personal diligence.
...secondly for entrance to a club of peers of similar ability to learn with.
I do not know what university you attended, but honestly, the learning ability of 'peers' within most universities varies greatly.
If they were so similar, all the 'peers' would have similar SAT scores, undergraduate grades, majors, and graduation rates.
Educating is not a priority for the majority of undergrad programs in the US (in terms of academics).
There is a site http://openstudy.com/ where you can get into contact with other people taking the courses at OCW.
I wanted to work through the 18.06 calculus course anyway, so having that with enhanced material is great news to me.
You could give pre-tests to people and organize them into "classes" which they will stay with for four years... along with ways of sharing personal info with each other (Facebook friends perhaps)... with a once-a-year in-person meetup weekend.