The End of College: Online Courses on the Rise

What’s the Latest Development?

In response to the technology industry’s calls for more computer programmers, Georgia Tech University has announced that it will offer an online master’s degree in computer science. While many other colleges offer open online courses, called MOOCs, Georgia Tech is the first to offer a full-credit graduate program. What’s more, the degree will cost about a quarter of those offered at traditional, onsite schools. “[The program] comes just in time. A shortfall of computer-science graduates is a constant refrain in Silicon Valley, and by 2020 some one million high-tech job openings will remain unfilled, according to the Commerce Department.”

What’s the Big Idea?

The field of education has been left largely untouched by the digital revolution but just as newspaper content was unbundled and divided into niche sources online, an all-encompassing college experience may become a thing of the past. Or not, if teachers’ unions and hesitant faculty get their way. “In April, an Amherst faculty committee decided against online courses, since they apparently run afoul of the school’s mission of ‘learning through close colloquy.’ … And at Duke, a faculty council at the school’s arts and sciences college voted 16 to 14 against granting graduation credits for taking a Duke MOOC.”

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Read it at the Wall Street Journal