Could you ever see the day when online programs dominate college?

Education is certainly gearing toward that. I'm getting my MBA now at a small private university, and while they don't have online courses yet they are definitely looking to introduce it soon to keep with with the "University of Pheonix" online types that are attracting students.

It's certainly convenient, but you still have to have the classroom for practical application- for example, group projects and presentations, a key aspect to a lot of MBA classes. But there are certainly areas of study that can be done completely online. The question is, will workplaces give favoritism to those who went to a physical university as opposed to an online university? That's what might dictate the trend.

I think CD's are definitely fading, but movies and video games I hope don't go 100% digital. I downloaded a movie on xbox live for the first time a few weeks ago, not realizing it would take forever to download. Sometimes you just decide you want to watch a movie all of a sudden, and don't want to waste time waiting on a download. In comes the beauty of redbox.

 

You're assuming the bandwidth won't be bigger in the future. Remember that the US is way behind a lot of the other industrialized countries so if we ever reach Korea's standards downloading movies would fly.

 

I do believe that it will transition this way. Real estate prices will continue to rise and the with college enrollments continuing to increase, it won't be practical/economical to increase campus size. As it is, there is a significant problem with rise in tuition fees.

Campuses will always exist and some of which, for the points indicated in the quote below. However, more and more there will be many courses that will potentially become mandatory as "online" offerings. Following a typical logic trail, the acceptance of these will lead to "online" degree programs for tele-commuters and out of state residents.

As an aside, I always had the hardest times with the group projects given time constraints of working and raising a family. I wouldn't be shocked that as we move forward, group projects become computer based and not requisite on being in a shared space.

 

Just finished writing a human anatomy mid-term.

Did pretty much all my studying with the online website of the textbook. I'll be extremely upset if I get anything lower than an A-.

My prof. gets zero credit for my learning.

 

Companies still see value in geographical proximity and personal interaction. I don't see that going away in business or education. Technology can help a lot in collaboration, and many things can be done virtually (even for people in the same room). But, I don't see the complete abolition of in-person classes to be coming, or desirable.

 

Post-singularity we'll just download our educations directly to our brains.

 

Sure, it'll happen (it's already started, really) for a lot of the non-science based fields. However, I'm a civil engineer, and I can say that a full 50% of my college career was spent in the lab. Lectures, and recitations might be able to shift to an online format, but when it comes to tangible sciences, in-person learning is the only way to go. That will never change.

 

Completely agreed.

 

You can get degrees in distance learning now. Degrees dedicated to training/teaching people online. You do the math.

 

Whoa! Mind explosion over here.

 

I could definitely see that happening, but it will meet resistance.

 

I certainly hope not.

 

People tend to hire those with similar backgrounds. For example, ivy league alumni favor hiring ivy league graduates for those big time finance jobs. So, it's just a matter of getting people with online degrees into executive positions where they can hire or influence hiring... but that might take time... the upper class don't like letting the 'rest' into their club... lol.

 

The crazy thing is you can get a degree from a place like UT while taking your entire "core" online from any Texas college offering online courses. You could simply take 2hrs of swimming or yoga at UT while doing the rest online and transferring in your credits at each semesters end. Thats 4 semesters worth of classes. After that upper-level majors offer several online courses, you can even request a non-online class make exceptions and the prof may comply. Online degrees are one thing but the truth is you can do it all online without anyone noticing.

 

I hope not, I really don't think you get as much out of learning by just doing it online. The classes where I have incompetent teachers and I am forced to team myself by other means such as online sources is always what I struggle in the most.

 

Can't imagine any science or engineering dept let that happen.

 

It's a much more efficient way of "going to school" IMO. I might be in the minority but I hope that colleges will still require physical attendance. Even though most of the professors are literally killing you slowly with their lectures, there are those rare educators that makes you think and makes going to school actually rewarding.