Newspapers Are Dying. Are Universities Next? | Hacker News Reader

Newspapers Are Dying. Are Universities Next?

chronicle.com

7 pointsrobg12 comments

Universities are like Y Combinator. You can learn everything you need to start a company on the internet, does that make Y Combinator worthless? You can learn everything you need to be a software engineer on the internet, does that make a degree in computer science worthless?

Universities offer a community of individuals learning together including student organizations, mentorship with faculty, and connections to get jobs later. Sure, if all you are going to do is fill a seat you might as well just do your learning online. But you'd be missing the point of a university education.

On the other hand, do newspapers have a value add to consumers beyond their content which is available for free online now?

Y Combinator is inexpensive compared to the value it provides. Also, are the substitutes (reading about stuff, etc.) worth a fraction of the summer experience? Note that I know nothing of YC other than what I've read!

Many colleges/universities existed before the Gutenburg printing press (see Oxford, Cambridge,University of Paris). Was there speculation at that time about how the book (the next big thing in information distribution) was going to put them out of business?

Online universities don't have near the reputation of old ones. Its not the education that counts, its the diploma, sadly

Part of the problem is that the cost of college/university education has skyrocketed far faster than inflation [1]. With easy-to-get loans for students [2], universities have no incentive to cut price increases. With the vast rise in adjuncts, they've cut back on the main reason for attending uni in the first place: the teachers.

Notes:

1 - Tuition and fees have been rising about 2x that of CPI (consumer price index is the number reported in the media as "inflation"). http://www.finaid.org/savings/tuition-inflation.phtml

2 - Student loans are easy to get because legislation made them impossible to discharge in bankruptcy. Federal subsidies to the lenders make them far more profitable than just about any other loan.

It's not likely that a MIT CS graduate will be incompetent, but the probability of ineptitude increases quickly as one goes beyond the internationally known, top-tier schools.

In some ways, the value of a formal education has been diminished. Thankfully, I have never been forced to exclude candidates based on academic pedigree. And, I test _everyone_ in interviews to see if they're clueful. So, if I'm already willing to accept candidates without regard to pedigree and I have to act as the gatekeeper myself, there's little disadvantage for an education seeker (I had to choose words carefully here) to "take" OpenCourseware classes, perhaps with a group. Furthermore, I'd respect such initiative much more than someone who attended a mid-tier CS program (like I did).

...the football coach, and other expensive things that cost more than they bring in.

This statement by itself shows how utterly ignorant the author is about university cashflow.

"recently began offering graduate courses in education administration, another traditional cash cow, through a for-profit online provider"

Yeah...it's a cash cow because one has to have a license (and therefore a degree) to be a school administrator in the US.

When faced with any threat, Universities will take the steps to evolve and become more efficient. Newspapers failed to do so...hence their current predicament.

don't think so. Students are brainwashed from the first grade that you need a college degree to get a good job, newspapers never had that

College is not even remotely as necessary as most people think. Education, however, is twice as important.

I don't think so. Most companies require a university degree to hire someone. The degree shows the firm that you are somewhat competent.

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