In my work with students, it is fairly standard that educators/speakers/counselors/parents push students towards attending college after they graduate from high school. I’m sure this is blasphemy to say out loud but I’ve been weighing whether or not this is still sound advice in our current world.
Is a college degree still worth anything?
I’m not sure, but I do know that the face of education is changing. To better understand how it’s changing, think of the newspaper industry. Twenty years ago, the newspaper was a staple within American society. But think about how technology has changed that. The majority of people don’t get their daily intake of news through a newspaper anymore. In the coming years, newspapers could possibly even become extinct.
Why?
Two primary reasons: access and cost. Why would I pay any dollar amount for a printed newspaper when (A) I can get the news I need from Yahoo or another online outlet and (B) most newspapers put all their articles online for free anyway.
Think about how this affects the world of education. Access and cost. Why would I spend $100,000+ to get a four-year degree when most of the same education I gain from that degree is readily available for free? For example, did you know that major universities like MIT and Stanford are starting to make all their classes available online for free?
The thing that excites me is that with education being more readily available online, it will drive the cost of learning down. Our current higher education model is really broken when you think about it.
Come spend $100,000 at our school for a piece of paper that will give you the ability to get a $35,000/year salary so you can spend the next decade or two paying off the $50,000 in school loans you have.
Brilliant.
I’m just thinking out loud here, but in another 10 years or so, I’m not sure a college degree will still have the value it does today. Don’t get me wrong. There will always be a premium placed on learning and knowledge, but I’m not sure that you’ll still need that expensive piece of paper to validate what you know.
Agree or disagree?
(For more on this subject, read Fast Company’s article called “How Web-Savy Edupunks Are Transforming American Higher Education” and Seth Godin’s recent post, “Education At A Crossroads“)
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