Potential disruptors in the higher education space. II

In an earlier post, I described some potential disruptors in the higher education space. In this post I would like to add another set - several non-profits that are trying to provide essentially free education : the Khan Academy, the University of the People, and the Saylor Foundation  .

 

The Khan Academy's self-description is straightforward:

We're a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education to anyone anywhere.

It does this through over 2700 10-20 minute long videos on a huge number of K-16 subjects. Most videos are made by the founder Salman Khan, but some come from other sources. Individuals can simply go to the web site and start learning. However, by signing in, the student can access a number of tools that help to visialize progress and the growing knowledge map. Similarly, teachers who use Khan material can get class statistics. 

Both the University of the People and the Saylor Foundation focus on college-level courses. They both make use of the fact that there is an enormous amount of educational material now available for free on the the internet. They repackage this material into majors, and incorporate it into their individual educational approaches.

The University of the People, founded by Shai Reshef, describes itself as:

.. the world's first tuition-free online university dedicated to the global advancement and democratization of higher education....University of the People offers a unique learning experience that combines educators, collaborative learning, information technologies and the internet.

At present, the University of the People offers study in only two fields: business administration and computer science. Each of these fields has a dean and a board of advisors who define degree requirements. Basic course material is assembled from open educational materials, some from the Open Courseware Consortium,  and given to course designers who modify and enhance the materials.  An in house group develops assessment standards for the degrees. Peer to peer learning is considered core to the approach, so students in a course are divided into groups of 20-30 that work together online on weekly assignments. Each group has an instructor who facilitates the peer to peer process by e.g. assuring that it is working towards correct outcomes, and suggesting other sources of information as needed. There are 5 terms in the year, with courses starting only at the beginning of the terms in order to create these cohorts. Admission is almost but not quite "open": applicants must be 18 or over, have a high school diploma, and be proficient in English. Although there is no tuition, there probably will  be in the future rather small charges associated with taking the exams. Students who successfully complete the degree requirements are awarded a bachelor's degree by the University of the People. The University is not accredited, but the website says that it is seeking accreditation at this time.

The Saylor Foundation was founded in 1999 by Michael Saylor.  It's mission is:

...to make education freely available to all. Guided by the belief that technology has the potential to circumvent barriers that prevent many individuals from participating in traditional schooling models, the Foundation is committed to developing and advancing inventive and effective ways of harnessing technology in order to drive the cost of education down to zero.

At present, Saylor is focusing on  working to identify, develop, and organize the material a student needs to know in order to earn the equivalent of a degree in any of the top ten majors in the United States. The foundation works with faculty and  peer-review teams from various higher education institions to package primarily open license educational materials into degree level programs. Learning goals for each course and each program are well described on the website. Any person can sign up for a course at any time, and it does not appear that there is any peer learning involved at present. It is not clear whether Saylor intends to offer a degree to students who succeed in passing the prescribed courses.

Saylor is collaborating with both p2pu (one of the potential disruptors described in part I of this series) and the University of the People to create and share courses, and some of Saylor's math courses come from the Khan Academy. Thus there seems to be a community working with some cooperation towards similar goals.

Both the University of the People and Saylor are providing the equivalent of degree programs, but lack accreditation. With current accreditation approaches, which depend almost exclusively on inputs (number of full time faculty, library facilites, etc.), accreditation for institutions of this type will be very hard to obtain. Yet, if accreditation were to focus on outputs e.g. what students actually learned, we might find that institutions such as these would fit well into the "outcomes" spectrum of accredited institutions.

I have not looked at a University of the People course, since one apparently needs to matriculate in order to do so.  The courses of both the Khan Academy and Saylor are rather rudementary in terms of use of pedegogy and technogy compared to what one finds in well funded online programs.  Thus, at this point in their development, the disruptive component of this group is not likely to be in the format and approach of the education being offered. Rather, it is likely to be in their demonstration that in this new era where information and content is everywhere, a reasonable college education can be produced at very close to zero cost.  

Comments

[course Requirements]

Thanks for explaining about the disruptor which will hamper the higher education. Good post indeed.