Bloom's Sixth

Among academics, online education inspires about as much enthusiasm as a raft sale on a cruise ship. That’s unfortunate, given that higher education’s cruise ship has a hull full of leaks and has been taking on water for years. The latest evidence of academic disdain for online education comes from the Online Report Card, which is sponsored by the Online Learning Consortium and other organizations (There was a link, but the page does not exist anymore), and has been published yearly since 2003. It is based on surveys conducted by Babson Survey Research Group in Fall 2015. In that…

Earlier this week, I interrupted two students in a small room at Spahr Engineering Library at KU. Tom Ellison, left, and Nathan Marlow at Spahr Engineering Library. The students, Tom Ellison and Nathan Marlow, were working on problems for a dynamics class. Each had tablet computers and used styluses to work problems by hand in OneNote. Ellison’s computer was connected wirelessly to a large monitor on a wall, via an adaptor he checked out from the library, and the two of them conversed and shared ideas as they worked. It was an impressive scene of collaboration in a space that makes…

Most Americans still see a four-year degree as important, but it is not at the top of the list of things that will help someone achieve a successful career, a recent Heartland Monitor poll suggests. In the poll, respondents ranked technology skills, an ability to work with diverse groups of people, keeping skills current, and having family connections above a four-year college degree. They certainly didn’t dismiss a college education. More than half said a…

Higher education has an image problem. And a trust problem. That should come as no surprise, given the drubbing that public colleges and universities have taken from state legislatures over the past few years. They have also taken criticism from federal policy makers – along with parents and students – about costs and transparency. The latest sign of flagging trust comes from a national poll from the Robert Morris University Polling Institute (There was a link, but the page no longer exists) in Pittsburgh. More than half of parents polled said colleges and universities weren’t…

No one disputes that college tuition has risen substantially over the past 20 years. Ask why, though, and you’ll get vastly different answers. Writing in The New York Times, Paul Campos, a professor at the University of Colorado, dismisses the idea that declining state subsidies have led to rising tuition. Instead, he writes, “the astonishing rise in college tuition correlates closely with a huge increase in public subsidies for higher education.” Vox…

I often roll my eyes at articles that take millennials to task for not measuring up to the standard of the day. All too often, baby boomers and those in generations before seem to wag their fingers at young people and spew out curmudgeonly laments that inevitably start with, “When I was your age …” Sample questions, above and below, from the international survey of millennials’ skills As I dug into a new report by the Educational Testing Service (There was a link, but the page no longer exists), though, I began to buy into the concerns it raises about the skills of American…

Faculty often see the benefits of online education for students but not for themselves, Karen H. Sibley and Ren Whitaker write in Educause. Development of online courses takes precious time away from other activities that generate greater rewards for faculty. The way to change that, Sibley and Whitaker argue, is to offer incentives to move into online education. They give these examples: Providing compensation as salary, research funds, or time (e.g., a course buy-out) Appealing to a…

In a discussion among faculty earlier this week, a conversation about online education quickly turned skeptical. We were exploring the model of the Minerva Schools, which uses a combination of online and experiential learning with a small group of students. It aims to reduce the cost of college by using technology, rather than physical classrooms, and to create cohorts of students who live in and…

Earlier this week, I wrote about the unlikelihood of competition and cultural forces pushing higher education to “unbundle” its degrees and services. Jeff Young of The Chronicle of Higher Education provides yet another take on that notion. Young says that providers of massive open online courses, or MOOCs, have pledged to democratize education, allowing anyone to become an educator and a learner. He describes platforms like Udemy, edX and MOOC.org collectively as the “sharing economy meets…

Will students one day piece together their own degrees by assembling courses a la carte from a variety of colleges and universities? Derek Newton of the Center for Teaching Entrepreneurship, says no. Writing in The Atlantic, Newton argues that technology won’t force the “unbundling” of degrees and programs in higher education the way it has the music industry and cable TV.…