Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO • Hacker News Board

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#81

Post by orsenthil » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 5:34 PM UTC

amttc wrote: post #78

dikaiosune wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you rate the rest of the experience?

I'm an OMSCS student. Udacity is fine. It serves its purpose. Sometimes it looks like the poor instructors are getting a double whammy of Georgia heat and hot spotlights, but the lectures are pretty high quality. I'm not too far into the program, but the courses I've seen are built around readings, projects, and Piazza (a student forum for us to talk to each other in). Piazza is where most of the interesting stuff ha…

Here! Another OMSCS Student. I think, many of us associate ourselves with Georgia Tech than Udacity, even though we have some excellent staff who are full time employed by Udacity for our courses.

The technical infrastructure from Udacity is a low key here. But the partnership, enablement and opportunity in providing 1000s of qualified students to pursue masters is a phenomenal achievement.

Forever grateful to Udacity and Sebastian Thrun for this program.

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#82

Post by Animats » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 6:56 PM UTC

strictnein wrote: post #62

pj_mukh wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they could've focussed on making the credentials valuable (maybe they did and it didn't work). AFAIK, if you told an employer you have a "nanodegree" in something or other, its glossed over. Usually, you have to back it up with real-world projects. In which case why would I pay for the degree, I should just go out and build something with the stuff I learn for free.

Some NSA job listings have mentioned Coursera's (and others) Data Science specializations. > "Completion of a data science certificate program (online or other) may replace 1 year of relevant experience. Some examples of data science certificate programs include those offered by Cloudera, Coursera, Indiana University-Bloomington, and University of California-Irvine." Data Scientist - Entry Level: https://www.nsa.gov/…

NSA has a big in-house training operation. Unlike startups, they're not looking for narrow specific skills in new hires. A year of paid formal classroom training for a new hire is not unusual at NSA.

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#83

Post by erikb » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 8:31 PM UTC

gedrap wrote: post #24

erikb wrote: post #21

Happy to see that they are doing so well. I was so excited when I joined (one of) their first class(es), A.I. At the time I was still a university student and had a hard time going to class, seeing how far technology was ahead of our teaching methods. Learning online is a much better method for me.

So maybe it's not that learning online is a better method but that you found better teaching material and online is obviously a easier method to do so?

No, I mean it's a much better method. I can start when I want (not Monday morning, 8 am), I can make a break when I want (if just to google something that I didn't understand), I can repeat stuff that I didn't understand at first, and I can continue with homework directly after the lecture (I don't have to switch rooms and thereby mental context).

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#84

Post by saturdaysaint » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 8:43 PM UTC

kumarski wrote: post #20

I don't think technology will revolutionize education the way everyone in Silicon Valley thinks it will. Accessibility issues, yes. Disrupting traditional teaching, learning, practicing....hmmm?

"The only thing that a 1850's person would recognize today are our schools. Why?" -@nolanbushnell

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#85

Post by kageneko » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 9:36 PM UTC

nkozyra wrote: post #69

CardenB wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There are a few classes that have a reputation for being poorly designed/maintained and a few with somewhat "unreasonable" time requirements (ie 50 hours a week for a single class)." As a current Georgia Tech student, I welcome you.

Thanks, I'm more than halfway finished :) I've often wondered what on-campus students think of the program given there are a lot of competing elements to having both at an esteemed CS school. I've tried thinking about my undergrad days and how I'd feel if there were an equivalent program.

I was accepted to the program the year that the online masters was announced. At first, I was not amused.

However, I really really enjoyed my time actually being on campus. There were a few classes I took that would have been very difficult to do online, such as mobile & ubiq computing, where I got to spend quite a bit of time in the prototyping lab. I also had the chance to socialize a bit with professors and do some research with them. And personally, I don't do as well with online classes. I think it's really useful to have both kinds of programs. They're different experiences and they appeal to different people. Having both campus and online programs gives more opportunities to innovate in education.

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#86

Post by nkozyra » Mon, Apr 25, 2016, 10:48 PM UTC

kageneko wrote: post #85

nkozyra wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, I'm more than halfway finished :) I've often wondered what on-campus students think of the program given there are a lot of competing elements to having both at an esteemed CS school. I've tried thinking about my undergrad days and how I'd feel if there were an equivalent program.

I was accepted to the program the year that the online masters was announced. At first, I was not amused. However, I really really enjoyed my time actually being on campus. There were a few classes I took that would have been very difficult to do online, such as mobile & ubiq computing, where I got to spend quite a bit of time in the prototyping lab. I also had the chance to socialize a bit with professors and do som…

Thanks for the insight. I would definitely prefer being on campus but don't think it would gel with a family + full-time job.

Re: Sebastian Thrun Steps Down as Udacity's CEO

#87

Post by erdojo » Tue, Apr 26, 2016, 4:19 AM UTC

uulbiy wrote: post #13

geomark wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel somewhat the same. I took a couple Udacity courses that were great and quite a few from Coursera. Coursera's free offerings are now partially gutted by restricting non-paying students from taking tests and submitting assignments.

I think the big mistake was offering something for free and then asking money for it. The first backlash was with the (unverified) certificates and the latest with the tests and assignments. It might have been a different story if they announced from the beginning that they are only offering their services for free for a certain period of time. They focused on gaining users and they succeeded on that, but now that th…

Coursera built its PR engine on the premise of bringing high quality top-university education to the world for free. They gave keynotes to large audiences, did press tours, and even used a .org domain. Very feel-good, and they capitalized on the resulting publicity and good will to raise a lot of money.

No one would have whined much about add-ons for a cost. But to restrict what was originally part of the core free experience - the experience they built their reputation on - is why any backlash now is entirely of their own making.