Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds • Hacker News Board

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#151

Post by ashtonkem » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:40 PM UTC

intended wrote: post #131

rgblambda wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The MOOC rush is over. We know the organic retention rates are abysmal. I don't think I've ever completed a MOOC. When I get what I want out of it I drop it. Now if I was paying for it or if completion was a requirement for a job or promotion I think I'd be more invested in completing the course.

True, and this one reason among many why MOOC Retention rates are at 3%. This is one of the reasons that online education will fall behind real world college classes. Another is whether people learn the same amount.

The lack of structure and pressure is also a thing. In a traditional class you must show up or miss out. MOOCs are available at all times forever, which means you can watch them “someday”, which is usually the same as “never”.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#152

Post by ashtonkem » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:41 PM UTC

intended wrote: post #127

11eleven wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In contrast, most people who get in, finish college. > In person education beats online education hollow. This isn't really true. "According to the National Center for Education Statistics, just 41% of first-time full-time college students earn a bachelor’s degree in four years, and only 59% earn a bachelor’s in six years." https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/just-41percent-of-college-st...

As you yourself point out, 59% finish in 6 years. In contrast, these are MOOC completion rates: >Among all MOOC participants, 3.13 percent completed their courses in 2017-18, down from about 4 percent the two previous years and nearly 6 percent in 2014-15. www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/01/16/study-offers-data-show-moocs-didnt-achieve-their-goals They add: >Certainly 55,000 people got access to…

I view a MOOC as similar to a well funded public library. A fantastic tool for entertainment, current students, and professionals looking for very specific things. But it’s not a replacement for guided education.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#153

Post by gbrown » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:42 PM UTC

intended wrote: post #127

11eleven wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In contrast, most people who get in, finish college. > In person education beats online education hollow. This isn't really true. "According to the National Center for Education Statistics, just 41% of first-time full-time college students earn a bachelor’s degree in four years, and only 59% earn a bachelor’s in six years." https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/just-41percent-of-college-st...

As you yourself point out, 59% finish in 6 years. In contrast, these are MOOC completion rates: >Among all MOOC participants, 3.13 percent completed their courses in 2017-18, down from about 4 percent the two previous years and nearly 6 percent in 2014-15. www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/01/16/study-offers-data-show-moocs-didnt-achieve-their-goals They add: >Certainly 55,000 people got access to…

It’s not really a meaningful comparison though - MOOCs have a lower (zero) barrier to entry, and a lower (zero) price of dropping. College is expensive, requires admission, and confers actual credit/degrees.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#154

Post by ThomPete » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:46 PM UTC

skocznymroczny wrote: post #11

supernova87a wrote: post #2

I remember wondering aloud at MIT/Harvard putting their courses online for free for anyone to listen to, and saying, well what is the value add then of paying to physically go to college? I guess we're going to find out whether the networking, friends, social aspect is worth it. There's also something about the competitive aspect of seeing other people in person do better than you or have better ideas than you. Which…

I know this might not be received well by the HN crowd, but I feel like the classes and networking are secondary, the main value of a reputable college is having a reputable college you can put on your résumé.

You dont need to have that to get a great high paying job. Most jobs in the tech industry are talent based not merit based.

There are some areas like doctor or experimental physics where physical presence makes a lot of sense. But most education can be found and consumed much better by thinking of the internet as your entire college and then work much more on self-motivation and curiosity which are the real secrets to educating yourself.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#155

Post by ghaff » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:46 PM UTC

intended wrote: post #107

jimhefferon wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went from lurking on HN to joining during the "MOOC rush" exactly because people did not seem to get that for the broad student population, online is nowhere near as useful as in person. While there are some percentage of people who have the motivation and skills to get out of online systems everything they would get out of in-class, the percentage is small. For example, when I am teaching a class, it is a dynamic…

Yes, this doesn't address the article. Conversations here usually shift from the article to some variant of "disrupt education" and college is signalling. I find Bloom's 2 Sigma problem to be illustrative of the extent to which online learning is a loss to students. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom%27s_2_sigma_problem Studying in person has significantly different results. The students are askign for partial refun…

Yes, colleges were mostly told to close although some were closing at least for undergraduates before the orders came down.

>The students are askign for partial refunds for tuition, not just room and board. I think this is a fair ask, and should be recompensed in some way or the other.

I'm sympathetic. The students aren't getting what they paid for. It's no one in particular's fault, but the service being paid for is being delivered in degraded form. I'm not sure you can even argue that, in general, the students will still get credit for this semester's courses because some classes probably can't be completed and, for a variety of reasons, many students will probably lose part of this semester and end up tacking on time to their degree as a result.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#156

Post by ivanhoe » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:47 PM UTC

yodsanklai wrote: post #59

supernova87a wrote: post #2

I remember wondering aloud at MIT/Harvard putting their courses online for free for anyone to listen to, and saying, well what is the value add then of paying to physically go to college? I guess we're going to find out whether the networking, friends, social aspect is worth it. There's also something about the competitive aspect of seeing other people in person do better than you or have better ideas than you. Which…

> well what is the value add then of paying to physically go to college? You can put on you resume that you were accepted in a selective program, and that you were able to complete it. Besides, the actual lectures are only the tip of the iceberg. If you attend in person, you have to do tons of assignments, labs, exams. You also have tutors and professors that supervise, pressure, grade you. You work in collaboration…

And you get to meet a lot of people who will tomorrow be influential in your industry.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#157

Post by pharke » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:47 PM UTC

supernova87a wrote: post #2

I remember wondering aloud at MIT/Harvard putting their courses online for free for anyone to listen to, and saying, well what is the value add then of paying to physically go to college? I guess we're going to find out whether the networking, friends, social aspect is worth it. There's also something about the competitive aspect of seeing other people in person do better than you or have better ideas than you. Which…

I think there is a lot of value in learning in the same place that others are learning. You have a set schedule, you have people to discuss the material with, you can learn from other students, you gain experience working with peers in a group. That being said, all of this can be done without the actual institution of college as it now exists. If you could organize a small group of people that want to learn the same material then all you need is a place to meet. The only things lacking then would be access to the professor and access to a lab but those have solutions as well, you can look for someone who has already graduated from a similar program at a high level or someone working in the field and ask them if they could work with the group or answer questions and for lab work you can search out a hacker space or other community group that has the required materials or maybe split the cost of buying the equipment with your group. I'll admit there's a hard limit to how far this will go, graduates != experienced educators and some equipment will only exist at universities or research institutions but I'm pretty sure that 80% of what is currently done at college could be done in a coffee shop with good wifi.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#158

Post by jibolash » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:50 PM UTC

supernova87a wrote: post #2

I remember wondering aloud at MIT/Harvard putting their courses online for free for anyone to listen to, and saying, well what is the value add then of paying to physically go to college? I guess we're going to find out whether the networking, friends, social aspect is worth it. There's also something about the competitive aspect of seeing other people in person do better than you or have better ideas than you. Which…

> There's also something about the competitive aspect of seeing other people in person do better than you or have better ideas than you. Which is hard virtually.

Maybe even this is not that hard. People already compete virtually on mobile and console games of all kinds of complexity just to see their names at the top of a "leaderboard"

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#159

Post by raslah » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:51 PM UTC

As someone who finished a Baccalaureate online, I’d say these students simply aren’t prepared for the mind shift to having to learn independently. Most of my professors seemed to loathe having to teach an online class and merely threw together a mountain of almost random assignments and research papers as if to say, “if you can survive this, you can have a degree”. Most of my courses didn’t even offer video lectures and were taught by low-paid adjuncts that never responded to email. You were left alone to figure it out. It’s a whole other ball game when you don’t have the deep support system of being on campus. I hope this brings improvements to online education in general.

Re: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds

#160

Post by ghaff » Mon, May 04, 2020, 12:53 PM UTC

russellbeattie wrote: post #44

> "Some estimate that they could lose up to $1 billion this year as they brace for downturns in student enrollment..." 3.7 million kids graduating this year, 70% of them planning on going to college, and probably 100% of their parents wondering if they should encourage their kid to defer for a year until things get back to normal. The drop in enrollment could be lessened a bit by lowering tuition for pandemic-related…

>3.7 million kids graduating this year, 70% of them planning on going to college, and probably 100% of their parents wondering if they should encourage their kid to defer for a year until things get back to normal.

I can only imagine. It's by no means a given that all universities will even be open for the fall term--and it's hard for me to imagine it makes sense to start college under those circumstances. Of course, it's also not a given what the options for other activities will be if you just go ahead and defer for a year.