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

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

#191

Post by eternalban » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:07 PM UTC

nicolas_t wrote: post #72

luckylion wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's different if you worked in France though, right? From what I understand, the grandes écoles are very similar. It's not so much that you'll get an education that's ten times better, but you'll have a degree from a school that says you've been selected for leadership.

Yes, probably, I mean I come indeed from a Grande école but since I've never actually worked in France, it's never really been asked for. And the few times when ranking was important (visas for Japan and Hong Kong), the fact that it's not well ranked internationally means that I got no exta points. In the end, I do think that degrees matter less than what people think and that it's completely possible to have a good…

The fact remains that most educated people are aware of the French approach to higher education and the exacting filter applied for entrance and matriculation.

As an example, in a previous job, I noted that the new French software engineer had come from INRIA and was a graduate of a Grand ecole. The fact that this resource went on to demonstrate well above average work and domain abilities was not a surprise to me.

So note that some of us do pay attention even if it is not mentioned during recruitment.

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

#192

Post by bachmeier » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:09 PM UTC

leetcrew wrote: post #188

bachmeier wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument doesn't really work. It appears that the college students want the credits and they want to finish out the semester, but they want a refund of an arbitrary amount of money. If you order pork and they bring out beef, it's reasonable to not pay for the beef if the restaurant ran out of pork, but it's not reasonable to eat the beef (which costs more) and then demand 40% off the price of pork because it's n…

if you really want to force the restaurant analogy, you could say it's sort of like when the restaurant is having a bad night. the service is really slow and some of the dishes don't come out quite right. if it's just a fluke, a good restaurant will comp most of the meal without you even having to ask. the problem with this analogy is that a restaurant just isn't very similar to a college. it's really important to a…

> when the restaurant is having a bad night

A "bad night" because it was hit by a tornado. Your wording implies the universities did something wrong. It's not like they could have done anything differently. They weren't responsible for the pandemic and they were legally obligated to shut down.

> I'd say the institution should do at least something to make you whole

I'd say it is unreasonable. They're not asking for a generic "something to make them whole". They want all the benefits plus a healthy refund. I don't know what the legal basis for their argument would be. Almost certainly they have lawyers who expect bad publicity to force universities to pay. That kind of rubs me the wrong way.

Disclosure: I work at a university.

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

#193

Post by MisterBastahrd » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:12 PM UTC

My gf took 3 online courses this semester (planned). Not a single professor had lectures to attend. They all just had a checklist of busy work and readings and an email address to contact them if they had questions about an assignment.

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

#194

Post by dahart » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:14 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.

Why do you feel like that, what evidence is there for your hypothesis in your personal life, or in statistics that you’re aware of?

There’s a wide variety of viewpoints on HN, so I think it’s unnecessary to speculate on what other people think, but personally the thing that doesn’t sit that well for me is that you’ve stated an opinion with nothing at all to back it up.

FWIW, having gone to both a not super reputable college (state school), and also a very reputable one, I can’t say that reputation is the “main” value, I might have benefitted from it but I wouldn’t even know. The math classes at the reputable school had much higher standards, they were harder and I learned more. I have some lifelong friends from both schools, but the group from the reputable school is generally much higher profile and further reach. I sold a business to someone I met through the reputable school. I also now work for someone I met through the state school.

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

#195

Post by shrimp_emoji » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:24 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…

>the networking, friends, social aspect

The what?

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

#196

Post by munchbunny » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:26 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 the college experience will survive precisely because the value add is the social aspect and the cross-pollination that comes from being near tons of people in lots of fields working on interesting things.

Colleges even market this aspect as the key differentiator from online classes.

In that case, I do think some refund is due on principle, because students at home in isolation definitely aren't getting that.

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

#197

Post by MarkMc » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:36 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…

> Also, this project had zero value on my resume. It would be different if MIT could grade it for me, and certify I did well

This is hugely important not just on the CV. The feedback you get from grading helps you understand what mistakes you made, and the prospect of receiving an official pass or failure grade is a big incentive to work hard.

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

#198

Post by hysan » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:40 PM UTC

Not too surprising that the experience wasn’t good. Having taught in-person and online before, I can guarantee that these students ended up with a sub-optimal experience at best. Teaching online is drastically different than in-person and is not something you can easily pick-up in short notice. Made worse is that they were in the middle of a syllabus designed for in-person instruction. How material is delivered, what type of assignments to give, how to even grade those assignments, etc. - all of that needs to be tailored to an online environment in order to have a good experience. You can’t just “adapt” it like driving on the opposite side of the road. And this is also ignoring tooling needed to make the online experience productive.

I believe the colleges when they say that their professors are doing their best. That they are delivering the same high level material. However, that is willfully ignoring the fact that content is a very small part of the college education experience. The delivery, environment, and people are what gives college its value. Lose that and the cost, especially for these high ranking colleges, is not worth it.

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

#199

Post by leetcrew » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:47 PM UTC

bachmeier wrote: post #192

leetcrew wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you really want to force the restaurant analogy, you could say it's sort of like when the restaurant is having a bad night. the service is really slow and some of the dishes don't come out quite right. if it's just a fluke, a good restaurant will comp most of the meal without you even having to ask. the problem with this analogy is that a restaurant just isn't very similar to a college. it's really important to a…

> when the restaurant is having a bad night A "bad night" because it was hit by a tornado. Your wording implies the universities did something wrong. It's not like they could have done anything differently. They weren't responsible for the pandemic and they were legally obligated to shut down. > I'd say the institution should do at least something to make you whole I'd say it is unreasonable. They're not asking for a…

I have no idea whether there's a legal basis for the argument, I'm just stating my opinion on what would be a fair outcome.

> They want all the benefits plus a healthy refund.

I don't think this is an accurate portrayal of the situation, unless you think the entire value of a college education is instruction, grading, and the piece of paper at the end. the school I went to was very much like this: I went to class, got good grades, graduated, and got a good job. no fun, no frills, just business. it was pretty cheap though, so I can't say I didn't get my money's worth.

I don't think people pay $60k a year for the "just business" experience. if they're not walking around the beautiful campus, going to events, or using expensive science equipment, they're not getting their money's worth anymore. online class is a sad substitute for this experience.

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

#200

Post by xiaolingxiao » Mon, May 04, 2020, 3:52 PM UTC

People focus a lot on whether online can replicate the in-person experience of networking, building relationships, etc. The other part of it is that student tuition pay for the use of facilities as well, not just classrooms, but also the recreation center and other campus amenities. So in other words, not all the money went into the "intangibles", but rather the very real tangibles.

Another comparison would be to prepay for a sit down experience at a high end restaurant, only to be told the restaurant shut down and you're actually going to actually have to get the food delivered. Presumably you'd want a partial refund not just because you didn't get the "magical vibe", but also because you literally did not sit in the physical space for 2+ hours.