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Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

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Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#231

Post by anoxor »

rdslw wrote: post #226
humanistbot wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "embracing" is definitely not the right word. Very few professors I know are happy about this whole situation. Universities are begrudgingly accepting the fact that they can't have in-person classes, so they have to turn to online alternatives. Tuition can't be changed because the few costs that are being saved (facilities still need maintenance) are offset by the massive losses in revenue from student housing…

> Tuition can't be changed because (whatever) Nope. What you're saying is "I cant restructure my business becasue I have high costs". Your competitor disrupting your business could not care less.

The issue is accreditation limits the number of disruptors that can come into the market and makes the bar very high for that. College is 100% right before disruption, but difficult to do.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#232

Post by Dwolb »

CrazyStat wrote: post #155
Dwolb wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What are the bottom 90 percent's motivation for helping people improve at that point? I think that's a great point but one that the Rocket League community somehow solves.

With very few exceptions, everyone who plays Rocket League is playing it because they find it intrinsically rewarding. When I taught intro stats I'd guess less than 2% of my students were studying stats because they found it intrinsically rewarding. Even when you get into upper level classes, even among graduate students, the percentage who are taking a class for the intrinsic reward rarely approaches 100%. Trying to…

But where does intrinsic motivation come from?

What are the objective differences between getting better at Rocket League and getting better at stats?

Agreed if we don't understand or create a basic framework, trying to put lipstick on a pig and making stats look like Rocket League is dumb.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#233

Post by xboxnolifes »

rdslw wrote: post #226
humanistbot wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "embracing" is definitely not the right word. Very few professors I know are happy about this whole situation. Universities are begrudgingly accepting the fact that they can't have in-person classes, so they have to turn to online alternatives. Tuition can't be changed because the few costs that are being saved (facilities still need maintenance) are offset by the massive losses in revenue from student housing…

> Tuition can't be changed because (whatever) Nope. What you're saying is "I cant restructure my business becasue I have high costs". Your competitor disrupting your business could not care less.

Well, yes. They can't restructure a business that has high maintenance costs on illiquid assets such as land and buildings in such a small, temporary timeframe.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#234

Post by hotcrossbunny »

deskamess wrote: post #216
humanistbot wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "embracing" is definitely not the right word. Very few professors I know are happy about this whole situation. Universities are begrudgingly accepting the fact that they can't have in-person classes, so they have to turn to online alternatives. Tuition can't be changed because the few costs that are being saved (facilities still need maintenance) are offset by the massive losses in revenue from student housing…

> Very few professors I know are happy about this whole situation. Exactly this. It is not the same experience being in the same class and teaching. All the energy that could have gone into that is now spent twiddling with gadgets. There is no coordinated 'course production system' in many environments. So teachers have to improvise and they are ending up on different ecosystems. Many of them are now learning to twid…

This is as much about their lack of historic engagement with new platforms than a fundamental difficulty in adapting the teaching process or content. Universities have been very invested in a high cost model. It's time to change. This like many things we are now discovering are ripe for reform and have lacked only the right catalyst to set a painful but necessary progress in motion.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#235

Post by dminzi »

kerkeslager wrote: post #100
b5n wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd think strategically about a gap year. If you're a great student with excellent college prospects a gap year might make sense, admissions are going to be very competitive for 21/22. If you're not the best student it might make sense to try and get accepted for 20/21 due to smaller field of applicants.

That applies to inbound freshman, but for students going into their sophomore-to-senior years, who are already accepted, taking a year off seems like a no-brainer.

Everybody keeps saying that it is a no brainer to take a gap year. I am headed into my senior year and I don't think it is as clear cut as everybody here makes it out to be. What are my options when I take a gap year? I can either live in my apartment near my school and do nothing or live at home. Either way, I am doing nothing because I have no money.

I haven't gone to classes consistently since the end of my sophomore year. As this year has unfolded, I've discovered that I can learn material much faster out of a textbook. I miss lectures because it was nice having a professor physically near me for questions and advice. That said, I am managing fine. Testing has been completely changed at my University and the anxiety I had around it is gone. I have 24 hours + open book for my exams now. I actually fill in many of the gaps in my course knowledge during the midterms and finals, leading to a more complete understanding of the class. This is obviously not true for everybody, but I am learning more and faster than I was before, leaving free time to explore adjacent interests and read.

The biggest problem I am facing with my learning at the moment is administrative nonsense. Enrolling for classes was already bad (UC). Now, not only is it bad, but it is pointlessly bad. I am not allowed to enroll in a class because there are 35 students in it. Based on what I've seen, maybe 20 will watch the live zoom lectures. Why is an online class that hardly anybody shows up to being capped? I believe it is because there is some contractual limit on how many students a prof/ta can be "responsible for". My roommate got that explanation after he was told he couldn't enroll in the last class he needed to graduate last quarter. In my mind, that reasoning does not hold at all given the current situation. It is either shocking that the administrators don't realize this or it is disgusting that they do realize it and choose not to change it.

That said, I am paying nearly $70,000 this year. Same as I paid last year. I am being ripped off this year. I was ripped off last year. Last year was terrible and this year is extremely terrible. At this point, I want to put the whole thing behind me. College has been great because all I've had to do is learn and I've made amazing friends. This year we'll be in our apartment carrying on.

The biggest concern that I have is the job market I'll graduate into.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#236

Post by rdslw »

anoxor wrote: post #231
rdslw wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tuition can't be changed because (whatever) Nope. What you're saying is "I cant restructure my business becasue I have high costs". Your competitor disrupting your business could not care less.

The issue is accreditation limits the number of disruptors that can come into the market and makes the bar very high for that. College is 100% right before disruption, but difficult to do.

I find it funny+, that well into XXI century, somebody on hackersnews is trying to persuade me that digital native disruptor has very high bar to disrupt brick&mortar old fashion behemoth, WHEN goliath is forced into digital space by external force (covid).

+) or significant, why US edu is so bad in terms of price to earnings ratio comparing to what you can get elsewhere. time to say that king is naked.

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#237

Post by hotcrossbunny »

game_the0ry wrote: post #142
wutbrodo wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self-directed study is challenging, especially for 17 year-olds that don't have anyone (eg parents) who are in tune enough with autodidactism to guide them. One of the biggest advantages of college for me was realizing how much there was to learn and how easy it was to do it (after skating through all of my schooling with straight As), and I only really refined my autodidactic abilities in my mid-20s.

> Self-directed study is challenging Fair point, but that's because students are not encouraged to learn what they are interested in.

Also the self direction is neither taught nor encouraged in the existing model of education

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#238

Post by [deleted] »

swiley wrote: post #194
thomasfortes wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there are kits to do experiments at home. For high school level, sure. But I can't see a sane way to let students handle acids like I did in chemistry labs during college, and physics labs have equipment that is too complex/expensive/dangerous to send to the students.

You can buy a lot of those chemicals in Walmart and Lows in the US (ex: Walmart usually has fairly pure concentrated sulfuric acid. Lows has most common organic solvents.) The lab equipment is also pretty easy to buy on amazon (I’ve bought some trying to teach myself, although I’d recommend against buying anything from China, It always seems to disappear somewhere around LA.) There’s an entire community of autodidact…

[deleted]

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#239

Post by rdslw »

xboxnolifes wrote: post #233
rdslw wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tuition can't be changed because (whatever) Nope. What you're saying is "I cant restructure my business becasue I have high costs". Your competitor disrupting your business could not care less.

Well, yes. They can't restructure a business that has high maintenance costs on illiquid assets such as land and buildings in such a small, temporary timeframe.

Well no. Controlled bankruptcy is restructuring.

Anyway, how my last sentence went? ;) who couldnt care less?

Re: Online classes are not worth cost of full tuition

#240

Post by arrozconcosas »

Many college classes are lightly attended and only mildly paid attention to already. I had a professor in college who would religiously take attendance every morning then after mid-terms and finals he would show a scatter plot of attendance versus test scores. There was mild correlation, but still plenty of cases outside what you'd expect (perfect attendance + terrible scores, or low/no attendance + high scores)
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