Five Trends to Watch During the 2018-2019 School Year

Discussion in 'Off-Topic Discussions' started by decimon, Jul 27, 2018.

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  1. decimon

    decimon Well-Known Member

  2. cookderosa

    cookderosa Resident Chef

    #5 AR - if I had a zillion dollars, I'd create a culinary lab this way.

    Also, I'm unfamiliar with Canvas. It says secondary, so that's probably why (my kids are homeschooled) but I'd like to get a better grasp on canvas/moodle/blackboard as the teacher instead of the student. Anyone have a suggestion on how to boost my skill without having a class of students to learn on?
     
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  3. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

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  4. cookderosa

    cookderosa Resident Chef

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  5. raji96

    raji96 New Member

    Thank you for the informative post.
     
  6. cofflehack

    cofflehack Member

    I agree with this one, especially with the first point (Online Graduate Degrees Will Gain Credibility). With the rise of the digital age, people always look for other avenues online to ease their way into something. This includes better access to education. A lot of universities are now opting to offer some courses which can be taken online to avoid hassle financially (no more high college fees) and physically (no more traveling to school every day). I feel like online graduate degrees will definitely be a thing soon.
     
  7. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    (1) I thought grad degrees online were a "thing" already. And not a new "thing," by any means. We've had reports from members working on distance Masters and Doctorates, going back many years. Here and overseas. Schools pretty well have to offer distance programs to survive. Pretty soon, schools that DON'T offer them could cease to exist.

    (2) "Avoid hassle financially (no more high college fees.)" - My local university charges exactly the same tuition for on-campus classes as it does for online courses. I find that's a pattern. In fact, I looked at a school yesterday (University of Manitoba) that charges $20 per credit EXTRA for online instruction. Distance education savings are in not having to get back and forth to campus, not living at /near the university and not quitting your job. The idea of cheaper tuition is often illusory. A fairy tale. The exception is - if you earn a degree by distance from another country which has good educational standards, but lower tuition - e.g. South Africa. Then you save big-time on tuition.
     
    Last edited: Jul 31, 2018
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  8. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    I would have expected to see online education foster more direct competition between schools and lead to lower prices, but all we've seen is everyone's prices continue to go up simultaneously. There are still some good deals to be had, but even the good deals are only relative to how incomprehensibly expensive everything else is.
     
  9. cookderosa

    cookderosa Resident Chef

    Convenience is worth something (to me). I busted my rear to save absolutely as much money as possible for my online undergrads from TESU, but at the grad level, I had to compromise because the subject didn't offer me the option of cheap, easy, or fast. I chose expensive, hard, and slow - but it happened to be in the exact discipline I needed (need) and I didn't have to go to campus. I selected the cheapest college within the group that met all of my other criteria first. That said, if I'd have had the option of paying less tuition at a less prestigious college - would I? Yes, in a heartbeat. I think "cheapest" isn't THE biggest draw for most people investigating distance learning because it isn't the biggest draw for most people who pursue traditional learning.
    I did a survey in my Facebook group (Homeschooling for College Credit) of 12,000 parents and "cost" ranked #1 by a landslide when asked why they homeschool for college credit (60%) but 60 isn't 100. 40% didn't care about cost. I think this is significant because the people in my group ALREADY accept and practice an "alternative education" mindset.
     
  10. heirophant

    heirophant Well-Known Member

    I get the impression that most universities still see DL as kind of peripheral to their main mission. It isn't the heart and soul of what they do, it's something additional on the side. And oftentimes their motive for making that addition seems to be to get another revenue stream going.

    I think that most of them price their DL programs based on what their B&M programs charge. Pricing the DL programs lower might increase the number of DL students, but would reduce the net profit-per-student. There would be additional cost to the organization too, more need for faculty, staff and infrastructure to serve the additional DL students that the lower prices attract.

    Both true and sad. DL hasn't really turned out quite how I hoped it would evolve, back in the 1990's when I got interested in this.
     

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