More on MIT OpenCourseWare

lewiz writes "Over at BBC News they have an update on the MIT initiative to give away all course material for free over the Internet that we read about on Slashdot quite a while ago. The full story details how they are doing it in the hopes that other Universities will follow suit. This seems an amazing thing considering the more recent moves toward pay-per-use services but definitely a good thing and I wish them the best of luck. The only question I see is whether or not this will help in the way of "official qualifications" - what if we know a large portion of a certain course... how do we go about proving it?"

Comments

WooHoo!

[GuERnix]

Maybe we can see some open source plans for that giant Tetris game that was built on the side of a building!

Re:WooHoo!

[Anonymous Coward]

That was at Brown, not MIT.

Re:WooHoo!

[Anonymous Coward]

This was first in Germany (www.blinkenlights.de). Now a similar, a bit bigger one is being built in Paris (that's in France, Europe ..err.. Non-USA, Mr. Ego ..err.. Mr. President)

Re:WooHoo!

[Anonymous Coward]

Just because it was at Brown doesn't mean they didn't do it at MIT too.

Proving you know the material

[grayrest]

>how do we go about proving it?

Take the class, break the curve and insist everybody else is stupid for not knowing it. At least, that's how it works here at GaTech, MIT might be different.

Re:Proving you know the material

[ninjadoug]

Simple, You pay to take the exams.
As if you do course-work, pay to get it assessed and marked.

In Britain we have The Open University, (http://www.open.ac.uk) not quite the same thing but not far off

Re:Proving you know the material

[Marvel Man]

Here we just take the test out exam. And if you pass it, you get credit.

Re:Proving you know the material

[Anonymous Coward]

I think at MIT, just keeping up with the rest of the pack is sufficient... ;-)

Re:Proving you know the material

[packeteer]

Basically what they are saying is this: "the education is free but the credit is not". Learn all you want but your still going to have to pay. Personally this will work well for me if i can do this when i grauate high school but i know plenty of other people that will never do anything but the bare minimum in a class. Most people in my classes in high school dont try to learn the subject material, they just learn the test answers.

Re:Proving you know the material

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe it is true that all colleges and universities will allow students to "challenge" a course; that is, test out of it. Of course they do charge for this privilege. But it's one way to get through the college obstacle course in less time. Or with less annoyance. Or whatever.

Re:Proving you know the material

[tonya499]

As was stated previously, "the education is free but the credit isn't". Free coursework is great for people who don't have the money or time to go to MIT but still need the knowledge. I'm sure there are still folks out there building the next Apple in their garage. :-)

Certification

[GigsVT]

what if we know a large portion of a certain course... how do we go about proving it?"

This is the thing. Colleges and universities are obselete. I think Brainbench had the right idea, just have many little certifications that make up the summary of your qualifications. What is the difference if someone learns something by reading online documents or by going to hear some windbag talk about it for 50 minutes? There isn't.

I think in the next 20 years we will see the demise of higher education as we know it. As older people that have obselete ideas about degrees meaning something die off, the new generation of managers that will value skills above sheepskins will come into power. Then we will see real reform in the education and training markets.

Higher education, as it exists now, is something like an organized religion, with plenty of dogma and rabid followers and supporters. I'm sure I will be flamed by those people shortly. I went to college, I did my four years, it was really pointless.... I couldn't recommend it to anyone with the intelligence to learn things on their own.

Re:Certification

[neuroticia]

It would be great if there were a service like Brainbench, only free. "Open Certification" or something.

Problem is, with Brainbench and other testing groups online, you're not proving you KNOW the material--just that you're able to do a quick Google search.

-Sara

Re:Certification

[rc27]

Not that my life is necessarily relevant to anyone else's, but.. I started college as a computer science major. I hated class and never went. I ended up switching to poli sci / philosophy. But now I work in web development. I think that there are advantages to the classroom setting when learning humanities subjects, where discussion and interaction are an important part of the learning experience. Learning a skill such as web development, on the other hand, can be done on one's own, by reading the right materials, much more so say learning and understanding Plato's Republic. But that's just my opinion. What do you guys think?

Re:Certification

[Vagary]

Your opinion supports the theory that hands-on disciplines, like web design and software engineering, don't belong in the ivory tower. And I think that is exactly what will happen with all this free content. Which, amusingly enough, will return universities to their place as institutions only for the wealthy who have the money and time to do philosophy and political science.

Re:Certification

[PDHoss]

This might be all fine and good for technology-oriented fields, but what about other disciplines? I don't want my kids taught by a teacher who can simply pass the cert. I'm not interested in having my spleen removed by the Johnny-come-lately who knows all the facts and figures but has no experience in doctor-patient relations. My attorney better have taken a few psych courses before he picks my jury.

You could well argue that it's "real world" experience, not a degree, that separates the shiny certs from the experienced [doctor|teacher|sysadmin|etc.]. But committing to a 4 year degree or similar program tells me, the customer/employer/whatever, that, at the very least, you've got the experience provided by a university and the sizable investment that suggests you'll likely stick it out.

PDHoss

Re:Certification

[dboyles]

I think Brainbench had the right idea, just have many little certifications that make up the summary of your qualifications.

I agree. There should be a way to divide fields into something called "subjects", and to become certified in each of these individual workshops ("courses"). Once a person ("student") becomes proficient in the basics of each of these "courses", he or she can move on to higher-level "courses" that provide a more in-depth explanation of the "material".

There will certainly need to be a way to evaluate these "students", so we'll assign them "grades". It would be nice to have some sort of record of this student, so we'll have a database called a "transcript" for each student.

Huzzah, a revolution in education!

In all seriousness, I think higher education deserves the respect that it gets. At the risk of sounding redundant, a certification does not equal knowledge, and a college education is much more than the sum of its parts. I've found that by going to class and making an attempt to be interested, I've become intrigued by fields that I otherwise probably would have avoided (like Statistics and Finance).

I realize college isn't for everybody (on either end of the spectrum), but to imply that a college student is in college because he is not intelligent enough to learn the material on his own is, well, wrong.

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want vocational education, there are places that offer it. That's not what college it about. I can't get certification in the ability to write comprehendable eassays. I'm in a much better position to understand the current state of civilization because of all those history courses I was forced to take. And what about the four years of partying?

Colleges offer a lot more than a certificate of skill comptetancy

Re:Certification

[epukinsk]

This is the thing. Colleges and universities are obselete.

Keep telling yourself that.

Erik

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

I am too lazy to register on Slashdot but my e-mail is emachusa@wam.umd.edu if anyone's interested in contacting me.

Anyway, I think GigsVT is an idiot. I am a comp sci major at the University of Maryland, College Park (ranked in the top 10 nationally for CS) and my education here so far has been much better than what I can do on my own, and that's why I pay for it. If anyone wants to flame me for being stupid, let me point out that I was a National Merit Semifinalist. So there.

Anyway, even if you don't like going to class, the fact that you do and you pass all the courses says something. The fact that you were accepted into a four year university and stuck through it says something. The piece of paper called a degree you get after four years is therefore worth something.

Higher education isn't going anywhere fast. These many little certifications you talk about is what a college diploma is about -- each course you take and pass represents a qualification. Overall, the diploma represents a lot of qualification.

UMCP is a liberal arts university. Only half of my degree is required to be in Computer Science. Will I ever use the humanities courses I took in the real world? Probably not... but the fact that I have to take them and have to pass them proves that I can deal with whatever bullshit I have to do to get by.

This kind of argument I hear from you is what I would expect from someone who couldn't cut it in academia, but you got your degree. I don't know how much you paid for it, but a lot of people pay and awful, awful lot of money to go to college, and therefore it's a privilege.

Taking little certifications doesn't show shit, since every certification you bring home will be obselete in five years, or maybe ten if you're lucky, at least in the field of CS. A college diploma lasts forever, and it says a lot more than "I know C++."

I don't appreciate being told I'm wasting $100,000.

Evan Machusak
University of Maryland, College Park

Re:Certification

[epukinsk]

What do you guys think?

As a decent web designer and fledgling software engineer, I think there's a big difference between web design and software engineering.

Erik

Re:Certification

[intermodal]

i agree with the learning part...though i don't really think certification is the answer. I think that what needs to happen is people need to:

-look at resumes for experience
-provide ways to get experience, like internships or apprenticeships

Without these in place, certification is just another money pit of memorization.

Re:Certification

[Soft]

What is the difference if someone learns something by reading online documents or by going to hear some windbag talk about it for 50 minutes? There isn't.

Well, as a teacher myself (lecturer or assistant professor depending on your equivalences, on optical telecommunications), I see a few issues with this:

• You can't really ask questions, especially on adjacent topics: it is not the same to send an email to someone you don't know, as to walk up to the teacher at the end of a lecture.
• In the maze of information a Google search yields, it is difficult to get the fundamentals as well as to separate the wheat from the chaff; in fact, you have to already know enough about the topic to get to and understand relevant information. Or ask further references to someone who knows.
• When learning on-line, do you really do the exercises? Yet often you don't really understand what is going on until you practice, programming being a prime example of this. More generally, it is easy to think you understand something - see all the self-taught webmasters who think HTML tag soup is a text formatting tool and is correct as long as IE interprets it...

Funny, BTW, we had a small debate a few months ago on whether to put our course material on-line. The consensus seemed to be that we should, except for some marketing types who wanted to make people pay for the service or something like that, and those who wanted a control process for letting out only the good. The comments above were pointed out in the process - some by the students themselves IIRC.

Re:Certification

[Raiford]

The error in this kind of thinking is that certification says nothing about whether a person knows how to think. A degree doesn't guarantee this either but it comes closer if the person has obtained a degree from a reputable institution in a engineering or science field. A college education is not about specific systems that you may learn about. It is more about learning fundamental concepts which you can apply to problems which require you to use synthetic knowledge.

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

Without the university infrastructure what is your proposed replacement for lab research in biology, chemistry, (neuro)physiology, and host of other disciplines? The reason degrees are becoming lower in value is that more students are being admitted, reducing the average intellectual capacity of the undergraduate population thereby influencing the course content..

Your entire post suggests an extremely unhappy time in university, and that's your focus. It would have had more impact if you suggested how to replace lab research, how to ensure comprehensive knowledge (not that that is the case at present), and how to weed-out those that are ultimately not qualified for the degrees/certifications. What about professional degrees (e.g., medicine (plus residency), law, engineering).

BTW, graduate school often amounts to what you propose with the departmental or university infrasture holding things together. Though not perfect this same organization **tries** to recruit mentors/faculty that can guide a student through X years of graduate studies. [If you believe PhDs are useless, then offer support the argument.]

Re:Certification

[spac]

Actually, I would argue that Colleges and Universities are far from being obsolete. You don't enroll in an institution of higher learning to learn new skills that can directly be applied to your job.

How much does any of the field-specific material you learn during University really get applied on the job. Twenty percent? Maybe 25? A degree is not as much a statement about what you know as it is a statment of your capability for abstract thought and learning skills. Something far more useful than writing a gate arrangement in VHDL ever will be.

Anyone can learn technical skills, but not many people can actually learn THINKING skills... and judging from the posts I've read so far not much of slashdot can.

Re:Certification

[ealar dlanvuli]

Certs are a scam from an era long gone, sorry. Has there ever been another career where you could get a well paying job for 3 hours of testing? Has there ever been a market whos cost of entry was a few months of tinkering? It was great while the public didn't know better, but when your 10 year old can do 90% of what the guy making 35k/yr at the hospital does, and he dosen't have any formal training, you start to wonder exactly what went wrong.

A person with a BS in CS or a similar subject (even a pure math major would be good) has twice as much chance of getting any position above "the IT tech that fixes our damn windows boxen" than someone with 5000 certs.

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

My neighbours must be calling the cops right about now. I was jumping around the place shouting "I'm not crazy! I KNEW it! Somebody else sees it too!"

I've been, well "trolling" is too strong a word, but maybe stirring up trouble, about how I think universities are basically a cult here on /. and IRL.

IRL, I get dirty looks and people trying to get away from me when I say university is a cult. It's like their career will be over if they dare to question the status quo.

I don't really remember when exactly I started thinkng that way, but it's been a while. I noticed that a lot of kids that go to university to get EE degrees have never ever touched electronics in their lives, have no grasp of the history of technology in the 20th century, don't appreciate the accomplishments of previous decades...

Anyways, I wish to subscribe to your newsletter, kind sir.

I want to know how you came to your conclusions, maybe it will help me make my opinions clearer. (I have this habit of jumping the gun with my ideas before they are well formed. My intuition is faster than the rational part of my brain, but I'm usually correct.)

Re:Certification

[AvitarX]

lets see, you want it to prove it's you, and make it free?
And the test really can't be open,I mean, testing is kinda where the whole obscurity thing actually helps.

What we really nead is a good formal testing, that costs money, but without it, there is no real proof. It will cost money, it costs money to verify the conditions, but then again, even cheap college costs 240 dollors, a course, and you nead to take a lot of bullshit. If a test was 75 or 100 dollors, that would be fine.

Free and Open just really don't lend themselves to accurate testing unfortunatly.

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

Should have gone to ISU, it's two ranks down the ladder and you get a full ride with a NM semi-final.

One of the smartest campuses I've ever been on to, they get quite a few very bright kids with that deal every year.

Re:Certification

[billcopc]

The reason bad employers don't care about what you know, is because the diploma only proves to them that you endured years of steaming bullshit and even paid for it from your own pocket. If proves that you're malleable enough for their demonic desires.

I think it should be obvious to everyone here that 90% of job security comes from properly taking and giving bullshit, the other 10% is all that's allocated to actual competence.

Re:Certification

[GigsVT]

I don't mean static material would have to completely replace interaction with people more experienced, only that the lecture paradigm is obselete. People learn by doing, as you pointed out. The open source community is a great example of this. There are thousands of self trained people who learned by reading material online, talking to the more skillful through email or through IRC, and just experimenting on their own.

My point is, mentoring isn't obselete, but the current college/university paradigm was designed centuries ago, and it shows. Classes with 500+ students only serve to highlight the weaknesses of this obselete paradigm.

Re:Certification

[tuxedo-steve]

What terrifies me the most is that the government of my country (Australia) seems to think very much the same way that you do. Higher education == the acquisition of job skills. Or, at least, that's the way it should be, and nothing more.

The thing is, that's not how it is. That's not how it should be. But it's a matter of degree (so to speak), depending on the nature of the course that you're taking. I did a computer science degree at one university, and was extremely dissatisfied with the experience. The majority of the course I did over the 'net, I saw little need for class attendance. It was something I thought I could do just as well through some certification / training school. I'm now doing another degree philosophy and art history at a different university. Whole different ballpark. I look forward to class every week now, because I know that when I go, I'm sure as hell going to learn something, I'm going to get insights from someone who knows what they're talking about (well, generally :).

The university format for the delivery of that kind of learning is excellent. It provides an environment in which you can discuss the meaning of what you're studying with experienced teachers and students. It provides a social aspect that is different from anything that exists in the "real world." To some people, it's not about getting "job skills", it's about getting an education. That's not the way it needs to be for everyone: from my own experience, I see little reason why CS needs to be taught in a university environment. But there's a big world of knowledge out there, and some of it is better taught face-to-face. Not the mention the fact that female art students are hot. :)

My government has been attacking higher education for years, cutting funding, forcing it towards becoming a service industry. In my last semester at the university I attended for CS, the university registered itself as a .com, deprecated the use of their .edu.au domain, and started referring to their teaching staff as "academic consultants." Now that's fucking scary.

Re:Certification

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it depends on how you define "web designer" actually. If, by web designer you suggest one who more or less "draws" up a site in something like Fireworks or Dreamveaver and their ilk, I would say they have less than nothing in common with traditional software engineering. On the other hand, if your method of web design consists of actually creating an architecture of sorts for a web application, then I contend that the two are more or less the same task, embodying the same basic principles. I also contend that compared to a basic little GUI app, web development can be much more challenging as you are often in the position of not knowing how people will access your web app or details about the environment in which it will be used. Personally, I invest a great deal of time and planning in my web designs, dutifully seperating function from content, planning ahead for "upgrades", insuring web standards are met, and a lot of regression testing.

Re:Certification

[/dev/trash]

proof. A college degree says to me that a person attended classes and took the tests themselves. A cert from Brainbench means to me that a person registered and had all the books at his side when he took the tests.

Re:Certification

[Door-opening Fascist]

A person with a BS in CS or a similar subject (even a pure math major would be good) has twice as much chance of getting any position above "the IT tech that fixes our damn windows boxen" than someone with 5000 certs.

I would argue that a person with any degree and some experience is more valuable than someone with certs. I have an uncle who works very successfully in IT whose degree is in poli-sci.

Re:Certification

[GigsVT]

I think GigsVT is an idiot.

Yay! Another convert!

I don't appreciate being told I'm wasting $100,000.

That is the crux of the issue, now isn't it.

It's not my fault the emperor wears no clothes, even if he paid a huge sum for it, I'm just pointing the fact out.

Re:Certification

[CrackersnSoup]

Um, Er, We have that already. Just call and pay, they will give you 1 test per day(or is it a week?) been a year since I was there. They have test centers all over. I didnt do much "formal" traning and that was online via web course's from BMCC in Oregon. http://www.newhorizons.com/retail/ Crackers`n`Soup

Re:Certification

[GigsVT]

Anyways, I wish to subscribe to your newsletter, kind sir.

Heh.

I want to know how you came to your conclusions,

A very bad experience at a large university. I won't name any names, but I think it is apparent which I am referring to. Lets just say I am not from Vermont.

Re:Certification

[dzym]

Do you honestly believe that in the complicated situations these working professionals today that they won't have the reference material by their side? Why, say, is the ability to work with documentation for reference any less valuable than being able to do basic CS shit like writing a function to read a file without reading dev manpages?

Re:Certification

[Soft]

People learn by doing, as you pointed out. The open source community is a great example of this. There are thousands of self trained people who learned by reading material online, talking to the more skillful through email or through IRC, and just experimenting on their own.

... and not knowing the difference between a hash table and a binary tree, and thinking that self-modifying code is cool. I've been there myself.

I indeed pointed out that people learned by doing, but I didn't mean that it was sufficient, merely necessary. You also have to work out the basics, both are critical if you are to master a subject.

Which is not to say that you can't have both outside of the classroom; if you know you can pull an A at the exam without attending, then by all means do so (I've been there too...)

Re:Certification

[Cheeze]

in real life, would you rather someone look something up in a book or on the internet and be 100% correct, or try to remember back 5-10 years to something a professor once had on a test?

Re:Certification

[Turing Machine]

Problem is, with Brainbench and other testing groups online, you're not proving you KNOW the material--just that you're able to do a quick Google search.

As an employer, what difference would it make? If I can hire one guy who can get the answer in 5 minutes with a Google search, or another guy who can figure it out in a couple of days on his own, which one should I hire?

Being able to look up answers (and evaluate whether those answers are right, a tougher proposition) is a very valuable skill.

Re:Certification

[xidix]

I have to agree with this. Having developed both desktop applications and web applications, I would definitely say the web applications were more challenging to architect and implement. Web development has a whole host of issues that desktop development takes for granted (things like security of interface and session management, or state maintenance). With most desktop applications, for instance, it's not usually possible for a malicious user to call a specific piece of your application and send arbitrary information to it in ways you had not intended. With web development, a malicious user can call any individual page of your application and submit data in an attempt to crowbar your application into doing something it shouldn't (for instance, sending arbitrary SQL queries to your database). There are also circumstances where performing a common programming task requires the web developer to jump through several hoops to get it done, where as for the desktop developer, it is implemented in a single function.

Re:Certification

[xidix]

Well, I hate to break it to you, but most medical students don't receive a whole lot of real hands-on experience until they graduate and do their internship. The only patients pre-intern medical students usually work on are the dead ones (cadavers). I don't see much difference in terms of "experience" between an intern who went to 8 years of school and passed all the requisite exams, and an intern who passed all the requisite exams on his own.

Most new teachers are also required to complete an intership before they can complete their state board exams. Same situation.

Re:Certification

[katheburt]

In my experience, the first thing a graduate learns after getting a job in his/her field is how little the college work resembles the actual work. And I've heard this from many others. So why would knowlege gained elsewhere than at school necessarily be inferior? I grant you, certs can be misleading, but so can diplomas.

Re:Certification

[rc27]

As a decent web designer and fledgling software engineer, I think there's a big difference between web design and software engineering.

And what does that have to do with anything?

Re:Certification

[Proneax]

There should be a way to divide fields into something called "subjects", and to become certified in each of these individual workshops ("courses").

You just summarized college. Why put classes and courses in parenthesis?? You take different classes, usually progressing in difficulty/specialization and when you accumulate enough in a specified field you get a degree. If this degree isn't specific enough to your career/jop path, you minor in something that is, meaning you took more specific classes. So you have a collection of classes (each class is really like a mini-certification) that makes up your major, and several other classes that complement your major and give you your minor. What you're proposing really isn't much different than how it works now, if you look at it from a broader view.

Re:Certification

[dboyles]

You just summarized college.

Apologies if it wasn't more obvious, but that's what I was trying to do.

Re:Certification

[alexo]

Problem is, with Brainbench and other testing groups online, you're not proving you KNOW the material--just that you're able to do a quick Google search.

As an employer, what difference would it make? If I can hire one guy who can get the answer in 5 minutes with a Google search, or another guy who can figure it out in a couple of days on his own, which one should I hire?

Being able to look up answers (and evaluate whether those answers are right, a tougher proposition) is a very valuable skill.

I am a big believer in "Googling". In fact, when I get stuck, the first thing that I do is check whether the answer is already available on the web or in the newsgroup archives. However, what happens when it isn't? Or when it is but has some subtle flaw?

There have been times when I needed to come up with a solution that wasn't available through search engines nor did anyone help me via usenet, mailing lists and "expert" sites. That's when the time invested in studyig for a degree paid off.

Re:Certification

[Chexsum]

I don't appreciate being told I'm wasting $100,000.

University is expensive!

Im sure youre not wasting money *unless you sit on hard plastic chairs* and I hope you like open technology - its nice to learn a hobby for free. =)

Re:Certification

[Chexsum]

Most people prefer an answer immediately and a good memory helps. Knowing why the answer youre giving is correct is respected alot more than without background knowledge in this situation.

Researching information is great but it isnt the only desired skill an employer should seek unless the employee will be a research assistant. ;)

in real life, would you rather someone look something up in a book or on the internet and be 100% correct, or try to remember back 5-10 years to something a professor once had on a test?

Id rather have someone who can do both and know when to do either. Information obtained online or from a book is not always correct!

Re:Certification

[vnsnes]

to expand on a point... most technology-oriented fields, except for maybe comp-sci, need to have laboratory experience. In CS, a home computer setup can be your lab. In disciplines like engineering, biotech, chemistry, materials, and etc. one needs to have access to labs with expensive equipment in order to develop their skills.

Re:Certification

[Squalish]

I believe I read in a column in PC Magazine a couple years back something like the following quote(Columnists with too much time on their hands are the only thing that makes the mag worth reading, really):

"In the future...(This was I think '97, back when the bubble was swelling), The truly smart and powerful people will be not those who merely posses knowledge, but those who know ways of procuring more knowledge on demand, of learning and of knowing where to learn things faster than their peers."

It was one of the few things in their ludicrous 5-year forcasts that is starting to come true.

Re:once again

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you read the BBC website and post links to it. Impressive. Can you let me know when your IPO is going to happen?

No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[arsheive]

Ars Digita founder Phillip Greenspun has been crusading for MIT to stop charging tuition for some time. I'm just amazed that his name is never brought up with this story, seeing as MIT finally seems to be doing what he has been trying to do for years, and in some small way perhaps moving toward being tuition-free...

Re:No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[bcrowell]

Most schools provide servers and encourage their profs to put some of their stuff online. MIT isn't doing anything new or unusual. This has absolutely nothing to do with being tuition-free. It doesn't even have anything to do with taking courses online.

Re:No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, there's a big difference between giving out your course material for free and giving out your education for free. That's kind of MIT's point about their value prop - An education is far more than just having read the course material.

That, and most people I know that have met Phillip think he's an egotistical dork (see the resolution of Ars Digita). Admittedly, he does have his groupies (see parent post), but by and large, he's not (and never was) the BMOC that some would make him out to be.

Re:No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[ez76]

I don't see this as a step toward MIT becoming tuition free.

If anything, they are reinforcing the cachet of the MIT diploma by effectively stating, "our course materials are only a small part of the picture."

Interesting move, and probably a challenge to Ivy League schools and other prestigious educational institutions to prove that their tuition pays for more than lectures and handouts.

Re:No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[Anonymous Coward]

All I know is that those three chicks on his site are totally hot.

Re:No props to Phillip Greenspun?

[Hal-9001]

The issue of MIT becoming tuition-free is not relevant to the topic of OpenCourseWare, but the high tuition of MIT and the Ivy League universities has been a pet peeve of mine for some time. In truth, MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and many other elite private universities would still be in perfect financial health if they did not charge tuition, as most of their funding comes from the growth of their endowments or from federal or private research funds. Greenspun's article raises a valid point that the high tuition of MIT and the Ivy League universities is equivalent to price-fixing, and I believe there was actually an anti-trust finding against MIT and the Ivy League over this issue.

I guess I'm really sore about this issue because I had the opportunity to go to MIT or Stanford, but because I didn't qualify for financial aid, I decided to go to a public university that did provide financial support. Ideally, one shouldn't be forced into decision regarding education by financial considerations, but in this educational system, it happens all too often.

Awesome

[(v)Jargon(v)]

This is going to be so great, I am in college right now and I hope that OCW will provide me with an edge and another resource when my teachers don't relay their thoughts properly.
YeeeHahh!

Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[Ars-Fartsica]

What people are now realizing is that one shot of education, taken right after high school, in a four-year package, is typically not suitable for the career and job changes that will eventually happen for most of us. You hear the term "lifelong learning" being thrown around now and it has a grain of validity. Many of us at some point will return to some type of educational institution for further coursework at some point, even if it is while we are working.

Colleges will still have a role. Many of them are adapting and offering more options to working individuals and other "part time" students. Many offer online courses. What colleges bring to the table is legitimacy. Most people still put more stock in a course from MIT than one from DeVry. If someone says "MIT", you immediately assume that they had to meet a fairly stringent academic requirement and that the lecturer or prof also had to meet a high requirement. The good schools literally have had hundreds of years to shape their good reputations, and its likely they will continue to capitalize on them.

Re:Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[archen]

Colleges will still have a role

chicks and beer just doesn't work so well without a college to use for an excuse.

Re:Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

You're doing it wrong.

Re:Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

##You hear the term "lifelong learning" being thrown around now....##

I've had the term "life-long learner" on my resume for 15 years. How is this a new term?

As far as I know, if you stop learning when you leave college or university, you didn't really learn anything there.

The point of those places is to teach you *how*
to learn. Where you go with that is up to you.

I generally agree that the current educational system is archaic. The university model is based on society as it was 200-500 years ago. Not very productive.

What is needed is a decentralized and
more modular approach to education instead of the dated 'cathedral' models we have now.

Re:Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

>Most people still put more stock
>in a course from MIT than one from DeVry.

And that's pretty darn ironic, since both the Chief Technology Officers of SGI (formerly Silicon Graphics) and NVIDIA both are DeVry alumni.

Re:Four year degrees, not colleges, are obsolete

[BalkanBoy]

You mean to say this person is from DeVry? Shut your hole, please...

Excellent

[Squid_Law]

This is pretty frikkin' cool. It's good to see that there's still a small amount of people prepared to make something available for free, and something that's actually worth reading.

Qualifications? No, thanks

[atomico]

Let us pick up freely what we want to learn, and do it at our own pace... We do not need anyone to put a stamp on our foreheads, saying 'this guy knows classical Latin' or 'I understand special relativity'.

During my entire life, I have had to pass exams and more exams, written, oral, practical, whatever; I know where to go if I need qualifications, but, for once, I think this is a wonderful opportunity to learn what we would like to know, unspoilt by grades, notes, or whatever the devil thinks next!

Re:Qualifications? No, thanks

[Jonathan]

Exactly. I sometimes buy textbooks in various academic fields and go through them just for fun. It's a geeky hobby, granted, but no geekier than playing video games, and sometimes the knowledge gained is even useful. Having lectures and assignments on-line is great because it will make my hobby learning easier.

Wrong.

[brunes69]

There normally is a HUGE difference between someone who gets a BCS degree and someone who has a stackload of certifications. If you have worked with both then you probbaly know what I am talking about. The massive glut of people with certs in the IT industry is the problem, not the solution. Anyone can buy a few books from Amazon.com, study for a month, and get a crapload of certifications. That doesn't mean they know the in depth fundamentals of computer science. What if some problem occurs on the job where they have to design a new algorithm to tackle a problem? Can an MCSD construct a skiplist in some random programming language he has never used before by the end of the day? I think not. It is the depth of education that marks the difference between a university graduate and someone who possess only certifications. Certifications are the equivalent of a vocational education - hands on training in a certain area. Without the acedemic background to be able to expand your knowledge, you will be stuch in nowheresville.

Re:Wrong.

[GigsVT]

I don't think you understand what I am saying.

There would be certifications in algorithm design, certifications in algorithm analysis, etc... They would be the same material that is taught in the course of a normal degree, only that the person and employer could pick and choose which skill set they wanted to pay for, on a micro level.

You are thinking about certifications as they exist today, i.e. specific training and certification usually tied to a commercial product. This is why I mentioned Brainbench, they had several abstract certifications that were approaching this goal.

Re:Wrong.

[Hal-9001]

But the advantage of having completed university coursework for a topic like algorithm design or algorithm analysis is that the grade for that course will represent competence in that field as measured over the course of a quarter or semester. I find it difficult to believe that someone's competence in such an open-ended and abstract field can be assessed by a score on an exam taken in the span of a few hours.

My $0.02

Re:Wrong.

[dzym]

Do you honestly believe some random BCS degree can design a skiplist in some random programming language he has never used before by the end of the day, when he is taught nothing but modula-3 and/or java in college?

Re:Wrong.

[GigsVT]

I find it difficult to believe that someone's competence in such an open-ended and abstract field can be assessed by a score on an exam taken in the span of a few hours.

In the end, a college course measures that competence with several quizzes, a couple tests, maybe a project or two, and an exam. I don't think that accurately reflects competence any more than a certification exam could.

Re:Wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

Or better yet, he knows all the ins-and-outs of using gets() in C, because that's all the instructor will tell the class how to get input.

Re:Wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct, most of the people I know with a CS degree are useless in the real world. I will take the geek who loves technology and is self taught over the rich kid who decided a CS degree was their ticket to loads of cash anyday of the week. I have seen and worked with both classes of people for a long time. I have seen a supposed java developer try to ping a gateway by firing up notepad and typing "ping 192.168.1.1" then staring stupidly waiting for the magic to happen. This was a person with a CS degree, working for IBM no less, and participating in an advanced java servlets class. This is typical of my experience with "cashing in" CS majors who were fortunate enough to be able to attend a 4 year degree granting institution. I have watched these people attend classes often. The one thing that stands out in my mind is their inability to learn via their own initiative, they rather seem to only grasp what is repeatedly fed them by an instructor and given that they only retain knowledge long enough to pass a test. As I say, I will take the geek who devours texts, experiments with their own systems, and is constantly learning simply because they love it anyday. Not to totally disagree, I have worked with and known CS majors who were really sharp, dedicated individuals as well. They are the exception, not the rule.

Re:Wrong.

[(void*)]

And what difference is there between a cert in algorithm analysis, and a course in discrete maths + formal languages?

The problem of the certs, is that no employer can know or specify, in advance, exactly and precisely what future problem needs to be solved. The point is to be flexible, and to be flexible involves not just book knowledge, but an apprecciation of how people currently tackle the problems of today.

Becuase the problems of tomorrow are caused by the solutions of today.

Re:Wrong.

[Henry V .009]

The competance of professors evaluating course-work doesn't stack up much higher.

The amount of cheating and copying that goes on is astounding. Moreover, the difficultly of a given course varies wildly from professor to professor.

There is simply no way to do this perfectly. In fact, I don't think that standardized tests are that much worse than evaluation by a professor. I think that it may work better for many subjects and many situations.

Re:Wrong.

[brunes69]

Yeah I do, if he is worth his apples. I know I could, as long as i had a reference available for the language. Once you understand the concepts, the rest is nothing but semantics.

Re:Wrong.

[dzym]

And to be able to process and use enough information to score a certification in a given language wouldn't impart the concepts behind programming well enough, is it?

Re:Wrong.

[HappyPhunBall]

brunes69, you are probably quite good at what you do. You have also more than likely worked with certification collectors who are far below your skill level, thus shaping your perception of them in a less than favorable light. You are correct that certs do not prove much of anything, but I hope you do not intend to imply that a four year degree proves much either. Apply your same theory to CS majors and see what you come up with. I could just as easily state that rich kids who are fortunate enough to have the funding for a four year degree and are looking to cash in on lucrative CS degrees are the problem, not the solution. Anyone with money can attend class, absord just enough to pass the exam, and attain the lofty title of software engineer. This does not mean they understand the basics of applying technical solutions to real world problems. What if they are thrust into the situation of having to think on their feet and having to learn quickly the solution to a problem which their instructor did not gloss over? I could go on, but I will not. Just as you display utter disdain for certification holders, I regard highly many of the cert holders I have worked with and shake my head in disbelief at some of the solutions I have seen put forth by CS majors. I will take passion and a voracious appetite for knowledge any day over a simple CS major, or a cert collector for that matter.

Re:Wrong.

[t]

I have worked with and known CS majors who were really sharp, dedicated individuals as well. They are the exception, not the rule.

While in my undergraduate EE program one of the professors had made the observation that while enrollment increases every year, the number of quality engineers graduating is roughly constant. I'm sure this is true for many disciplines. It is akin to observing the increasing number of physicists while noting how many "Einsteins" have been produced/found.

Re:Wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

That doesn't mean they know the in depth fundamentals of computer science.

And it doesn't mean that they don't...

Re:Wrong.

[rizzo420]

certification says you can read a book and answer tests. colleges require projects and tests and more hands on work than certifications do. you don't get that hands on work just by taking a certification test. most anyone that knows anything about a computer can get A+ certified, but they don't necessarily know how to do the work. same thign with an mcse, they know the basic concepts and when you would use something, but they don't know the more in depth stuff. certification is for training monkeys to do something... college is to actually do beyond that. the coursework required by college courses is more than is required to get certified (meaning you don't have to do any work to get certified other than take an exam). i don't think college will ever be obsolete, at least not for the majority of fields... you can't just get certified in bio. there's too much knowledge required. like the other guy said... certification is like a vo-tech school, not college. it's more of a trade than anything else.

Re:Wrong.

[GigsVT]

the coursework required by college courses is more than is required to get certified

Apparently you failed English several times?

Re:Wrong.

[cooldev]

In the end, a college course measures that competence with several quizzes, a couple tests, maybe a project or two, and an exam.

This sums up what is causing many of the people on this thread to miss the point. A college degree is, in a sense, a certification, so what does it matter if you get your certification through a trade school, online course, or traditional university?

Unfortunately, a degree isn't proof of anything more than the person had the ability to pass his classes. He may have skipped every class, gotten ahold of the previous year's test, and crammed just enough at the last minute to do decent on the test. My job, when I'm interviewing, is to ferret out those people and show them the door.

The problem is that measuring competence is hard. Attending college, going to and participating in class, working on projects, working with professors doing cutting-edge research in your field, and getting a part-time job to help do research or teach a class, are worth far more than the sum of the parts. A degree doesn't show proof that you took advantage of all of those opportunities, but it indicates you had them, whereas you probably wouldn't for most other types of certifications. That is one of the reasons that a degree will help get you "in the door": the inteviewer can then attempt to not only measure your knowledge, ability to learn, and character, but also find out whether you took advantage of your college experience, or were just passing time.

I could go on and on about the reasons for getting a degree... For instance, my experience is that people that are self taught are extremely knowledgeable about one area, but they have holes in their knowledge and often don't realize it. They don't know what they don't know.

But, in the end, college isn't perfect for everybody. I highly recommend it if you can afford it, but it's easy to waste the experience (expecially if you're intelligent) by gliding through like you did in high school, or treating it as if the exams were the goal, and not just goalposts.

Re:Wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice ad hominem. Way to get an unpopular point of view such as yours across, by resorting to propaganda.

Good show!

Re:Wrong.

[PurpleBob]

If you don't recognize that as a perfectly valid sentence structure, then you've got more problems with English than he does.

So what was the point of that comment?

Re:Wrong.

[GigsVT]

I wasn't really referring to the part I quoted, I meant his whole message looked like some 10 year old typed it.

Re:Wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

So, in other words: you've failed to argue your case convincingly, and now you're just being petty and immature. I think you need certification in more than just CS, friend.

Re:Wrong.

[rizzo420]

i throw out thoughts. it's not really to be read like a book, it's to be read like a conversation. like i'm speaking it, and if you speak in complete sentences all the time, then you are a better man than i. so you still haven't made your point clear and you've been proven wrote by at least 2 different people... when you have a point to make, make it, don't just critique the way i make posts on slashdot... and for the record, i did very well in english, and i write pretty damn good papers too, but i tend not to care when i make posts to slashdot.

speaking of english... another subject you can't just get certified in without knowing what you're doing... thanks for the idea...

Re:Wrong.

[zup_willy]

I completely agree! I spent 7 years in college and had ALOT of fun! if you can afford college, then go! no doubts, GO! There are just as many "Degreed" dumbasses as there are "Certified" dumbasses. A "degree" may be losing its luster every year...but still go to college, its great fun.

Re:Wrong.

[Bush Pig]

A professor of mathematics (Ernie Tuck IIRC) at Adelaide University was comparing two models of maths teaching/learning in an article I read some years ago. The first, he called the cathedral model (a towering structure built on firm foundations), and the second, the Calcutta model (a whole bunch of disconnected hovels). How is getting a whole lot of hovels^H^H^H^H^H^Hcertifications in algorithm design, etc, equivalent to a decent education in computer science?

Re:Wrong.

[Chexsum]

...his whole message looked like some 10 year old typed it.

You failed English too huh - whats your point? :)

Open learning is fun - I didnt know theyd have seminars available also when I first read about OCW - w00t!

No Discussion Forums

[Vagary]

I worked at Royal Roads University, a small Canadian university with a focus on distance postgraduate degrees. It was common knowledge there that the real value in an education is interaction with your peers and professor. As a result, a lot of their education delivery theory focused around discussion groups.

MIT isn't really giving much of anything away. The valuable part of a university education is discussion with your peers and feedback from your professor. All you're getting on this website is a library of multimedia textbooks.

However this could be very valuable to other, much more modest institutions who can't afford to produce their own multimedia textbooks. To take this poverty to its logical extreme is to create entirely peer-driven classes -- no professor, everything marked by your classmates. Which is a much more exciting idea than just watching reproductive biology lectures naked.

"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[StupendousMan]

GigsVT wrote:

What is the difference if someone learns something by reading online documents or by going to hear some windbag talk about it for 50 minutes? There isn't. ... I couldn't recommend it to anyone with the intelligence to learn things on their own.

People can read material in books just as well as they can read them on-line. Libraries have existed for centuries. If your argument is correct, universities should ALREADY be obsolete. No one should need to go to college, because everyone can just read books and gain all the skills and knowledge he needs.

And, yes, I not only went through college, but I now work at one. I'm one of the windbags that GigsVT mentioned. Would you like me to poll the students in my class? "Okay, guys, I'll just stop coming to class, preparing lectures and readings, giving you homework, and answering your questions. Instead, I'll just wait until the quarter ends and give you the final exam."

Care to wager how many of those students would jump at the chance to avoid this old windbag?

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[GigsVT]

Care to wager how many of those students would jump at the chance to avoid this old windbag?

I jumped at that chance as much as I could. Several courses I was able to only attend exams and get an A nonetheless.

Most of the other classes I took, this was impossible, due to the professor rigging up some contrived system where grade depended on attendance, such as only accepting assignments during classtime, at the end, from only those who attended the full class. There is obviously a problem if most professors must resort to such tactics to get their captive audience.

Don't get me wrong, I respect knowledge, and the knowledgable. I think it is the framework that is wrong, the whole paradigm is wrong. There are certain things that can only be learned from those with the experience to teach it, but I think the current system fails at accomplishing that.

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't get me wrong, I respect knowledge, and the knowledgable. I think it is the framework that is wrong, the whole paradigm is wrong. There are certain things that can only be learned from those with the experience to teach it, but I think the current system fails at accomplishing that.

One of the great things about higher education is that it's optional! If you don't want to attend class, don't. If you don't think the degree is worth your time, move on to the next part of your life.

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see,

o perhaps there were problems with your department and those should be addressed.

o perhaps you didn't put any effort into taking advantage of what the university offered. That is, there are hundreds/thousands of courses to choose from as electives. Though you received nothing of value from university what percentage of the *other* thinking students would say different?

o perhaps the above two points interacted and cannot be generalized.

From my perspective greater care must be taken by all universities to ensure quality education. That said, your knee-jerk response to a system that is flawed and not irreparably broken is of know value.

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[GigsVT]

One of the great things about higher education is that it's optional! If you don't want to attend class, don't. If you don't think the degree is worth your time, move on to the next part of your life.

That's the thing, I wanted to learn, I never want to stop learning. When I went to college, it was under the assumption that learning would be a main goal. What I found was a system of learning that was utterly incompatible with the way that I, and many other people, actually learn.

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[GigsVT]

perhaps there were problems with your department and those should be addressed.

You bet, huge problems.

there are hundreds/thousands of courses to choose from as electives

Only that I would have had to take 17 or more hours a semester to take courses that wouldn't have counted toward degree in order to take them. Most engineering/CS/business programs have a strong set of required courses that take up your complete time from start to finish, with "general studies" requirements that only give you a couple choices.

Re:"the intelligence to learn things on their own"

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually my university (RIT) offers some classes that have no lecture, only a book and tests. They happen to be quite popular. I wish more classes were offered that way. I would say that you can learn anything you want out of a book, it is just faster to learn it from an interactive source such as a good professor.

Degrees and Such

[puto]

Well, as a tech who who went to school for CS and has some certs here is what the market wants.

Ok, you are a 22 years old and a Linux god. You know Php, CGI, et al ad naueseam. You got a semi decent project on source forge. Where are your big bucks?

Well a company looks at it this way. A degree shows that you took the time and completed something. Whether it is in CS or underwater basketweaving. And you might not know fuck all about anything but you showed a little discipline.
AND college really can teach you some much needed social skills to survive in the real world. I do not care how good you are at what you do, if you piss of the customers cause you are l33t and they ain't, your out the door. And this also means that the Think Geek cap and Spawn t-shirt are not appropriate apparel for all occasions.

Online courseware is great, and I am one of those people who can pick up things easily from a book. But you know what? Regular classes are great too, you make friends,contacts, meet girls, get out the house.

All my practical knowledge in this industry I picked up on my own. IS was just starting to hit Unis so the courses were not all the good. I took a lotta business classes which have come in handy.

I like to see someone with a degree and mad skills. Good combination. Degrees are not that hard, and unis can come cheap here in the us. And if you got the skils you can get a job to pay for the school are do it yourself.

And before you come down on me. I got a GED at 20, started college at 23, finished at 28. Cause even though I got pretty good jobs with my skills, as soon as I got that paper, it opened many more doors.

So the online thing is great to a point. But you gotta have the real world behind it.

And at 32 years old I wish I could back do the uni earlier, and give my younger self a swift kick in the ass. Oh and buy some Microsoft stock ;)

Puto

Re:Degrees and Such

[Em Emalb]

"Well a company looks at it this way. A degree shows that you took the time and completed something. Whether it is in CS or underwater basketweaving. And you might not know fuck all about anything but you showed a little discipline"

The thing that kills me: Ok, College completion shows discipline, and that you took the time to complete something. Why then, pray tell, do the people that have gone the military route have such a hard time breaking into the work ranks after their service is up? Surely we can all agree military service is harder than going to college. Also, discipline is an obvious requirement.

And yet, I today have many friends out of work that are highly qualified former military that cannot get work simply because they don't have that piece of paper. Sad isn't it.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Anonymous Coward]

I finished college at 22, I still don't have a job. I was working for a company making the same as other people who only had a GED or a diploma.

For me college has opened 0 doors. I put in my time but it hasn't done shit. Blame the economy or whatever but that still hasn't done anything for me.

Look at job offers in the papers. Masters required, 29k a year. Give me a fucking break. I put more money into school in a year than that.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Anonymous Coward]

Online courseware is great, and I am one of those people who can pick up things easily from a book. But you know what? Regular classes are great too, you make friends,contacts, meet girls, get out the house.

You must be kidding about the girl stuff. Did you study CS?

Re:Degrees and Such

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree with the MS stock tip. I seriously see MS facing some stiff competition inside of the next 5 years.

People seem to forget all to soon, just 10 years ago x86 was just taking off as the "platform to be on"; and even then it only happened because compaq cracked IBM's bios. MS has about as mature a monopoly as I have over the room I'm currently occupying. This is why they are constantly looking at "where the hell are we going to go when people realize how little we have done outside of implimenting a standard DCOM and DirectX", things like XBOX aern't side trips from thier current buisness model, they are safeguards incease they stop selling windows tomorow.

5 years from now anything could happen, XP isn't really all that complex (and if you limit the inital hardware the OS supports it's a whole lot less complex), and a few hundred million capital could totally outdo it from the ground up. AOL could come out with a x86 version of OSX that runs AIM and Office X (and a few other odd's and ends), and it could be released tomorow with "live boot" cd's sent to all AOL users. AOL would demand hardware manufacturers cary thier os, or else, and MS would overnight loose 20% of the marketshare; this is becoming more and more possible the better and better AOL's version of netscape becomes (no it wasn't a competitor to IE4, but NS7 is properly labeled one version ahead of IE). WHO KNOWS WHAT WILL HAPPEN.

The market is extremly volitale. When MS has held 90% of the marketshare for 10 solid years, and there aern't FREE os's that are only lacking a few million R&D to make a easy-to-configure front end running around, then you will have a case, until then I could easily see everyone switching again in the next 15 years.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Hal-9001]

Except that military service only demonstrates competence in a narrow specialization (i.e. how to operate specific equipment or something along those lines). I agree that military service is good for developing discipline (as a general rule my college friends who had been in the military or were doing ROTC were much more disciplined than I), but college allows one to demonstrate more general competence in a field more (or less) relevant to the business world.

Re:Degrees and Such

[tuxedo-steve]

So the online thing is great to a point. But you gotta have the real world behind it.

Heh, once upon a time, the "real world" would have been considered to be outside the university environment, as the Jargon File notes. How things change. :)

Re:Degrees and Such

[Anonymous Coward]

What did you major in?

Re:Degrees and Such

[Em Emalb]

In some fields, your summarization is correct. In IT, however, there are many many different areas you are responsible for. Andy yes, I agree, college and military together makes a potent employee.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Anonymous Coward]

Assfucking, with a minor in Sociology. I got out with a GPA of 3.9, but nobody needs assfuckers these days :-( At least, not where I live.

Any other Slashdot assfuckers have the same experience?

Re:Degrees and Such

[Gerry Gleason]

You have some good points. Degrees and certifications do help if you are looking for a job, particularly when the market is tight, but you learn the important stuff by actually doing it.

And before you come down on me. I got a GED at 20, started college at 23, finished at 28. Cause even though I got pretty good jobs with my skills, as soon as I got that paper, it opened many more doors.

You have done well to take the time an do that after working a few years. My history is different, but I know it is hard to go back to school when you are working. I ended up getting my B.S. from MIT in three years out of five. I sort of dropped out after two years and started to work full time. It was very hard to go back, and if I didn't have enough credits to finish in one more, I don't know if I would have.

It is very cool that MIT is doing this, and I hope it encourages others. If you don't care about the piece of paper, this gives you access to an important part of the coursework, and there is no reason not to use your local community college or university to hook up with teachers and resources, and design your own degree with curiculum created at the best universities of the world.

In the meritocracy of the Free/Open source community, paper doesn't count for much anyway. A typical hacker career path is going to college straight from HS, then getting addicted to hacking, ignoring all classes (hard to get up for those 10AM classes after hacking 'til 3AM), then drop out and get a job. Isn't this true for Richard Stallman? The piece of paper won't ever matter for him.

That said, a degree from a top institution always gets you some instant credibility, and a PhD is still pretty much a required entrance certificate for acedemia.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Hal-9001]

Well unfortunately, whether or not military personnel are overspecialized often doesn't matter. Perception is reality--many people believe that military occupations are overspecialized, and that can be a barrier to joining the non-military workforce.

Re:Degrees and Such

[Mudhiker]

Surely we can all agree military service is harder than going to college

I beg to differ, having done both. Joining the U.S. military is the easiest thing on earth, as long as you meet the physical and mental requirements. Boot camp beats the crap out of you but it's over soon enough. After that your life is handed to you on a platter. It might not be the life you prefer but all the major decisions are made for you.

Military training is somewhat valuable. It's mostly just a start, and a real job in the real world is going to require further school.

Incidently, at least half of the new people reporting to my unit these days are college drop-outs.

McGill too

[BSDevil]

Here at McGill in Montreal, we've got the beginings os this type of system set up - cool.mcgill.ca has about six courses on-line now. Each lecture is composed of all the slides used in the actual lecture, plus the voice track of the lecturer synch'ed to the slides. Useful when you're too hung over to go to Friday morning Chemistry

Re:once again

[Anonymous Coward]

the difference?

no one visits your site.

The point is?

[Isle]

All material for all the courses I follow at the moment are available on the web.

The reason is I am now a postgraduate student and no books exists that cover the kind of recent research material that we need to learn. Instead we use research articles, and they are always published on the net nowadays.

For the pregraduate studies the dilema is the same, except you have to buy the books at the local bookstore. You can still end up with knowledge without proof.

So how to prove what you know?
Just remember to enroll for the exam!

Oh! so universities are not free in your country?
Well, that is a completely different issue.

You are a little Myopic my friend.

[Keebler71]

Sure, for your little microcosm which I am assuming is computer related (like many of the people here) a degree may indeed be irrelevant. This is because those who currently work in the IT/CS world have demonstrated that being self-taught is oftentimes adequate to maintain a good, high-paying job.

For pretty much every other subject, higher-learning is and will remain necessary. How many self-taught mathematicians and chemists do you know? How many astronautical engineers or geneticists just read a few "Teach yourself xxxx in 24 hours?" and began doing important research?

I submit to you a different vision of the future... eventually people who really know what they are doing with computers will no longer be a novelty. There is a generation of people behind us who were raised on computers. For them, the skills needed to become a programmer or network adminstrator may be as common as those needed to work retail today. With such a wide base of computer literacy,... perhaps those sys admin and programming jobs will not have the status (or salaries) that they do today. Regardless, despite what it takes to land a job in the field, the science of computing will continue to progress through the efforts of those in the research labs... the people doing the hard-core CS research at universities and industry.

As for your personal experience, I don't doubt your account at all... but what did you choose to study in college and do you practice in that field today?

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[GigsVT]

what did you choose to study in college and do you practice in that field today

CS, yes.

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[pll178]

I agree with Keebler71. For anything other than IT, you really need to be at a university. When I started college 8 years ago, I studied Physics. Sure, you could pick up some introductory books in physics and teach yourself the basics, but, once you get past the basic freshman and sophomore physics, you WILL need some instruction from sources other than books. Have you ever tried to read a book on statistical thermal dynamics or quantum mechanics? I guarantee that unless you are at the level of Einstein or Feynman, you would not be able to learn these topics on your own for the first time.

Another thing is that many technical fields outside of IT and CS actually require equipment or expensive software in order for you to learn the topics. For instance, when was the last time you bought a spectrum analyzer or a logic synthesis tool like Synopsys Design Compiler?

What people seem to forget is that a college education gives you a broad background to think critically about the world. You don't have to study an area that relates to your current job. You just need a good background to help you through life.

After college, I worked for 2 years in the EE field and whenever we hired people, we only hired people with BS in EE or a BS in CS. We would not even look at a candidate with just certifications. When I went to work for the corporate arm of the company, it was very IT focused, but even then, when we were hiring, we never even called back a candidate unless they had a bachelor's degree.

I just went back to college (CMU) to get my Masters degree in Electrical Engineering. I can tell you that there is no way that I would have been able to learn what I am learning now without being at a university. I know that when I graduate, I will have more options open to me than if I stayed in my previous job. So all you people who think you can get by with certifications, please keep pushing forward on that path. That will help me get a job more easily after I graduate. ;-)

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[nempo]

I don't think there will ever be a future as the one you described, why? Because all mainstream OS:s are just click and play and will become more easier to use for every month that passes. If you want to set up a webserver just press the webserver button and then go through a wizard that asks you all these questions from which it generates the configuration. The point is, if something goes wrong in the OS or you need a quick fix for some error you cant just open up a nice gui and mark some checkbox to make it do what you want.
If these people that had no other experience then an OS with a bunch of static fetures tries to switch to something with a dynamic interface they will probably be scared of it and not bother with it.
How is someone going to learn how to program when the only compiler for your OS costs several thousends of dollars (replace with currency and/or amount of choice).

I remember the first time I installed linux on my computer after hearing about how easy it was to get started with programming.The login screen came up, I logged in and thought, 'How the hell do I navigate this OS?' With no book or manuall I slowly started to learn the OS. I think you need to have a sortof 'geek-attitude' to be able to learn things on you own and the average humen dosn't have this 'geek-attitude'. Atleast I dont think so ;).

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[Simon Kongshoj]

I submit to you a different vision of the future... eventually people who really know what they are doing with computers will no longer be a novelty. There is a generation of people behind us who were raised on computers. For them, the skills needed to become a programmer or network adminstrator may be as common as those needed to work retail today.

At the risk of sounding like a grumpy old man, most of that generation is raised on computers that run software specifically designed to not require computer literacy. The user-friendliness paradigm used in modern software is not about making programs that help the user becoming knowledgeable in their operation, but about making programs that require an absolute minimum of knowledge to use. Most modern young computer users know what a CPU is and why it's better to buy AMD than Intel, they know how to set up a gaming LAN and the like, but they don't know about processor architecture or how TCP/IP works. Why learn about TCP/IP when you can set everything up with buttons and menus, and who wants to learn HTML if you can make your gaming clan's webpage in Frontpage?

Of course there are exceptions. There always are when we make generalizations. But all in all, I don't think high computer knowledge is that much more common among that generation than it was earlier. The general level is higher (people can put together computers themselves, perform upgrades and repairs), but the ratio of people who actually know what they're doing doesn't seem to be that much higher than what it used to be.

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[Supergrass]

Great post. I'm in 100% agreement.

Re:You are a little Myopic my friend.

[Anonymous Coward]

As someone who first went through college and graduated with a CS degree with a 4.0, after first being a high school drop out, but taking GED, bouncing through various college courses in Theater, Auto, Art, and others, then acing a course once family was important enough to actually care. I have to say college was always a disappointment.
But, outside of that "microcosm", also quite succesful at:
Sales
General Management
Photography
Engineering (not computer/IT related)
Note that:
I am NOT a good test taker.
I have much trouble sitting in a class and sitting still.
Hell, I'm a very clear diagnosed case of ADHD and Manic Depressive!
However, at the respected colleges I went to, I was constantly asking the teachers questions they couldn't answer.
This was because I read voraciously, accessed any information I could get my hands on, and spoke to people I could find who actually worked in the fields of interest, and apprenticed wherever I could.
The world is losing much but losing the Mentor/Apprentive system.
They teachers are becoming unthinking automatons.
Heck, they even started coming to me for questions and solutions for their courses!
The last couple of years were a joke, they are so far behind, buried in their scholastic isolationism from the real world.
Research is important, but can be supported in other ways too.
Every school I've been at as a temporary instructor myself I have found them at least 2 to 4 years behind in technologies, science breakthroughs, etc.
I no longer opt to teach at such institutions because I have watched them purloin funds from far too many unsuspecting victims.
I've opted the last 6 years for certs. But finding ones that require practical assignments in addition to tests.
That require working comprehension, not just memorization and spitting out the results, which any computer can do these days.
Cogitation.
Thesis requirements etc.
These are not easy.
They are hard work. My last one was a 6 month long endeavor.
But they do not have to be the sole domain of Colleges and Universities.
Take the approaches and methodologies learned in those environments, and open them to the world.
All on my own, using initiative, determination, hard work and methodologies, developed through REAL WORLD experience since 1981, and getting the paper work. I did the "degree thing" to make those who are so narrow minded and "too busy" to actually sift through who has the skills and who doesn't.
In 5 years I went from nada tech building PCs to a CTO making significant sums.
My interviews are based on actual knowledge and methodologies, and how adabtable they were to take what they'd learned and apply it to situations they hadn't experienced.
This works for those in college, or out of it, with certifications or degrees, or only real world experience.
It is more effective at finding true gems that are far superior candidates, than any degree has shown.
I've seen all levels of degree earners who were incredibly incompetent, all the way up to Phd.
For software developers, part of the interview process, was to make them right and/or anayluze code or problems/results. What they would be doing in the real world.
Or whip up high level designs, and have them grilled on the holes, and see how they handle it.
A quick glance showed whether they were messy coders, clean but useless, hackers, or the rare gems of excellet elegant artist/scientist mixes.
Certain tech sectors are going to be worth no more than the telco techs of today, and the electronics techs of the 60's and 70's who have Masters or better, and are now stuck as sales men for Tandy/Radio Shack, it's already getting closer to that.
The standards from the colleges, tech schools, heck even the high schools now are practically giving away (practically) MCSE's, CCIE's, etc.
And they are pretty much just selling degrees to those who can afford them, not based on any ability to function in the real world.
There is a place for interaction to develop better skills in lieu of real world experience.
You can't learn it all from a book whether self taught or in a school.
You certainly need a test lab for experimenting (I built my own from cheap parts, but muddle through).
But that's it, in LIEU of real-world.
At the same time, developing broader, more generalized skill such as troubleshooting methodologies, can be applied to ANY field, technical, legal, medical, etc.
These CAN be learned without colleges, and many of those colleges fall far short anyway.
Now, some few Universities and colleges are exceptional, for a few in exceptional circumstances and exceptional funds capabilities.
But in order to raise the society as a whole across the entire curve, from lowly intellect to most gifted, making as much information available as possible, and providing some means of guidance, maybe some mentoring, and organization to the tomes of information is all key, but the archaic, thousands of years old technique of supposed elitists "academic monks" hoarding their "knowledge", only to be doled out in increments for outrageous price, is going to be revamped I pray.
It is the means of proliferation of information and knowledge that advances a society.
When a culture makes it more difficult or restrictive to access the information, the society damages advancements for the whole in it's short sightedness.
Opening up the information to many, and then others providing some guidance, in and efficient means, without cost restrictions, letting poor and wealthly compete on the same playing field!
I have known many a person who could not afford going to any college at all, or at least one of better value, because of their financial and social status.
If this becomes a trend.
Opening information that much more, in the face of so many trying to control and profit.
Our society will benefit in unimaginable ways.
So many that could not have broken the patterns of their fore-fathers, will, with much hard work, and innate talent, rise to new levels of opportunity.
Colleges and Universities, just like any other entity, must adapt, or else other entities will evolve to replace them.
Hopefully this is sign of adaptation.
However, in restrictive cultures/countries this is less likely to happen.
Also the over-commercialization is dimming the bright gem that was the promise of the Internet tbehind all the flashy, gaudy marketing fluff of no informational value, burying the real knowlege behind a swarm of white noise.
I hope our country at least can start the trend towards freedom to self-educate, if no others can.
Ok, enough rant.
You get the point.

Re:Macintosh homosexuals

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody mod this up now !!!

OpenEDU?

[swordboy]

I've always wondered what makes classroom instruction so damn expensive. After the need to *cough*repeat*cough* some classes over, I thought about something:

Why can't a professor just video tape the damn lesson and catalogue the class participation? After a few years, I'd assume that there would be a complete class as well as the entire set of questions/clarification that could possibly be asked.

I also had a prof that made his own book. It'd be real cool if the gov't could create an "open" text book initiative. Books could be freely available online, while other profs could use them, modify them as long as the new version was also freely available.

Once the material was created, I don't see why there couldn't be an "open university" to be used freely by everyone. Obviously, there'd need to be testing centers created, but that is another topic.

College is too expensive. It doesn't have to be.

Re:OpenEDU?

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realise that no decent lecturer repeats exactly
the same things every year? Teachers learn too.

Re:OpenEDU?

[garcia]

Capitalism, it apparently doesn't work the way you want it to.

Re:OpenEDU?

[HisMother]

Why can't the prof videotape the lectures? Because virtually all subjects evolve. If the prof is worth his/her salary, next year's lectures will be different than this year's. If they aren't, well, then this is why a degree from MIT costs more than one from Podunk U.

Re:OpenEDU?

[Quixote]

Why can't a professor just video tape the damn lesson and catalogue the class participation? After a few years, I'd assume that there would be a complete class as well as the entire set of questions/clarification that could possibly be asked.
Because then we'd all be still programming in Algol or Snobol or Cobol or ***ol.

Re:OpenEDU?

[bcrowell]

College is too expensive. It doesn't have to be.
Did you go to a private school? At the community college in California where I teach, the cost is $11 per unit. If you transfer to a Cal State or UC after that, you're still only paying a tiny percentage of the cost of your own education -- the taxpayers pay the rest.

BTW, what about lab courses? What about the gymnasium? The library? Research? All that stuff costs money too.

Why can't a professor just video tape the damn lesson and catalogue the class participation? After a few years, I'd assume that there would be a complete class as well as the entire set of questions/clarification that could possibly be asked.
This makes sense if you had a lot of really horrible teachers who used lecturing as a method of instruction. Lecturing is a ridiculous custom left over from the middle ages, when books were so expensive that students couldn't afford their own copies, so the profs read them out loud, and the students transcribed them.

The big problem with lecturing is that it's passive. To make the classroom experience worthwhile, you need something active, like students discussing stuff with each other, doing worksheets and getting help from the teacher, etc. None of this would work in a passive medium like video.

I also had a prof that made his own book. It'd be real cool if the gov't could create an "open" text book initiative. Books could be freely available online, while other profs could use them, modify them as long as the new version was also freely available.
I can't imagine why the government should get involved in this, but for free textbooks, see my sig. Is your prof's book available for free online? If so, I'd like to catalog it on my site.

Re:OpenEDU?

[overture]

Actually it isn't really a new idea. This was the way our technical college did it in it's earliest days (in the early 70').

The lecturer would record the lecture once and then the students would sit in the classroom watching it on a tv. Sometimes the lecturer stood in the door watching as well because he wanted to know how well it worked.

It didn't work well.

It's not a good way to motivate the students and the contact with the teacher might be more important then one would imagine :)

Of course, nowadays there are a few long-distance courses that uses video materials but I still believe the most painless way to get yourself an education is to be at the same location as the teacher.

Recently an investigation was started on whether those tapes were ever archived, would be interesting to see how it looked.

Re:OpenEDU?

[Anonymous Coward]

it isn't THE TEACHER that is spending the money,
and the money isn't SPENT ON THE TEACHER EITHER.

the cost of the education comes from the cost of the FACILITIES. buildings ARE NOT CHEAP. but they are even less cheap when they need to be retrofitted to be ADA-compliant. where is the rest of the cost? the cost of having deans offices, and secretaries, and being ISO-900x compliant, and making sure you follow health codes and OSHA codes and workman's comp and .... college is expensive for the same reason that making a company is expensive.

COLLEGES SPEND MORE MONEY ON UNDERGRADS than the tuition. MIT LOSES MONEY ON STUDENTS. they get HALF of the cost of a student from tuition. the rest they cover from grants.

the course materials are the least of ANYONE's costs.

Textbook Answer Keys

[Anonymous Coward]

One problem I have with open-source learning is that it's still nearly impossible for an autodidact to get their hands on the solution manuals to alot of textbooks. Does anyone have any idea how you might go about it?

Good! I am looking at ACM and other online classes

[MarkWatson]

This sounds great!

I am trying to use my down time (i.e., time not spent working for paying customers) to increase my overall skill level.

I going to re-join the ACM because they have several online classes that I want to take.

re: proving what you know: Most work comes from old business contacts and personal references, so knowing your stuff will pay off, even without a degree or certification.

Anyway, I can't wait until September 30 to see what the first round of coures will look like.

-Mark

Give away?

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they try to do a "dotcom"?

1: Give away stuff for free.
2: ?
3: Profit!

it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[Erris]

The case is analogous to software source code. The course materials, on their own, are worthless. They have to be interpreted and kept current by a knowlegable instructor to have value. What constitutes knowlegable is accredation through peer review.

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[CemeteryWall]

Peer review worries me. It can be a club of academics with the same mad ideas and they will obviously accredit each others work. Mad ideas may have their place in helping us discover better ones but too often subjects protect themselves from the outside world by a range of entry barriers: eg. special language that is unnecessarily obscure or disbarring the "unqualified" from comment.

Software at least has some sort of empirical basis. We can actually ask "Does it work?"

But perhaps this last point is too naieve. Inb the UK we have failure after failure on large Government software projects. And the government IT "gurus" are still pushing the same old methodology.

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[pyite]

Software at least has some sort of empirical basis. We can actually ask "Does it work?"

No, we cannot. A program cannot be proven correct.

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[CemeteryWall]

No, we cannot. A program cannot be proven correct.

Don't be daft. I meant "correct" in the ordinary everyday sense of the word that I learnt in childhood and still often use today.

You obviously mean "correct" in some post-Godel computer science way.

I have heard this behaviour called "Learn to Spell Forget to Think".

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[alexo]

Software at least has some sort of empirical basis. We can actually ask "Does it work?"

No, we cannot. A program cannot be proven correct.

1. No it cannot, in the general case, but it can be proven incorrect.

2. No it cannot, in the general case, but there is quite a large (and useful)subset of programs that can.

Also, cf. Donald Knuth: "Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it."

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[pyite]

Oh I agree with you. I only said it to illustrate the fact that programs are not black and white. Many times something may appear to work, but in fact not always work, etc.

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[pyite]

Oooh, I like the Knuth quote! Now I get to bring it back to the guy who originally told me that a program cannot be proven correct. However, I do think Knuth might be referring to a more abstract concept here such as an algorithm as it's really hard to test a program for ALL possible inputs. Sure, we can prove an algorithm with a single argument true by induction, but it's awfully hard to do so as the number of arguments increases.

Re:it's a matter of peer review and accredation.

[alexo]

Hence my mention of a "subset".

proof or knowledge vs proof of completion

[Anonymous Coward]

if you are looking to prove your knowledge, then I suggest getting together with others who share your drives and goals and creating a product (or at least a good demo). Unless of course you want to work for another empty headed suit that sees more value in letters after your name than in actual knowledge and applicable experience. I personally put more faith in certifications than anything, because too many times there are idiots with degrees that have no value except to absorb my revenue at an alarming rate. (there are those that would see this and think I am dumping on degrees, far from it. However, I understand that degrees are not what they should be today and that theory is only the start, but NEVER the beginning or end of knowledge and usefullness.) learn as much as you can, then apply it and start adding to that theory. The best ideas are generated by those that learn from applying. If you then have a firm understanding of the fundamentals and base of that field, then with your drive and experience you have the possibility of doing great things.

education is people interaction

[peter303]

I have a MIT degree. Sure, you can learn a lot by reading the right stuff, even going to a college bookstore and buying the textbook (which generally dont exist for many MIT courses, because they are ahead of the material). But it is interacting with the instructor and fellow students that make the difference, whether doing problem exercises or in testing that really re-inforce whether you know the material or not.

Have they Thought...

[DiS[EnDeR]]

If I started a company, with a couple proffessor's that "certified" peopl ehad complete the courseware provided by MIT. Would that not hold standing with organizations as a degree. A person could complete the courses on their own time, and pay us to "mark" their work. If myself, and my collegues held the proper credentials, and were therefore a "trused" authority in the matter, I believe such credentials would have to hold some standing. Universities are very impersonal in most cases anyway. Why dont we just get rid of the "institution" as well.

Re:Have they Thought...

[Spasemunki]

Unless you're willing to go through the (somewhat exhaustive) process of having your little organization accredited as a college (which may not be possible for such an org- I'm not sure what the standards are, but I think having your own curriculum might be one), such degrees would have no more standing than the '6.99 Ph.D Extravaganza' message I keep getting in my hotmail inbox. Using MIT's information to actually issue degrees might also introduce some copyright problems- you're no longer using their info for personal enrichment, you're using it to run a business. Trouble would ensue.

The Net's Killer App?

[theskipper]

No, not for becoming the next Gates or Ellison. How about for the intellectual progression of humanity? Maybe it will open doors for people to rediscover the scientific method and induce a tad more critical, rational thinking in the world.

Imho, the reason why otherwise intelligent people believe man killed off the dinosaurs is because they never learned how to think when young. Maybe with open education some folks will reexamine different fundamental assumptions that they normally wouldn't have time to do in their busy lives.

As a parent, the betterment of humanity is a killer app in my book.

Re:The Net's Killer App?

[Anonymous Coward]

true, but not everyone wants to be "bettered". in australia they
introduced free tertiary education, in the mistaken belief that low
university enrolments were due to cost, and not australians being a bunch
of dumbasses in general. did little to raise university enrolments (apart
from boost the number of "eternal freshmen", as one would call them) and
nearly sent the country broke (although arguably that was due to other
moronic policies of the ruling party).

Re:The Net's Killer App?

[peterpi]

Everybody knows why the dinousaurs really died out.

Whenever they saw one of those early-mammal thingies, they got real scared (dinos are scared of mice) and had heart attacks.

What were you doing at school to not know that?

Would it be...

[Anonymous Coward]

www.qut.com, perhaps?

so what...

[thogard]

So they give out a few courses...

Do they give away things they consider real IP?

For example.... a student (hhh@mit.edu) of theirs came up with a lameass protocol for VoIP (sort of since its over real ethernet packets, not IP packets). That was sold off to a company call NBX corp and their ip rights included lots of cool things like gnu zip and gnu tar from what I've heard of the license agreement. These were later were bought by 3com and all included in a product you can buy today for way too much money.

Now that 3com is selling me gnuzip, how do I get source or is it some special deal with MIT so they don't have to provide that even though strings shows "You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License" and other worthless nonsense.

Did I mention that 3com was one of the few IT companies that supported the DMCA?

not making money doesn't mean not losing money

[jdkane]

It's nice that MIT plans to give away all this information for free. But they still have to pay for the bandwidth, the web content management costs, the hardware costs, etc., etc.

Even if MIT does not want to make money off it, they should at least figure out a model to cover the costs.

I have a feeling they will have to address this situation (probably sooner than later) because the high-quality content will be in high demand. No doubt with this proposition of free materials comes a high cost to MIT.

Re:not making money doesn't mean not losing money

[GigsVT]

MIT probably pays 10 times more for illegal mp3 downloads than this will cost.

Most larger universities already have at least several OC-3s. Textual web based content is tiny compared to student net usage, most of which is non-educational.

My point is, I don't think this will be an issue.

How "free" is this?

[NamShubCMX]

I really hate the english word "free" with all its meaning.

In this case, what kind of free is it? (beer or speech)?

I'm curious because I'd like to kknow if it will be possible to have translations in other languages...

Re:question to slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

SHATNER
S ha tne r
ShAtNeR
shatnershatnershatnershatnershatnershatnershatners hatnershatnershatnershatnershatnershatnershatnersh atnershatnershatnershatner
--rentahs--
S
H
A
T
N
E
R

curiosity and the taxpayer

[xipho]

Too many comments from people worrying about getting jobs and being "legitimized". Whatever happened to learning something for learning sake? This is free information that you would otherwise have to pay *thousands* of dollars for. Damn cool.

And another thing... In intro to grad-stats this semester I've been told that locking down/encrypting course-notes etc will be the wave of the future, this from a state school. Heaven forbid that Joe-taxpayer actually be able to learn on their own! YOU pay taxes that support ME going to school. Shouldn't you have access to all the information generated by your tax-dollars?

Re:curiosity and the taxpayer

[inode_buddha]

Heh, thank you for your commentary re: "legitimizing". I already work no problems, and my US taxes and loans pay my own way thru school for the 2nd or 3rd time... I'm not worried about getting work, I'm just worried about paying for an education that may be worth only bragging rights to my employers, even if they themselves won't acknowledge those bragging rights unless it's to their advantage. Never mind that I earned and pay for those out of my back pocket entirely... And for what it's worth: I love reading, especially Western Philosophy and the history thereof.

Information vs. Education

[be_all]

All through elementary school and high school, we are offered a myriad of courses in order to give us broad fundamental skills and to expose us to as much of an variety as possible.

But, beyond basic skills and experience, school teaches us how to deal with other people, how to intellectually relate to and cooperate with others, how to ask and answer questions.

College or university is no different. Now, you choose what you want to study, but you do is in an environment that focusses on honing your academic skills to the standards of true academia.

Course materials are a great information resource, nothing more. I think people in the technology industries tend to lose sight of this more than in other fields because so much detailed information is required in understanding all the different technologies out there. (Ironically, that is how people who have read all the manuals who mistake information for education.) Few people will read information sources just for the hell of it. That's where teachers come in: they provide focus and enthusiasm. Nothing is better for getting through a really boring course that a great professor. The teacher motivates, guides, and assesses: a very important job.

But ultimately--and I think this is what they believe at MIT and why they're not too concerned about giving the material away for free--degrees are about learning how to apply the fundamental academic skills to the chosen material, and obtaining one is about interacting in an academic environment.

But, in the real world, if all a person needs is certification for administering an Apache web server, then give them a certification course (information). If they need to understand an Apache web server, give them an university course (education).

Urine testing for cannabis?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why the heak do corporations do urine testing for cannabis nowadays?

I thought bigotry and religious dogma were a thing of the past. Guess we're still living in draconian shithead times...

OpenEdu? No!

[RobertFisher]

There are a number of points which need to be made.

First, it takes time to plan out lectures to the extent that they are even worth recording for future generations of students. And time is one resource which most professors do not have. The way academia works today, most professors at major universities are largely occupied by their research activities. Teaching -- especially at the undergraduate level, and most especially at the lower level undergraduate level -- is typically viewed as a nuisance, or at best, a distratction from research. It is quite rare to find a set of lectures worth recording; more often than not, the lectures were prepared in a big hurry the night before or the morning of the lecture. The vast majority of lectures are simply not worth recording in any form.

That said, excellent class materials DO occasionally become available, though typically in print form (as you alluded to). Faculty teaching commonplace courses (for instance, Quantum Mechanics or Statistical Mechanics in physics) whose subject material does not vary much, will often go back to their old notes, polish them up a bit, and have another go at it in a few years. After a few iterations of this process, excellent course notes are often developed. In many cases, those notes find their way into one of those famous textbooks which you have grown to love (or hate!). A great example is the classic "Spacetime Physics" on special relativity, which included questions from actual students taking the first version of the class, along with authoritative answers from John Wheeler, who is one of the world's foremost thinkers on relativity theory, and also one of the best physics teachers who has ever lived.

There are several major implicit assumptions in your statement which I should address. Imagine, for instance, that Feynman, when writing his famed lectures, decided to make then "open". What we would have today, in addition to the original, pristine edition, would be a proliferation of umpteen different versions with comments, additions, and substractions made by other folks. Now, this may come as a shock to you, but the world of ideas is not a democracy. Some ideas are better than others; some thinkers better than others. I submit that Feynman's original version would be vastly superior to almost any modified one; hence, the proliferation of "open" texts, when the best texts by the world's foremost thinkers are already available, would do little good other than to confuse and obfuscate the beginning student. You need to critically examine your assumption that open source dogma is applicable to every conceivable circumstance.

Another huge fact you are missing out on, is that all those great textbooks by the world's greatest thinkers are already at your disposal for free (as in beer). All you need to do is go down to your public library, and check them out! Feynman, Knuth, Plato, Samuelson and others are at your fingertips. If your library does not have a book, just request it through interlibrary loan. This is, in fact, the best of all possible worlds. You really don't want to have to sort through umpteen diluted and distorted "open" versions of those texts.

As someone who grew up during a time when internet access was not commonly available, I find it amusing and alarming that many younger students seem to think they can find anything they wish on the web. Simple point of fact is, those of us who have sat down with the best texts, bugged our profs with questions, did the labs, and thought about things, came through with a much better understanding of basic sciences than those who scanned the web for some writeup by lord-knows-who at Buttfuck U. Again, the world of ideas is not a democracy.

Which brings me to another major assumption in your statement : that one can simply acquire the knowledge one needs by passively sitting back and watching a video or reading a book. In fact, the biggest factor in learning is doing. Working out homeworks. Doing labs. Asking questions in lecture and in sections. This is a really key fact that most beginning students really miss out on; even in introductory courses, there are many challenging concepts which most students fail to absorb. (For instance, how many of you who have taken a basic physic class can explain how a top precesses? Or PRECISELY how the twin paradox works?) Watching another student ask the same questionm may help to some extent, but you will then miss out on another crucial part of learning, which is learning how to ask the right questions. When you boil it all down, learning is essentially an active, participatory experience; you will learn much, much more by becoming actively engaged, rather than just sitting back on your couch and watching a video or reading a book. And you simply cannot do that without lecturers, labs, teaching assistants, and so on. That is why learning at all levels (kindergarten and up) is inevitably so expensive, if done properly.

Bob

Two Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

It makes sense MIT would be the one to do this. Universities in general are becoming more and more like corporations, trying to maximize revenue by any means possible. MIT on the other hand focuses on science and engineering, and both those fields place high value on spreading the information they develop. Think about the push among scientists to get away from expensive scientific journals and publish on the web for free instead.

My other thought is that this could be very useful in developing countries that can't afford an extensive university system. Bright people who want to learn a field could pick it up over then net. Not as good as going to a school, but a whole lot better than nothing.

Open Degree Programs

[MichaelPenne]

The next evolution I see (as a courseware developer at a university) is an open degree program: folks take the best classes for their degree from schools all over the world, and then receive the degree from their preferred degree granting institution.

The benefits of this is that one is not limited to the quality of classes at your local U, if the CS dept is better at MIT, or a particular class is better at Yale, on can take the course there (virtually).

The things that local schools will provide: computer/web access, standard software and help for that software, places to collaborate with other students, get cheap beer and pizza, take classes that require in person interaction, places to take proctored tests, etc.

Overall, moving a good part of education online will help free us from the geographical bounds that currently make it tough for kids from San Diego (or Capetown) to get an MIT education, while allowing the best teachers to teach the best students from around the world.

Of course, how to pay & get paid for all this is another issue, and the one currently holding back alot of technology use in education.

Some of the other problems:

Faculty often don't get paid for taking the time to put their materials online. Some schools have a team that does this for the faculty, but many other schools expect them to learn to make their web pages themselves.

(The irony is that while the don't get paid to type and format their lectures in html and draw their diagrams in illustrator or gimp, they _do_ get paid to spend man-decades of their teaching career scrawling on blackboards! One of the things that drives me nuts about the "traditional" in class experience is sitting around or trying to keep up while a prof. scratches away at a black board or white board when this information could be so much better displayed in a nice, readable font on a projected website!)

The effectiveness of classes is often partly judged by how many students show up. We had a prof. who teaches an 7am ecology class take all his very good online materials down because he got marked down on reviews for having so few students show up.

Of course the problems with monitoring testing & providing hands on technology help for students who lack tech skills, the 'digital divide'.

Fair use of copywritten materials.

In any event, it's a great first step by MIT. Hopefully the politics and economics of online education will catch up with the technology someday.

University Degrees Misunderstood

[samx]

Sounds like you have not understood the concept of scientific education. The point of it is _not_ to get you ready, or give you the skills for the job market. The point is to give you the skills needed in scientific work. That is, instead of teaching you to know the newest buzzword programming language, all the available protocols, or libraries, you are being tought to understand the underlying concepts, and to give them a sound firm basis. To give you the tools to analyze and reason about the concepts.

There is a difference between _knowing_ something, and _understanding_ something. When you know how to do something well, you are good in a craft. When you _understand_ why doing something one way is good, and in another way is bad (versus just knowing based on experience that one way works well, and the other works poorly), you are looking from a scientific point of view.

Most programmers excel in the crafty way, and ignore the science. You could say: So what, it works the way we are doing it. At the same time everyone is complaining about how badly software works, that they are full of bugs, security holes, etc..

Anyone saying the current trend in software development is in any way mature is just being ignorant. Open source development, where you have 1000 people fixing bugs in a cvs server helps make great products that work fairly well. But the bugs should not have been there in the first place! And you would rather be able to do it with the same quality without needing the 1000 people watching after you.

This is where the science comes in. It is trying to understand how we could program (or whatever activity you are doing) better, why those bugs happen, what we could do to stop them from happening in the first place. How we could automate things, why reuse works so poorly that we need 100 different ad hoc solutions for each problem, etc.

It seems there are many people who go through colleges and universities, who miss the point of what is being tought, and why it is being tought. This makes people who are saying: It was all a waste - we didn't learn anything. If you were looking to learn the newest widgets needed a job world, I'm sure you were dissapointed, and likely even resisted learning the stuff that was 'theoretical - nothing to do with real world - waste". Well, based on history, most of that waste will be the central concepts in 10-50 years, when the industry catches up.

Without science we'd still have blacksmiths do all our pots one at a time, each one working a bit differently from the previous. Without science, in 50 years, we'd still be programming software with the same 'ad hoc' methods we are using today.

Re:University Degrees Misunderstood

[galapagos]

hey dont forget the engineers. It is the engineers who observe whats going wrong and apply the science to rectify it. Half of the problem with software is we just forgot the engineering discipline - the production engineers who crafted supply-chain , the electrical engineers who had red-blue-green colors instead of inventing half a dozen stupid uml signs "sometimes common sense jyst works"

Link http://web.mit.edu/ocw/

[edgrale]

If anyone is wondering, the link is http://web.mit.edu/ocw/ . It can also be found at www.mit.edu just press the OpenCourseWare link.

I'm neck deep in LMS

[cvd6262]

I've been touting OKI and OpenCourseWare since we first heard about it. I'm working on a PhD in Instructional Tech, and I have to deal with people from SCORM, BlackBoard, and WebCT all the time.

What the people whose employments are threatened by open course stuff say is that MIT is doing this to force their faculty to create new stuff. Bullocks!

I personally do not care where it comes from, or why it's being distributed for free, but, if the quality is high, it will cause some change to the field.

PS - If you're looking for an Open Source prokect that's up this alley, look into textweaver.

What about the problem sets?

[JumpingBull]

This is very heartening news, as usually the professors that make the course material do research on that subject. Usually the course note depth is directly proportional to the intellectual passion for the subject.

However....

There is a lot more involved in mastering technical material then straight memorization of endless facts. In order to organize the facts, a simple mnemonic (theory - ok, maybe not so simple..) is used as an index, or memory trigger to a body of knowledge. This uses the ability to chunk complex sets of information into an abstraction. Recalling the information is walking the (chunked) tree. (Although Ted Nelson's ZigZag http://www.xanadu.com/zigzag/ might be a better representation). Making sure that those processes are firmly grasped by the wetware ( ie the brain) is the tough part. Also, a series of tests, exercises, assignments, etc. are required to cement that knowledge into long term memory.

In addition, there is ( as a poster has pointed out) the important human element in learning. Camradarie is not only found in the Military, but even in Slashdot! Flames and trolls notwithstanding...

Universities, despite their flaws, are still where you would find the Hackish majority. I blame the libraries, personally. Industry is ok, but you don't get the really ugly ( read - fun) problems there.

But, if problem sets are also released, I for one will be dancing in the streets!

Can you say REAL Information Insemination?

[domenic v1.0]

Who's ready to learn??? I am!

Connexions project

[roystgnr]

If you've got a MathML enabled browser (and it's associated fonts) installed, take a look at Rice University's Connexions Project. I worked there when it was getting started a couple years ago, and it was already being used as the "textbook" in a few electrical engineering classes. I think it's still mostly electrical engineering and math content, but the means of presenting that content (single-concept "modules" which professors can tie together and expand into courses navigated via a Mozilla sidebar panel) is pretty neat.

Tell the politicians to support internet learning.

[CemeteryWall]

I have just emailed my Member of Parliament suggesting that our government encourage universities here to do the same at MIT.

To be effective the universities should be given credit that leads to increases in funding.

I hope others will contact their MP's too. A good way is Fax Your MP

Incremental Value

[Anonymous Coward]

The value of MIT releasing course materials is, at least in the short-term, more incremental than revolutionary. Within the short-term, degrees and degree granting institutions will continue to have value. The real impact is that institutions with less-than-stellar quality course materials will be able to use MIT's. And that there can be an open-source effort to improve upon the best of the materials released. Instead of replacing degree programs, this move will increase the value of degree programs in general by making the curriculum better.

Which is not to say that the long-term revolutionary potential of free learning over the web should be ignored. Just that discussion up to this point seems to have ignored the short-term reform aspect.

Missing the point

[Mishra2002]

I think most of you are missing the point of what open courseware is trying to accomplish. In typical slashdot fashion you're looking at this through CS eyes. MIT however teaches much more than CS. Certification may be all well and good for programmers, but what about Aerospace engineers? As a recent graduate from the hell known as course 16 I can attest that my MIT education is not something you could get from simply reading. Almost all of my classes involved projects and getting my hands dirty in one way or another once I advanced beyond basic knowledge. MIT is publishing its course material as a guide, a primer as to what goes into making some of the best engineers in the world. In no way shape or form however is this inteneded to replace a university education.

-Mishra

MIT "free" online software..yeah right..

[Anonymous Coward]

Post materials on web..get "free' feddback from online people ...go back to the classroom and use for nothing, where students are paying $30,000 /year tuition and average instructor pay is $140,000...why should open source , open education people help these guys operate an education factory/business ?
To many people these days open source, really means free improvements applied to commercial materials with no financial overhead....

Re:MIT "free" online software..yeah right..

[Anonymous Coward]

You're a cynical dipshit, motherfucker.
btw, the average prof make much less than 140k at MIT, and much less than he or she could make if they switched to industry. Say what you will, but these are not people primarily motivated by money.

Re:MIT "free" online software..yeah right..

[donnejohn]

What is MIT selling...degrees right? .You can't get one if you do not pony-up the money..read all the crap you want online you do not get a degree

Video Tutorials

[Anonymous Coward]

nerdmaker.com

the revolution has begun. More classes sold = less cost per class, eventually 1-3 dollars/class

nifty

[RestiffBard]

I know that being able to prove you know the material may be important to many of us but for me this is just nifty as hell. science and computers and all that nifty geek crap we're into is my hobby. I don't think I could ever be a quantum physicist for a job but I love "the knowing" of it.

This is very cool for those of us that just want "the knowing."

Re: Depends on the person

[xidix]

You are making a HUGE generalization.

I know a fellow who graduated with a 4-year CS degree, and couldn't write a program to save his life. When he was in school (a fairly prestigious southeastern university) all of his programming assignments were group efforts. So he just got in the groups with the best programmers, then offered to do the jobs no one else wanted (documentation and presentation). On the rare occasion that he had an individual assignment his friend, a brilliant programmer, would "help" him with his assignment. Today, he has a nice shiny degree hanging on his wall, that most would agree is worth no more than the MCSE of a "Transcender Afficianado".

Do you think he is a unique case?

While there are a lot of paper-toting know-nothings in the world, there are also quite a lot of certified developers and administrators who, while lacking financial means to attend college, had the drive and initiative to master their skills through self-study, and used certification simply as a metric to demonstrate their knowledge. Let's not start blindly lumping people into categories of academic haves and have nots.

While perhaps not a shining star to point to (especially on Slashdot) Bill Gates could serve well as an example of someone who rose to greatness without the help of an academic degree. He dropped out of Harvard in his junior year to found Microsoft. Would he somehow have been a better programmer or businessman if he had spent an extra two and a half years drinking and playing cards, and left with a piece of paper?

Separate "Certification" from Trusted Authority

[Anonymous Coward]

For security certificates, a trusted authority verifies that you are who you say you are. When you say you are educated, you are making a claim about yourself. Currently universities and colleges act as Trusted authorities, certifiers, and trainers. It is time to break out these functions into separate roles. To get a "degree" should involve getting tested by one party whose testing procedures are open to validation by Trusted authorities, who receive the documentation from testers regarding your performance (or lack of) and who verify your completion of a particular course of study. In this way, educators, testers and certifiers can work independent of schools. The free market would determine what courses of study were valuable and which credientials would be required.

Re:Macintosh homosexuals

[Anonymous Coward]

No kidding. Did you watch Junkyard Wars with the curly-haired MIT fairy? I had to be told twice and I had to check three times to be sure it was a guy. I still don't believe it. I don't care if he can etch his own CPU on a grain of sand, that's still the gayest guy I've ever seen.
He must be real happy to be surrounded by guys like that.
FAG

Excellent Idea

[j_kenpo]

I have to commend MIt for their effort in this field. This is definitly a idea whos time should have happened much earlier. Inside of our online learning portion of our intranet, we offer many such free courses to individuals in our company willing to learn (hence our title for this "Willing Learner"). I know of other professors at local Universitis that would take full advantage of this. An idea like this coming from MIT can only raise the bar of education for other institutions and students willing to take advantage of this. I can say Ill be looking at some of this content myself...

Caltech's already begun

[olafva]

Some Caltech CS courses
are already on-line including CS294,
by Professor DeHon, formerly of MIT & Berkeley.

Re:Caltech's already begun

[olafva]

Click Working Calender for Powerpoint slides. See also

Perfect

[ronaldocv]

You got right to the point. Certs will never replace a good grad, it's just a way to show an expertise in an specific set of programs. The cert followers seems to ignore that without CS and hard study not even Windows would exist (that wouldn't be so bad...). Worst: most people just install and use a Linux distro, but who assembles it? Guess who! My point is: if you love computing, like I and many people around here do, you fell that a BCS is that step ahead you need. -Ronaldo Campinas, Brazil

Take a Lesson from Firefly

[serutan]

Lots of very interesting opinions being expressed here, but considering our recent experience with Firefly let's hold off on analyzing MIT's program until Sept 30 when it's actually released. Then we can actually look at some of the course material and THEN unleash our praises and criticisms. Personally, having attended a small, non-geek-friendly liberal arts college because I was too introverted to move away from home, I'm salivating to partake of a little vicarious MIT experience, even in a small way.

Keep in mind

[dmomo]

that learning from OCW is not the same as taking a course. Granted, someone who is motivated enough to learn on their own will still benefit greatly from this. However, remember that the courses themselves will not be available through the OCW sie. From the FAQ "Rather, the goal of MIT OCW is to provide the content that supports an MIT education". While the readings themselves will not be available, sylabii (SP?), lecture notes (and most usefully) assignments will be. This is still contingent, of course on the level of participatory initiative that is undertaken by faculty and assistants. Offering materials through OCW is purely voluntary.

OCW is more geared towards faculty of other institutions who want a guide in developing a curriculum. Still, independant learners are encouraged to take advantage.

On a sidenote, while currently working for MIT obtaining reproduction permissions for course handouts, it appears to me that copyright is one of OCW's hurdles. While copyright is currently on the verge of redefinition, a lot of thought has to be put into the formalities of offering free content on-line.

It's not about certs. Its idealism.

[brrent]

From the very beginning MIT has made it clear that this is NOT the path to a degree, but rather a way for those who want to learn, to access extremely high quality educational material. They have made their "idealism" very clear. I applaud them. I am sure many in poorer countries will do likewise, whilst hungrily gobbling up knowledge. It will be of great assistance to schools of all stripes in developing nations as they seek to "add meat" to their curriculums.

I love to learn. I am 50 yr. old US citizen, without a college, degree but wish I had one. However, a LOVE of learning drives my 3 or 4 hours of study per day, NOT the dream of a degree -- diminishing marginal returns, blah, blah. I am almost drooling at the possibility of access to such materials.

This initiative is not about helping poor, starving US dot commers who have just experienced a reality check get a free/cheap degree, or a better job. MIT is truly practicing the "Golden Rule".

Blessings on MIT!

brrent

New?

[scabbers]

It is quite usual at a german universtity (at least in the natural sciences) that the teachers have (LaTeXed) material to their lectures which is put on the net and often equivalent to textbooks (but have the advantage of beeing exactly the same stuff as done in th lectures).

Re: Depends on the person

[Anonymous Coward]

> Bill Gates could serve well as an example

And Larry Ellison of Oracle is also a drop-out.

So is Steve Jobs (although he's more of a marketeering guy).

of course open course ware is about tuition

[Anonymous Coward]

a. yes the opencourseware IS related to the tuition issues. see answer below c.

b. MIT has had all of its course info, lecture notes, psets, exams, solutions, etc, on-line since www began. it's not new. for many course, it was always there if you just looked through their web pages.

c. greenspun isn't the only one who said mit should be tuition free, and he isn't the first either. see answer below c.

MIT, like the ivies, has a problem: their base is the middle class, so how do they keep educating the middle class. as tuition rises, only the ultra rich and ultra poor get to afford private schools. the cost of an undergrad student is twice as high as the price of their tuition; MIT subsidizes the remaining parts using its grants. but where is the expense? in having students on campus.
many times the ivies and mit have discussed making tuition free--it would take a billion dollar endowment, give or take. not that outrageous at all. yale has moved toward it by just having grants/work study instead of loans. mit and harvard are working out their own plans.

by formalizing the opencourseware initiative, there's a major win on many levels. first, the material was already on the web because that's what the profs wanted, so they didn't have to expend resources keeping it off; second, it allows other people to use their resources, which produces more fact checking, etc. third, it being a door by which MIT can create a way to "make tuition free"--by having students do MIT coursework without coming to MIT. maybe not today will this be used toward accreditation, but maybe not so far away. this lowers MIT's cost, and solves one of MIT's problems re: teaching to the middle class. then, sure, MIT is more than just course materials--those who REALLY want the experience will pay to attend. but the numbers will be smaller. (solves a different problem too: the major source of lawsuit troubles is the student body. if they aren't "on campus
, MIT is extremely unlikely to be held liable for their actions..) because what makes MIT better than other schools Doesn't Scale. Period. and who in their right mind would begin a university today, under the staggering weight of state and federal legislation?

MIT can't maintain its prowess and exponentially increase its size. but it CAN reach a larger audience with materials on the web.

the UC system is trying to do the same--but different colleges there are doing VASTLY different things wrt copyright and web rights. MIT understands those issues are loses in the long run for it anyway.

you may think colleges are obsolete for a variety of reasons. they --colleges--worry about that too. to be not obsolete, they must adapt. they are attempting to do so.

THEY ALREADY EXIST!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you guys SURF THE WEB????

this is so ludicrous. this material is ALREADY THERE, LARGELY. (okay, maybe not in ANThro--but who the HELL went to MIT for anthro? none of us--we did that FOR FUN)

the course materials HAVE BEEN AVAILABLE TO ANYONE for YEARS for most of these courses. JUST SURF MIT's class web pages!

really! just DO IT.

if you guys were really interested in learning,

[Anonymous Coward]

or hell,

if you guys actually SURFED THE WEB,

you'd see that most of these course materials WERE ALREADY AVAILABLE. freely. on their course web sites.

HAD BEEN FOR YEARS.
just like at other universities.

but i guess you aren't interested in learning, just talking about it.

not price fixing: so said a fed court

[Anonymous Coward]

you say it's equiv to price fixing. but that was argued in court, and MIT won. go look it up.
read about Constantine Simonides and what he argued. they won for a reason.
and before you think about "price-fixing", usually, that's done at a profit. but the ivies and MIT SUBSIDIZE 50% of the cost of ugrads. that's right, ugrad tuition doesn't cover HALF of the costs to MIT.

don't blame the system for you not going there. you could have gone to MIT and incurred debt like many others did. that was your choice. their choice was well worth it on that level, if you look at how fast MIT alums pay off their loans.

Re:not price fixing: so said a fed court

[Hal-9001]

I think the main reason I'm bitter is I would like to have put something on the dome, but $100,000+ over four years to put something on the dome is a little much. Besides that, I have no regrets of completing my undergraduate studies at a public institution, debt-free. In fact, I think it is smarter to save on one's undergraduate expenses by going to a public institution than to go to a private institution, no matter how prestigious, and incur a mountain of debt. And I know many of my college friends agree with me, because a lot of them turned down offers of admission for MIT, Caltech, and the like. After all, you can always go to those places for graduate school, and in computer science or engineering, they will usually fully subsidize the cost, regardless of financial need. Which begs the question: why not do that for undergraduate studies, too?

Re:question to slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

shatner was the first man in space

Re:question to slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone would think you work on the 5th floor or something.

p.s Picard.

"Online Superstars"

[aricusmaximus]

Being someone who was in the online education market (pre dot-bomb), let me tell you *exactly* what's going to happen (and in fact I've already seen happening):

Right now every teacher for every class delivers lectures. In the future (10-20 years), this will be the exception. Here's what we'll see:

• As with music and books, will be an online store of "greatest hits" - collections of the best online lectures and course materials (tests, activities, skills tests).
  
• The vast majority of instructors will be relegated either to being "support" positions (like most T.A.'s today), roaming class bulletin boards, or being "production assistants" to the Professorial "Superstar", or proctors (grading) for non-automated (e.g. non-multiple choice) tests and assignments.

This is analogous to what's happened in the music industry. Live band performances are the exception, not the rule. Live bands were killed by the invention of records, CD's, and video. (Most) Live courses are going to be killed by the internet. There's simply no need for 1000's of professors to do "covers" of the material one professor (or a good team of educators) can create and distribute online.

FYI - here's how a new (and very good!) online course is produced and automated:

1. A "Superstar" Professor ("Prof. BIG IQ") and her team creates an online course.
   
2. She teaches the course for one quarter. (alpha-testing)
   
3. She reviews how the course went, and finds ways to automate (via reorganizing and adding more course material, more skills checks) the areas that students find hard to understand. The goal is to have the course "automate" the questions the students ask most.
   
4. She "tests" the course again, by teaching it another quarter (beta-testing).
   
5. She repeats steps 3 and 4 (rewriting, adding, revising, and testing) until "the course practically teaches itself".
   
6. The course is finally "published" and, in fact is better than 99% of the "non-automated" courses out there. Professor "BIG IQ" (and her support team) now moves onto the next challenge.
   
   Note that I use "is produced" rather than "will be produced in the future" up above, because it's already happening.
   
   You heard it here first, ladies and gentlemen.

OpenCourseWare is in *beta*

[McIntyre]

I've had the pleasure and opportunity to be involved in the Web development side of MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW), and just from coding up all the sample exams, lecture notes, handouts and problem sets I've learned an amazing amount without even intending to. Today, for instance, I'm delving into the world of Linguistics and the intricacies of Tagalog and Athabaskan Slave-Hare.

It is not just the usual course syllabus and general course information going up on these sites.

It is important to keep in mind that Sept. 30th is the "public beta" of the pilot site for the MIT OCW project. We are making our first batch of course sites available to the world, while we continue to work out the kinks and bugs in anticipation for the full launch a year from now.

For someone who is self-taught in Web development and research (like many others here), MIT OCW is not just a valuable tool for teachers and people already knowledgeable of the subject matter on the site, it's an incredible resource for everyone who has access to it -- from the very basic programming skills taught in "Introduction to Computers and Engineering Problem Solving," to the complex mathematics of nonlinear dynamics and chaos theory.

Definitely check out the site on Sept. 30 and let us know what you think. Your feedback will help us as we continue to improve.

Last Post!

[alpg]

Alan Cox wrote:
>> On any procmail new enough not to be full of security holes you set
>Brain on, Imeant majordomo of course 8)
You got me worried there for a brief (very brief) moment :-).
-- Stephen R. van den Berg (AKA BuGless)

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...