Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Forget University — Use the Web For Education, Says Gates

Posted by Soulskill on from the school-two-point-oh dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Bill Gates attended the Techonomy conference earlier this week, and had quite a bold statement to make about the future of education. He believes the Web is where people will be learning within a few years, not colleges and university. During his chat, he said, 'Five years from now on the web for free you'll be able to find the best lectures in the world. It will be better than any single university.'" Of course, the efficacy of online learning is still in question; some studies have shown a measurable benefit to being physically present in a classroom. Still, online education can clearly reach a much wider range of students. Reader nbauman sent in a related story about MIT's OpenCourseWare, which is finding success in unexpected ways: "50% of visitors self-identified as independent learners unaffiliated with a university." The article also mentions a situation in which a pair of Haitian natives used OCW to get the electrical engineering knowledge they needed to build solar-powered lights that have been deployed in many remote towns and villages.

1 of 393 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Guy with lots of money says it, so it must be t by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    So my choices are believe the guy who made SO much money he quit his job and they still pay him a fortune ... or ...

    believe the teachers and professors who's sole goal in life is to get tenure so they don't have to worry about working hard ever again.

    You may be right that Gates isn't really qualified to make such a statement, but I'm more inclined to believe the man who 'does' rather than I am to believe the man that 'tells me how to do it, but doesn't actually do it himself' which is what professors are.

    If they could get a real job, they wouldn't be professors. Being a professor has the advantages of being able to have your students do your work for you, getting paid, and eventually having a nice permeant get out of jail free card.

    Those who can, Do.

    Those who can't, teach about it.

    Those who can't teach about it, write books telling everyone else how to teach about it and do it.