Sebastian Thrun Pivots Udacity Toward Vocational Education

lpress writes "Udacity CEO and MOOC super star Sebastian Thrun has decided to scale back his original ambition of providing a free college education for everyone and focus on (lifelong) vocational education. A pilot test of Udacity material in for-credit courses at San Jose State University was discouraging, so Udacity is developing an AT&T-sponsored masters degree at Georgia Tech and training material for developers. If employers like this emphasis, it might be a bigger threat to the academic status quo than offering traditional college courses."

Comments

LOL

[dcollins]

"If employers like this emphasis, it might be a bigger threat to the academic status quo than offering traditional college courses."

Please. Here is a list of technologies that did NOT result in the demise of college education:

- Books mass-produced on the printing press.
- Correspondence courses in the early 1900's, engaged by millions of hopeful learners at the time.
- Radio or television programming.
- Software-based learning from the 1960's onward.
- Online courses from the 1990's onward.
- MOOC in the 2010's onward.

I really don't understand the Slashdot mass delusion that this or any technology could mean the death of colleges in any short- to medium time frame.