10 ms·

Udacity the new ITT Tech?

186 points by masters3d 10y ago

sumitgt 10y ago
I really used to love Udacity, but at some point their constant mini-quizzes just drove me nuts. Totally broke my flow. I prefer the Pluralsight approach. Quickly going through some Pluralsight courses has really broadened my toolset. I prefer to think of MOOCS as a way to augment what you learn via traditionally methods as opposed to replacing traditional education entirely.
- lfowles 10y ago
  > I prefer to think of MOOCS as a way to augment what you learn via traditionally methods as opposed to replacing traditional education entirely. From the ones I've taken, they would be great as a replacement to the various Intro To X courses in a traditional curriculum. Although, I'm pretty sure half of my senior classes for my bachelors degree were still Intro To X!
- FLGMwt 10y ago
  I actually went the opposite. At some point I realized I was watching Pluralsight courses and declaring success because I finished the last video and therefore I was leveled up in that thing. Quizzes on Udacity stuff and Coursera courses (especially Odersky's Scala one) often catch me cheating where I realize I had drifted and missed the information I'm being quizzed on. I'll go back and watch the relevant bit thoughtfully and then be able to answer.
  - amerkhalid 10y ago
    This is my experience too. Also I used to watch Coursera videos on Android App. But if I lose my position in a video, it was pain to figure out where I left off. I like short videos cause much easier to recover where you left off from. Also I am not a paying member of Udacity but seriously considering them for Android dev program.
- spikefromspace 10y ago
  Same here. The content is split into 2-5 minute videos and it constantly has to reload new videos and the mini quizzes interrupt the flow. I'd much rather watch a full 30min-1hour lecture in one go. Personally though, I do think the content itself and the project reviews are helpful.
- muraiki 10y ago
  Sometimes it can be the opposite case. The Udacity course on statistics with Katie Kormanik has lots of well designed problems to work on as she taught various statistical concepts. This helped make sure that I really understood what was being taught and strongly cemented the concepts in my mind. That being said, this particular course is very well designed and it was clear that the instructor had actual experience _teaching_ (she has a M.Ed. from Stanford). On the other hand, I've taken -- and given up on -- both Udacity and Coursera (more lecture oriented) courses that had absolutely abysmal instruction. I had no doubt in the instructor's skill at the particular domain, but it was clear they had no idea how to teach.
- criddell 10y ago
  Pluralsight looks pretty neat. I'm looking for a Ruby on Rails course and it looks like they have a bunch.
- posterboy 10y ago
  As an opposite argument, I valued the chance to skip hours of introductory video after simply solving the tests.
calebm 10y ago
From what I've seen, Udacity's classes are of the utmost quality. I don't have any experience with ITT Tech, but I always got the impression the class material was lacking in quality.
- slm_HN 10y ago
  I was doing a survey of the beginning programming MOOCs that teach Python. The Udacity course, Programming Foundations with Python - Learn Object Oriented Programming, was by far the worst. I don't see how anyone could think it had "utmost quality". Both EdX and Coursera had classes that were much better.
  - wikibob 10y ago
    Which particular classes on EdX and Coursera did you find to be worthwhile?
FLGMwt 10y ago
Disclosure: I'm not a Udacity employee, but I am a fan and a MOOC supporter (since I only program professionally because I learned through them + books). Only say this because I'm about to be pretty defensive of Udacity. 1) Not all new nanodegrees use the new pricing model. So far, only the more rigorous ones announced do: Self Driving Car Engineer & AI Engineer. The new VR one is the same monthly model. All existing courses are the monthly model, for now. 2) The monthly ones offer a 50% back offer. If you finish within a year, you get half your tuition back, so $100 for every month it took. To be fair, they could stop this at any time, but it was supposed to only last a few months, but they've been doing it since early last year. 3) Per their terms, to graduate, you must complete all projects and pay at least one month of tuition which is $200 in the US. With the half back offer, this becomes $100 if you finish in the first month + 7 day trial. The article quotes $400 4) Most of the courses are free to take. 5) Some of the degrees offer a job guarantee if you pay a bit more. 6) The content is damn good quality, from what I've been exposed to. Google people teach Android classes, Nvidia people teach graphics, MongoDB people tech MongoDB. At the very least, the quality is more consistent than other MOOC platforms. I might have went overboard O.O
- sremani 10y ago
  I took Introduction to Machine Learning class, and it was free and definitely of good quality. Even the expensive nano-degrees are not in the ball park of ITT tech tuition. $800 per 12 weeks for 3 terms, that is a grand total of $2400. That is a good amount, but for a 9 month course it is justifiable, and you will not get into debt that you cannot claw out of.
  - karmicthreat 10y ago
    Full disclosure, I paid for the first semester of the SDC course. I am hoping that udacity is able to keep this sort of pricing. I am also hoping that the udacity doesn't get subsidized through student loans like ITT was. I think it skews things so student and education company goals are no longer aligned. They have an interest in churning out as many students as possible with little quality control then. By making the student cough up a good but not insurmountable chunk of cash upfront udacity has to ultimately answer to the student market.
jamestimmins 10y ago
Udacity was an essential tool when I was working to get my first job as a developer, specifically the Intro to Web Development course taught by Steve Huffman. But its effectiveness came because it gave me the tools to go on and build projects in my free time; those are what I showed to potential employers, not the certificate I received from taking a (then) free online course. As far as I'm concerned, that's the key metric for education in a field like software development where students build projects to show to a potential employer: do graduates have the knowledge needed that they can go out and build projects that will get them hired, without naming where they acquired the knowledge. If you succeed in that for long enough, then the value of the brand name will develop naturally. Udacity still appears to be quite strong in what matters most, actually educating students, regardless of their marketing materials, which is where ITT Tech failed.
- muraiki 10y ago
  I also owe my career to that course -- and really, to Steve Huffman's excellent instruction. The course has just the right level of depth. From that course I went on to build a paid site with Django (which also has great instruction in the form of an amazing tutorial), and shortly thereafter was able to land my first programming job using that project and some other things as my portfolio.
Kluny 10y ago
I've heard a lot of positive reviews of Udacity's courses, but I wonder if those come from people's bias after sinking a lot of money and time into it. Has anyone done a nanodegree on their employer's dime (regular wage plus tuition)? What did you think?
- spikefromspace 10y ago
  I did the Tech Entrepreneur nanodegree over a period of 7 months. With the half your money back offer, I ended up paying $700 into the course and ended the course with an interactive prototype and a marketing plan. Both of those I still use to move my product development forward, so I felt that it was money well spent. In comparison, I have taken classes in my grad school that I spent $1200+ on that I ended with anything to show for it. I will say though that Udacity show more preview content and maybe a longer trial period (currently 7 days). I did try the Android nanodegree and felt it was not worth my time but that was because of my experience in it.
- andreyk 10y ago
  I took the Data Analyst nanodegree, paid entirely by my company as you say. I don't think it's really worth it as the classes are pretty shallow and undemanding, but after a year of doing it I did get a lot of exposure to different languages/technologies and the opportunity to do several cool projects (here's an example http://www.andreykurenkov.com/writing/visualizing-imdb-data-with-d3/ http://www.andreykurenkov.com/writing/visualizing-imdb-data-...). So I think for expanding your knowledge base while being employed or doing other things, it's quite good (and, there is also Udacity's MS program with Georgia Tech for more serious education and credentials). It is even perhaps worth paying the $100 a month yourself if you put in the work to finish a bit early (the deadlines are set so it takes 13 months if you don't try to finish early). But, there is a lot they could do to improve - the nano degrees really are a bunch of totally separate MOOC classes strung together.
  - Kluny 10y ago
    Data Analyst is actually the one I'm interested in. Did you have a background in data science already that made the course seem entry-level to you? How hard did you push yourself?
curiouscat321 10y ago
I've never been involved with Udacity or any for-profit schools. But, its remarkable how much that ad feels like a University of Phoenix ad. Most for-profit school ads seem to push flexibility and future job earnings. University of Phoenix (and Udacity) go for a much subtler route for the TV ads I've seen. They glamorize the ending jobs and the college-student/professional lifestyle. In my mind, the worst for-profit schools suffer from two distinct issues: bad instruction and bad credentialing. Udacity supposedly has fixed the instruction problem with strong industry ties. But, they haven't fixed the credentialing problem. A Udacity nanodegree is still worth very little, if anything, compared to any other form of education.
- markdown 10y ago
  For the Nanodegree courses, Udacity guarantees a job or your money back. Would your perception of Uni of Phoenix change if they did the same?
  - hellogoodbyeeee 10y ago
    What kind of job are they guaranteeing? My current position is like 25% data science and 75% business analyst (with a business analyst level salary). If they would guarantee me a job that was 100% data scientist with a $100k salary I would sign up in a heart beat, but I figure they will say I already have a job doing that function and not give me my money back.
    - rockdiesel 10y ago
      https://www.udacity.com/nanodegree/plus https://www.udacity.com/nanodegree/plus https://udacity.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/207695886-What-type-of-jobs-will-you-offer- https://udacity.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/207695886-What... https://www.udacity.com/legal/nanodegreeplus https://www.udacity.com/legal/nanodegreeplus
      - kd0amg 10y ago
        Udacity guarantees you a job offer as an employee or a contractor within 6 months from receiving your Nanodegree Plus credential (the Job Placement Period). Further, in your new job Udacity guarantees that your gross income from such job will be in excess of your cost of tuition (pre-tax) within a 3 month period following job placement. 3 months at (US federal) minimum wage is roughly $3500, well over a year's tuition.
king_magic 10y ago
To be brutally honest, I've been pretty unimpressed with Udacity - specifically, their Deep Learning and AI for Robotics courses. I personally felt the quality of the content was low enough that I could not justify paying for something larger, like their Self-Driving Car Nanodegree (which I was accepted to for their first run, but I ultimately declined to shell out $2,400 USD because of the quality issues I observed in those other classes). Compared to some of the courses I've taken on Coursera (e.g. Andrew Ng's Machine Learning), the general quality from Coursera blew Udacity out of the water. End of the day, I'm not going to pay for content that is poorly stitched together, contradictory, constantly interrupting you, short on delivering insightful explanations and simply unclear in many places. I'm not going to pay to waste my time on forums to tease out information for solving quizzes / programming challenges that should have been covered in the course content. I'm not going to pay to deal with snarky TA's on a power trip. I'm not going to pay to waste my time because the course quizzes or programming assignments are expecting you to magically gain some insight that could not be reasonably attained by viewing the course content only. And I'm not saying these courses should necessarily be easy - not at all - but there should be some reasonable level of success attainable without having to endlessly scour the internet for why your solution, which looks pretty correct based on the course material, isn't passing in their test harness - only to learn that the author of the course decided to arbitrarily switch the order of two operations in his solution (that were previously demonstrated over and over in the reverse order), and that's why your submission is failing. Sorry, but screw that. Not worth my time, not worth my money. And to anyone else about to shell out a large chunk of cash to Udacity - think long and hard before you do - there are likely better options out there.
- garysieling 10y ago
  I've been trying to build out a site of free standalone lectures (https://www.findlectures.com https://www.findlectures.com), and it's become clearer as I've been building a collection of content how different the motivations behind free material is from paid. If a university / professor / hiring manager is behind the free content, they're promoting their brand, so they need really compelling material to stand out from everyone else.
  - 10y ago
kyleschiller 10y ago
I used to work at Udacity so I'm pretty biased, but I will say that the concern here seems pretty misplaced. "The reality is that the for profit school’s only goal was to make money for their investors. It doesn’t matter if the students are not able to find jobs in their field. It doesn’t matter if most students work dead end jobs waiting for a tech job that never arrives." While it's not true for all programs, Udacity's nanodegree+ offers a full refund unless you can find a job. There are perfectly valid concerns about the quality of the job. Having said that, the even bigger and more fundamental difference between Udacity and ITT is that the vast majority of Udacity material is available for free online. Aside from the credential, what you're really paying for is personal feedback on projects. Because Udacity has to pay actual qualified engineers to give that feedback, it's appropriately expensive.
- wolfgke 10y ago
  > Aside from the credential, what you're really paying for is personal feedback on projects. The problem is that in countries as German, Austria (and I heard Brazil, too) there is a mentality of "credential or it did not happen". So for me, living in Germany, the only reason why I might be taking a course offering no credentials is that I am deeply interested in the topic. So perhaps it would be a good idea to offer a "very cheap certificate without any personal feedback".
kaa2102 10y ago
I decided to start searching for Udacity training and certificates after hearing the Udacity CEO speak at Google I/O in 2015. I have been extremely happy with that decision as I've found software developers that were knowledgeable, intelligent and intellectually curious. I did also go through an interview and learning/onboarding process but I would judge the Udacity by the outcomes and not the inputs or appearance of the ads.
droithomme 10y ago
Original Udacity was a competitor to Coursera and EdX. Current Udacity is not in that domain. It provides very specific technical training designed in consultation and funding with specific companies for skills that they need. Said companies then hire the top students in the classes. The classes work as a sort of technical screening. Not sure this is comparable to ITT Tech, which charged a lot of money for useless degrees. This said, many of the early Udacity classes are quite useful for general skills. Quality varies though and one problem they had was not updating content in reaction to feedback, not correcting either errors or areas that were unclear. These issues are somewhat irrelevant in their current targeted domain in which one either is able to pick it up with the training offered and get the job or not.
- rifung 10y ago
  > Said companies then hire the top students in the classes. The classes work as a sort of technical screening. Do you have any sources for this? I see that a lot of companies sponsor courses and nanodegrees, but I still haven't seen any statistics about jobs after "graduation". I had considered taking some nanodegrees myself but can't really justify it since I have to work full time and make a living which is difficult enough.
- SwellJoe 10y ago
  I would suggest that ITT was worse than useless. It was a negative indicator of quality for job candidates. Not having ITT on your resume is better than having ITT on your resume (even if nothing replaces it on the resume).
ralmidani 10y ago
Back in 2013 when I first discovered MOOCs, Udacity was more like Coursera and edX in that they had mostly traditional CS and Math courses. Now, in the catalog, the various Nanodegrees appear before any individual course. But if you scroll down, you'll see they still offer the old courses in topics like Programming Languages, Theoretical CS, and Differential Equations. Personally, I'm not in a rush to find employment, and am deliberately focusing on edX in order to prepare for a Masters. I took MIT's Intro to Programming with Python, and am now in Software Construction with Java. Both feel like timeless courses teaching principles applicable to any language or environment. Do Udacity Nanodegrees similarly teach transferable skills?
- BWStearns 10y ago
  It seems that the nano degrees are meant to provide a specific practical skill set as opposed to a broader academic inquiry. I think those skill sets are valuable (taking algo trading now), but the course is about how to use Python and statistics to build machine learning programs for finance, not about Python, stats, or finance. Maybe it's a bit of a distinction without a difference though because you'll have the beachhead from which to expand into each of those areas afterward.
bitL 10y ago
I see the current MOOC divided into 4 styles: - if you want academic rigor, you take edX and to some extent Coursera - if you want to learn something between academic and practical you never did before while working full time, you take Coursera courses - if you want to train yourself on some of the latest trends, you take Udacity - everything else that is outside big companies/academia you seek on Udemy and similar platforms I am happy with all these, I initially spent most of my learning time on Coursera, then moved mostly to edX for big-name university curriculum and now I am taking Udacity's self-driving car nanodegree and maybe later AI nanodegree if I get in. You simply need to choose what you want and then look at the appropriate platform. I am very happy we have now different shades of a good thing and I applaud to all people making this possible! Big thanks!
- umbs 10y ago
  IMO, this is a very clear summary of major MOOCs available for us today. I have taken courses on all the above MOOC offerings and completed courses to varying degrees. For a Software professional, the rigor in increasing order is: Udemy, Udacity, Coursera and edX. Of course, this is a very high level generalization and depends on each course/professor.
- sjnair96 10y ago
  Thank you for that! I seem to be in an eternal "paralysis analysis" stage when deciding what to study. I have gone years searching for the right tutorials/courses so that I can learn most efficiently. I know this is unhealthy and actually really inefficient, but I still do it :(
  - dwaltrip 10y ago
    Change always starts with a single small step. Completing a single lesson, even if you don't finish the rest of that course, could be that step. Do it for future you! =)
    - sjnair96 10y ago
      It's not that starting a course is hard, it's deciding which one that is hard.
dhawalhs 10y ago
The title is inflammatory. This article is based entirely on how he feels from a 30 second commercial and his experience with ITT Tech. It has nothing to do with his Udacity experience. Unlike ITT Tech or any other for-profit universities, you can do a majority of the Udacity curriculum for free. e.g For the VR Nanodegree (shown in the video), you can signup for the courses for free [1] and evaluate it whether the format/quality works for you. And like any other content provider, some courses might not be good as others. I am currently doing Udacity's Machine Learning Nanodegree [2] and also did the first AI class from Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig. Part of the Nanodegree involves doing courses from Georgia Tech's Masters in Computer Science curriculum. [1] https://www.udacity.com/course/vr-software-development--ud1014 https://www.udacity.com/course/vr-software-development--ud10... [2] https://www.udacity.com/uconnect/intensive https://www.udacity.com/uconnect/intensive
webwanderings 10y ago
I spend a good deal of time on various MOOC platforms as a learner and observer. In my opinion (no association with anyone), I think Udacity is a scam! There are way too many courses I have come across, which are there only to grab the money. There is no quality control there. In my opinion, Edx, Coursera, Khan Academy, are a better deal.
- jplahn 10y ago
  That's a pretty big accusation with no justification. Care to contribute some detail as to why Udacity is a scam?
  - webwanderings 10y ago
    Look at the quality of some of the content; extremely poor, but the cost does not reflect. The word scam may be too harsh, but I can't tell what it may be like when you pay for something and feel ripped off. Most of such content I have noticed, are generally referred through reddit via free coupons. But that does not negate the fact that they are being sold.
    - psbp 10y ago
      The Udacity content is all free, or as free as it is on Coursera and edX. You pay for additional stuff like code reviews, but the lectures and quizzes are all free. If anything it's more "free" than coursera.
      - webwanderings 10y ago
        I'll be damned. I confused the udemy with udacity. I guess I cannot edit my comments, or else I was going to remove them for a major affed up. When it comes to Internet, i.e, virtual material which you can't touch or feel...branding is all there is.
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cloudjacker 10y ago
Sure, if I can short it When's the IPO, know anybody in Congress to trade the enforcement actions in advance on my behalf?
yalogin 10y ago
I don't think promising a job will make Udacity on par with ITT. I am not qualified to comment on how good they are at placing candidates. I am currently going through the course for Autonomous Robots on Udacity. I am not in it for a job and I am not even in that domain to begin with. I just want to write code for an autonomous toy car. I find the course very good, particularly for someone without a AI background. Its intuitive and very simply laid out. I really like the small videos and quizzes at the end of each. This is precisely because I have no backgroud in AI, however even I am finding it annoying when I have to review an old lecture. On the whole I really like it though.
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foobar101010 10y ago
The unasked question is why does university need to be expensive so as to create what is becoming now a deep class divide in the society causing the dumping of increasing number of youth into the "service" economy. Thus destroying the value that society could have obtained from them had they been given a chance at an education.
- kyleschiller 10y ago
  Lack of competition. A University's revenue is basically defined by it's capacity, which means that lowering tuition doesn't let you "win" in any sense of the word. The huge boom in EdTech startups is partially attributable to tech allowing for the easy dissemination of information, but has even more to do with a huge unmet need for talented developers in a culture that isn't particularly concerned with degrees. All we're seeing now is the logical conclusion of those forces playing out.
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ankurjain10 10y ago
I strongly feel that Udacity has HUGE potential and the recent TV ad is quite inspiring. - From student's perspective, it can't get better than this - learning from the top instructors in the world at a very low price. Learning AI at a fraction of the cost. - From employer's perspective - I have hired more than 50 engineers both at startups and at world's biggest company. I would definitely value people with a nano-degree from Udacity over a course that they studied a decade ago in the college. The students from Udacity have more practical knowledge and understand the latest concepts. In my viewpoint, the biggest potential is the reach - people from all over the world can learn advanced technologies like Self-driving cars. Who could have imagined this few years ago! I am positive that companies worldwide would LOVE to interview candidates who have studied at Udacity.
- PostOnce 10y ago
  Would you trust a doctor with a nano degree before one who studied "a decade ago"?
  - jwagenet 10y ago
    This is a poor comparison. Over the last decade it is unlikely that the techniques and training to become a doctor have changed substantially. Sure, there are medical advances and new technologies that change how a doctor does business, but fundamentally the pace of change is slow. On the flip side, AI and ML have made significant strides within the last decade. Unless your career required you to keep up with and innovate in the space, you probably are well behind the times. A nanodegree may not stand well on its own, but coupled with previous experience it may be a way to show you are actually familiar with up to date trends and techniques on the topic.
- wernercd 10y ago
  Sorry to be snarky, but you come off a little strong... sounds a bit astroturfish? With that aside, I think the article makes a good points. Prices are rising and they seem to be mainly beneficial for existing professionals. IMO: Nano-degree's would only be a step above certifications - A+, Network+, etc. And a step below a 2 year degree... then most important, experience. A class from 10 years ago is definitely meaningless... after your first few jobs, college as a whole is meaningless outside of connections made and HR checkboxes to be met. For the same reason this nano-degree might help... but it'll be just as meaningless sooner - because its specialized, quickly out-dated and still less important than demonstratable experience or a 2/4 year degree.
kentt 10y ago
Betteridge's law of headlines: any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.
kuprel 10y ago
"The reality is that the for profit school’s only goal was to make money for their investors. It doesn’t matter if the students are not able to find jobs in their field" I know the founder and he really cares about people, especially his students
ukyrgf 10y ago
I wonder what a video like this does for the first impression from an employer's point of view. ITT Tech was viewed as cheap because their commercials played in the cheapest time slots, alongside adult hotlines and As Seen on TV ads. If an employer had never heard of Udacity and did research from scratch, they might like what they see. If they recognize it as one of those commercials that play in the middle of the night, they might just skip right over the resume. I was interested in pursuing a new field at Western Governors University after reading comments on sites like this and Reddit where a couple people said "I happily hire WGU grads because I know they put real work in". Then, I saw one of their commercials play on Comedy Central at 2 AM, and it immediately stopped those plans for me. You can't take anything seriously when it airs after this: http://www.perfectsmileteeth.com/ http://www.perfectsmileteeth.com/
andybak 10y ago
I'm usually quite good keeping track of TLA's but it's late and I've drawn a blank on what ITT stands for. Wikipedia is being no help: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT Anyone? (PS - I'm not ashamed to ask. I think it's a tiny public service to ask the meaning of an acronym as it reminds everyone else that these aren't necessarily universally understood even in our own little tech bubble)
- matlaber 10y ago
  International Telephone & Telegraph https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Technical_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Technical_Institute "By 1999, ITT Corporation (which had merged with Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide the year before) had divested itself completely of ITT Tech's shares. The schools were allowed to continue using the "ITT" name under license."
gigatexal 10y ago
Also not an employee, but the major difference between udacity and the ITT (sh*t school that it was) is the vendor created nano-degrees, the pay-as-you-go structure, and the ability to learn real world things.
the_watcher 10y ago
I'm a fan of MOOC's in general (at least as a concept), and support them charging for things like nanodegrees, in theory. While I do agree that the commercial is eerily similar in tone to the ITT Tech ads most of us remember, $2400 for a nanodegree is much cheaper. Further, so long as they continue to not be tempted by the federally backed loans spigot, people pay for these out of pocket, as opposed to levering the hell out of themselves. While that presents it's own issues, it wildly reduces the incentives that the excesses of federal loans has led to, as the fact that much of their market simply don't have that kind of money to outlay at once. Also, I've got a few friends who have gotten nanodegrees from Udacity, and every single one has been more than satisfied, which may color my opinion a bit. That said, I'm a firm believer in the idea that there should be options for those of us who prefer a structured curriculum of courses, but aren't interested in the breadth education required from a traditional degree, and that is priced in a way that someone who lives frugally can save for and pay for up front, out of pocket.
crispytx 10y ago
I just finished taking the first of their Android Basics courses (User Interface), and I thought it was excellent. The course was free however. I'd be hesitant to pay $200 a month though for the non-free courses. In my opinion, Udacity's courses are high quality, but also expensive.
eranation 10y ago
I think it's not. First thing people tend to forget is that aside from then nano degrees, they offer a master of science in computer science degree from Georgia Tech (a top 10 CS graduate school) for about $7,000. Sebastian Thrun, Udacity's CEO and founder, ex google VP (developed their self driving car project) and a Stanford professor, initiated it, AT&T donated money and Zvi Galil (college of computing dean) and the GT faculty took the challenge and built it with Udacity's assistance. There are already several graduates, and evidence shows the rigor is ad high as on campus. It just can't be compared to ITT without having in mind they enabled the world best "ranking to cost" ratio program in the world in my opinion. Source: I'm a GT OMSCS student.
opinionsarelike 10y ago
yeah and articles like this make medium the new Enquirer
wolfgke 10y ago
I just want to remind the people that the original business model of Udacity (and Coursera) was something different: Udacity/Coursera wanted to offer the courses for free. It is a fact that employers are searching for employees who are smart, self-determined and love to learn new, complicated things on their own. So they wanted to make money from making their database of learners with their list of completed courses etc. available to employers/recruiters etc. for pay. If it had worked out, I must say that it would in my opinion not have been a bad idea. P.S.: Different topic, related business model: I am still waiting for a postmortem on Stockfighter: https://twitter.com/tqbf/status/771533037666390017 https://twitter.com/tqbf/status/771533037666390017
- languagewars 10y ago
  I think they ran into the problem that running the programming competition sites costs a lot less and has little maintenance compared to building and updating the classes. It was doubly difficult since they needed mostly applied classes to have students that were interesting to employers and finished in under 4 years.
  - wolfgke 10y ago
    > think they ran into the problem that running the programming competition sites costs a lot less and has little maintenance The skills you need for programming competitions are in my opinion quite different from the skills that you need for a "typical" programming job. Programming competitions "usually" mean hacking together a barely working program using ugly tricks that any project manager would strongly frown upon. Also one does not care about maintainability, understandability etc. Also there a programmers (like me) who love to learn new things (such as in MOOCs), but hate the time pressure and competitiveness of programming competitions and thus never participate. In other words: I would be very careful to hire people by looking at programming competitions. > It was doubly difficult since they needed mostly applied classes On the other hand: This could have been used to bring in some of the cost: If there are employers who would love to hire graduates with knowledge in CurrentHotTechnology, they could sponsor the development of courses for that.
thoughtRelay 10y ago
Genuine. That is the one word that comes to mind if I was asked to summarize my experience as a student with Udacity over the past 16 months. I have been working in the technology industry for several years now. If your goal is to work in the tech space, then it’s especially important to commit to lifelong learning. Working thru various Udacity courses has refreshed long dormant forgotten facts from university days. In addition, I have gained new skills and knowledge which to further build upon. But the one aspect I think I value the most is the interaction with the other Udacity students, project reviewers and Udacity instructors. Each person brings a unique composite of varying experience which has broadened my perspective. I realized I lived in a bubble and my bubble was very small. The bubble is still there today, but witnessing some of the transparency coming from Udacity has helped my bubble to grow. Up front cost is a valid concern for a student. I applaud Udacity for keeping education available at zero cost. I can't even imagine the effort involved in behind the scenes to compose educational material for a global audience. Further, to make that material available on a global scale all while trying to balance a pertinent curriculum with changes in the fast-moving technology sector. For the perspective student, I would advise caution when reading some of the marketing material from Udacity. I view it as "marketing speak". I personally find some of the "guarantee job" promo's distasteful. But I do not view it at the same level as say a typical twitter stream or a politician running for office promising everything under the sun if only "you elect me!". I have had some negative experiences while enrolled with Udacity. I do recall having a beef during the rollout of the new classroom that occurred earlier this year. But that’s an execution aspect and executing at 100% is a tough bar to maintain. If only I maintained my New Year’s resolutions 100% of the time ;) The one thing I can say, unequivocally, is the genuine sincerity of the people that work at and with Udacity. I do believe they sincerely care for a student’s success. Where that success bar lies are going to be unique for each person and as such, the road to that success will vary and of course change with time.
ipsin 10y ago
I'm no fan of ITT Tech, but when the author says "ITT was never an accredited school", that's not true, right? My understanding is that it was accredited by the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS), which was recognized by the Department of Education as an accrediting body until about 3 months ago[1]. [1] http://www.esrcheck.com/wordpress/2016/10/10/department-of-education-upholds-recommendation-to-remove-acics-accreditation/ http://www.esrcheck.com/wordpress/2016/10/10/department-of-e...
- mgadams3 10y ago
  I don't think the author is accurate at all with that statement. Outside of the EQUIP initiative that was just launched for the first time in 2016, there is no way to get your students approved for federal student loans (Title 4) unless your institution is accredited. ITT Tech made something like 90% of their revenues from Federal student loans... very predatory. It's possible ITT tech started without accreditation and they earned it over a half decade period of time ("earning" doesn't ensure quality... it means you jumped through the hoops and haven't deliberately walked away with students money without providing at least the illusion of education)
- wccrawford 10y ago
  When I went there (around 2004, IIRC), they claimed to be "accredited", but their credits were unlikely to be accepted elsewhere if you transferred. I asked, and that's what they said. They did, however, accept many of the credits I had from my local community college, and I was able to test out of a few more courses.
mdevere 10y ago
Udacity is awesome and almost entirely free to use. Through Udacity I have learned the basics of computer science, lowish-level web development (python/webapp2), ... then later some more advanced web dev tooling (Gulp, linting, etc.) It's what I recommend to anyone who asks, what's the best way to learn how to code. It's: 1. Udacity - Intro to computer science 2. Udacity - Steve's Huffman's web development course 3. and from there you're up and running and can make your own path
thght 10y ago
Just watch the Udacity add from 2016. Besides the price tag on that video (paid from students money), most scenes look more like science fiction than the reality of what we achieve with the jobs we do! It's business as usual. The problem with courses is not only money, it is also valuable time spend. Another issue is that Courses often tend to give you the false impression that you master something once you've completed it. There is always that difference between selling a course and what students actually gain. Why not spend your time to become a better autodidact, and use this vast free resource called the internet? Maybe it's just me, but I really don't want to depend on paid courses.
wccrawford 10y ago
I see people posting prices here. Why can't I find the prices on their site? Nothing turns me off a service like being unable to find the price without signing up and/or starting a "free trial".

186 points by masters3d 10y ago

I really used to love Udacity, but at some point their constant mini-quizzes just drove me nuts. Totally broke my flow. I prefer the Pluralsight approach. Quickly going through some Pluralsight courses has really broadened my toolset. I prefer to think of MOOCS as a way to augment what you learn via traditionally methods as opposed to replacing traditional education entirely.

lfowles 10y ago
> I prefer to think of MOOCS as a way to augment what you learn via traditionally methods as opposed to replacing traditional education entirely. From the ones I've taken, they would be great as a replacement to the various Intro To X courses in a traditional curriculum. Although, I'm pretty sure half of my senior classes for my bachelors degree were still Intro To X!
FLGMwt 10y ago
I actually went the opposite. At some point I realized I was watching Pluralsight courses and declaring success because I finished the last video and therefore I was leveled up in that thing. Quizzes on Udacity stuff and Coursera courses (especially Odersky's Scala one) often catch me cheating where I realize I had drifted and missed the information I'm being quizzed on. I'll go back and watch the relevant bit thoughtfully and then be able to answer.
- amerkhalid 10y ago
  This is my experience too. Also I used to watch Coursera videos on Android App. But if I lose my position in a video, it was pain to figure out where I left off. I like short videos cause much easier to recover where you left off from. Also I am not a paying member of Udacity but seriously considering them for Android dev program.
spikefromspace 10y ago
Same here. The content is split into 2-5 minute videos and it constantly has to reload new videos and the mini quizzes interrupt the flow. I'd much rather watch a full 30min-1hour lecture in one go. Personally though, I do think the content itself and the project reviews are helpful.
muraiki 10y ago
Sometimes it can be the opposite case. The Udacity course on statistics with Katie Kormanik has lots of well designed problems to work on as she taught various statistical concepts. This helped make sure that I really understood what was being taught and strongly cemented the concepts in my mind. That being said, this particular course is very well designed and it was clear that the instructor had actual experience _teaching_ (she has a M.Ed. from Stanford). On the other hand, I've taken -- and given up on -- both Udacity and Coursera (more lecture oriented) courses that had absolutely abysmal instruction. I had no doubt in the instructor's skill at the particular domain, but it was clear they had no idea how to teach.
criddell 10y ago
Pluralsight looks pretty neat. I'm looking for a Ruby on Rails course and it looks like they have a bunch.
posterboy 10y ago
As an opposite argument, I valued the chance to skip hours of introductory video after simply solving the tests.

calebm 10y ago

From what I've seen, Udacity's classes are of the utmost quality. I don't have any experience with ITT Tech, but I always got the impression the class material was lacking in quality.

slm_HN 10y ago
I was doing a survey of the beginning programming MOOCs that teach Python. The Udacity course, Programming Foundations with Python - Learn Object Oriented Programming, was by far the worst. I don't see how anyone could think it had "utmost quality". Both EdX and Coursera had classes that were much better.
- wikibob 10y ago
  Which particular classes on EdX and Coursera did you find to be worthwhile?

FLGMwt 10y ago

Disclosure: I'm not a Udacity employee, but I am a fan and a MOOC supporter (since I only program professionally because I learned through them + books). Only say this because I'm about to be pretty defensive of Udacity. 1) Not all new nanodegrees use the new pricing model. So far, only the more rigorous ones announced do: Self Driving Car Engineer & AI Engineer. The new VR one is the same monthly model. All existing courses are the monthly model, for now. 2) The monthly ones offer a 50% back offer. If you finish within a year, you get half your tuition back, so $100 for every month it took. To be fair, they could stop this at any time, but it was supposed to only last a few months, but they've been doing it since early last year. 3) Per their terms, to graduate, you must complete all projects and pay at least one month of tuition which is $200 in the US. With the half back offer, this becomes $100 if you finish in the first month + 7 day trial. The article quotes $400 4) Most of the courses are free to take. 5) Some of the degrees offer a job guarantee if you pay a bit more. 6) The content is damn good quality, from what I've been exposed to. Google people teach Android classes, Nvidia people teach graphics, MongoDB people tech MongoDB. At the very least, the quality is more consistent than other MOOC platforms. I might have went overboard O.O

sremani 10y ago
I took Introduction to Machine Learning class, and it was free and definitely of good quality. Even the expensive nano-degrees are not in the ball park of ITT tech tuition. $800 per 12 weeks for 3 terms, that is a grand total of $2400. That is a good amount, but for a 9 month course it is justifiable, and you will not get into debt that you cannot claw out of.
- karmicthreat 10y ago
  Full disclosure, I paid for the first semester of the SDC course. I am hoping that udacity is able to keep this sort of pricing. I am also hoping that the udacity doesn't get subsidized through student loans like ITT was. I think it skews things so student and education company goals are no longer aligned. They have an interest in churning out as many students as possible with little quality control then. By making the student cough up a good but not insurmountable chunk of cash upfront udacity has to ultimately answer to the student market.

jamestimmins 10y ago

Udacity was an essential tool when I was working to get my first job as a developer, specifically the Intro to Web Development course taught by Steve Huffman. But its effectiveness came because it gave me the tools to go on and build projects in my free time; those are what I showed to potential employers, not the certificate I received from taking a (then) free online course. As far as I'm concerned, that's the key metric for education in a field like software development where students build projects to show to a potential employer: do graduates have the knowledge needed that they can go out and build projects that will get them hired, without naming where they acquired the knowledge. If you succeed in that for long enough, then the value of the brand name will develop naturally. Udacity still appears to be quite strong in what matters most, actually educating students, regardless of their marketing materials, which is where ITT Tech failed.

muraiki 10y ago
I also owe my career to that course -- and really, to Steve Huffman's excellent instruction. The course has just the right level of depth. From that course I went on to build a paid site with Django (which also has great instruction in the form of an amazing tutorial), and shortly thereafter was able to land my first programming job using that project and some other things as my portfolio.

Kluny 10y ago

I've heard a lot of positive reviews of Udacity's courses, but I wonder if those come from people's bias after sinking a lot of money and time into it. Has anyone done a nanodegree on their employer's dime (regular wage plus tuition)? What did you think?

spikefromspace 10y ago
I did the Tech Entrepreneur nanodegree over a period of 7 months. With the half your money back offer, I ended up paying $700 into the course and ended the course with an interactive prototype and a marketing plan. Both of those I still use to move my product development forward, so I felt that it was money well spent. In comparison, I have taken classes in my grad school that I spent $1200+ on that I ended with anything to show for it. I will say though that Udacity show more preview content and maybe a longer trial period (currently 7 days). I did try the Android nanodegree and felt it was not worth my time but that was because of my experience in it.
andreyk 10y ago
I took the Data Analyst nanodegree, paid entirely by my company as you say. I don't think it's really worth it as the classes are pretty shallow and undemanding, but after a year of doing it I did get a lot of exposure to different languages/technologies and the opportunity to do several cool projects (here's an example http://www.andreykurenkov.com/writing/visualizing-imdb-data-with-d3/ http://www.andreykurenkov.com/writing/visualizing-imdb-data-...). So I think for expanding your knowledge base while being employed or doing other things, it's quite good (and, there is also Udacity's MS program with Georgia Tech for more serious education and credentials). It is even perhaps worth paying the $100 a month yourself if you put in the work to finish a bit early (the deadlines are set so it takes 13 months if you don't try to finish early). But, there is a lot they could do to improve - the nano degrees really are a bunch of totally separate MOOC classes strung together.
- Kluny 10y ago
  Data Analyst is actually the one I'm interested in. Did you have a background in data science already that made the course seem entry-level to you? How hard did you push yourself?

curiouscat321 10y ago

I've never been involved with Udacity or any for-profit schools. But, its remarkable how much that ad feels like a University of Phoenix ad. Most for-profit school ads seem to push flexibility and future job earnings. University of Phoenix (and Udacity) go for a much subtler route for the TV ads I've seen. They glamorize the ending jobs and the college-student/professional lifestyle. In my mind, the worst for-profit schools suffer from two distinct issues: bad instruction and bad credentialing. Udacity supposedly has fixed the instruction problem with strong industry ties. But, they haven't fixed the credentialing problem. A Udacity nanodegree is still worth very little, if anything, compared to any other form of education.

markdown 10y ago
For the Nanodegree courses, Udacity guarantees a job or your money back. Would your perception of Uni of Phoenix change if they did the same?
- hellogoodbyeeee 10y ago
  What kind of job are they guaranteeing? My current position is like 25% data science and 75% business analyst (with a business analyst level salary). If they would guarantee me a job that was 100% data scientist with a $100k salary I would sign up in a heart beat, but I figure they will say I already have a job doing that function and not give me my money back.
  - rockdiesel 10y ago
    https://www.udacity.com/nanodegree/plus https://www.udacity.com/nanodegree/plus https://udacity.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/207695886-What-type-of-jobs-will-you-offer- https://udacity.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/207695886-What... https://www.udacity.com/legal/nanodegreeplus https://www.udacity.com/legal/nanodegreeplus
    - kd0amg 10y ago
      Udacity guarantees you a job offer as an employee or a contractor within 6 months from receiving your Nanodegree Plus credential (the Job Placement Period). Further, in your new job Udacity guarantees that your gross income from such job will be in excess of your cost of tuition (pre-tax) within a 3 month period following job placement. 3 months at (US federal) minimum wage is roughly $3500, well over a year's tuition.

king_magic 10y ago

To be brutally honest, I've been pretty unimpressed with Udacity - specifically, their Deep Learning and AI for Robotics courses. I personally felt the quality of the content was low enough that I could not justify paying for something larger, like their Self-Driving Car Nanodegree (which I was accepted to for their first run, but I ultimately declined to shell out $2,400 USD because of the quality issues I observed in those other classes). Compared to some of the courses I've taken on Coursera (e.g. Andrew Ng's Machine Learning), the general quality from Coursera blew Udacity out of the water. End of the day, I'm not going to pay for content that is poorly stitched together, contradictory, constantly interrupting you, short on delivering insightful explanations and simply unclear in many places. I'm not going to pay to waste my time on forums to tease out information for solving quizzes / programming challenges that should have been covered in the course content. I'm not going to pay to deal with snarky TA's on a power trip. I'm not going to pay to waste my time because the course quizzes or programming assignments are expecting you to magically gain some insight that could not be reasonably attained by viewing the course content only. And I'm not saying these courses should necessarily be easy - not at all - but there should be some reasonable level of success attainable without having to endlessly scour the internet for why your solution, which looks pretty correct based on the course material, isn't passing in their test harness - only to learn that the author of the course decided to arbitrarily switch the order of two operations in his solution (that were previously demonstrated over and over in the reverse order), and that's why your submission is failing. Sorry, but screw that. Not worth my time, not worth my money. And to anyone else about to shell out a large chunk of cash to Udacity - think long and hard before you do - there are likely better options out there.

garysieling 10y ago
I've been trying to build out a site of free standalone lectures (https://www.findlectures.com https://www.findlectures.com), and it's become clearer as I've been building a collection of content how different the motivations behind free material is from paid. If a university / professor / hiring manager is behind the free content, they're promoting their brand, so they need really compelling material to stand out from everyone else.
- 10y ago

kyleschiller 10y ago

I used to work at Udacity so I'm pretty biased, but I will say that the concern here seems pretty misplaced. "The reality is that the for profit school’s only goal was to make money for their investors. It doesn’t matter if the students are not able to find jobs in their field. It doesn’t matter if most students work dead end jobs waiting for a tech job that never arrives." While it's not true for all programs, Udacity's nanodegree+ offers a full refund unless you can find a job. There are perfectly valid concerns about the quality of the job. Having said that, the even bigger and more fundamental difference between Udacity and ITT is that the vast majority of Udacity material is available for free online. Aside from the credential, what you're really paying for is personal feedback on projects. Because Udacity has to pay actual qualified engineers to give that feedback, it's appropriately expensive.

wolfgke 10y ago
> Aside from the credential, what you're really paying for is personal feedback on projects. The problem is that in countries as German, Austria (and I heard Brazil, too) there is a mentality of "credential or it did not happen". So for me, living in Germany, the only reason why I might be taking a course offering no credentials is that I am deeply interested in the topic. So perhaps it would be a good idea to offer a "very cheap certificate without any personal feedback".

kaa2102 10y ago

I decided to start searching for Udacity training and certificates after hearing the Udacity CEO speak at Google I/O in 2015. I have been extremely happy with that decision as I've found software developers that were knowledgeable, intelligent and intellectually curious. I did also go through an interview and learning/onboarding process but I would judge the Udacity by the outcomes and not the inputs or appearance of the ads.

droithomme 10y ago

Original Udacity was a competitor to Coursera and EdX. Current Udacity is not in that domain. It provides very specific technical training designed in consultation and funding with specific companies for skills that they need. Said companies then hire the top students in the classes. The classes work as a sort of technical screening. Not sure this is comparable to ITT Tech, which charged a lot of money for useless degrees. This said, many of the early Udacity classes are quite useful for general skills. Quality varies though and one problem they had was not updating content in reaction to feedback, not correcting either errors or areas that were unclear. These issues are somewhat irrelevant in their current targeted domain in which one either is able to pick it up with the training offered and get the job or not.

rifung 10y ago
> Said companies then hire the top students in the classes. The classes work as a sort of technical screening. Do you have any sources for this? I see that a lot of companies sponsor courses and nanodegrees, but I still haven't seen any statistics about jobs after "graduation". I had considered taking some nanodegrees myself but can't really justify it since I have to work full time and make a living which is difficult enough.
SwellJoe 10y ago
I would suggest that ITT was worse than useless. It was a negative indicator of quality for job candidates. Not having ITT on your resume is better than having ITT on your resume (even if nothing replaces it on the resume).

ralmidani 10y ago

Back in 2013 when I first discovered MOOCs, Udacity was more like Coursera and edX in that they had mostly traditional CS and Math courses. Now, in the catalog, the various Nanodegrees appear before any individual course. But if you scroll down, you'll see they still offer the old courses in topics like Programming Languages, Theoretical CS, and Differential Equations. Personally, I'm not in a rush to find employment, and am deliberately focusing on edX in order to prepare for a Masters. I took MIT's Intro to Programming with Python, and am now in Software Construction with Java. Both feel like timeless courses teaching principles applicable to any language or environment. Do Udacity Nanodegrees similarly teach transferable skills?

BWStearns 10y ago
It seems that the nano degrees are meant to provide a specific practical skill set as opposed to a broader academic inquiry. I think those skill sets are valuable (taking algo trading now), but the course is about how to use Python and statistics to build machine learning programs for finance, not about Python, stats, or finance. Maybe it's a bit of a distinction without a difference though because you'll have the beachhead from which to expand into each of those areas afterward.

bitL 10y ago

I see the current MOOC divided into 4 styles: - if you want academic rigor, you take edX and to some extent Coursera - if you want to learn something between academic and practical you never did before while working full time, you take Coursera courses - if you want to train yourself on some of the latest trends, you take Udacity - everything else that is outside big companies/academia you seek on Udemy and similar platforms I am happy with all these, I initially spent most of my learning time on Coursera, then moved mostly to edX for big-name university curriculum and now I am taking Udacity's self-driving car nanodegree and maybe later AI nanodegree if I get in. You simply need to choose what you want and then look at the appropriate platform. I am very happy we have now different shades of a good thing and I applaud to all people making this possible! Big thanks!

umbs 10y ago
IMO, this is a very clear summary of major MOOCs available for us today. I have taken courses on all the above MOOC offerings and completed courses to varying degrees. For a Software professional, the rigor in increasing order is: Udemy, Udacity, Coursera and edX. Of course, this is a very high level generalization and depends on each course/professor.
sjnair96 10y ago
Thank you for that! I seem to be in an eternal "paralysis analysis" stage when deciding what to study. I have gone years searching for the right tutorials/courses so that I can learn most efficiently. I know this is unhealthy and actually really inefficient, but I still do it :(
- dwaltrip 10y ago
  Change always starts with a single small step. Completing a single lesson, even if you don't finish the rest of that course, could be that step. Do it for future you! =)
  - sjnair96 10y ago
    It's not that starting a course is hard, it's deciding which one that is hard.

dhawalhs 10y ago

The title is inflammatory. This article is based entirely on how he feels from a 30 second commercial and his experience with ITT Tech. It has nothing to do with his Udacity experience. Unlike ITT Tech or any other for-profit universities, you can do a majority of the Udacity curriculum for free. e.g For the VR Nanodegree (shown in the video), you can signup for the courses for free [1] and evaluate it whether the format/quality works for you. And like any other content provider, some courses might not be good as others. I am currently doing Udacity's Machine Learning Nanodegree [2] and also did the first AI class from Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig. Part of the Nanodegree involves doing courses from Georgia Tech's Masters in Computer Science curriculum. [1] https://www.udacity.com/course/vr-software-development--ud1014 https://www.udacity.com/course/vr-software-development--ud10... [2] https://www.udacity.com/uconnect/intensive https://www.udacity.com/uconnect/intensive

webwanderings 10y ago

I spend a good deal of time on various MOOC platforms as a learner and observer. In my opinion (no association with anyone), I think Udacity is a scam! There are way too many courses I have come across, which are there only to grab the money. There is no quality control there. In my opinion, Edx, Coursera, Khan Academy, are a better deal.

jplahn 10y ago
That's a pretty big accusation with no justification. Care to contribute some detail as to why Udacity is a scam?
- webwanderings 10y ago
  Look at the quality of some of the content; extremely poor, but the cost does not reflect. The word scam may be too harsh, but I can't tell what it may be like when you pay for something and feel ripped off. Most of such content I have noticed, are generally referred through reddit via free coupons. But that does not negate the fact that they are being sold.
  - psbp 10y ago
    The Udacity content is all free, or as free as it is on Coursera and edX. You pay for additional stuff like code reviews, but the lectures and quizzes are all free. If anything it's more "free" than coursera.
    - webwanderings 10y ago
      I'll be damned. I confused the udemy with udacity. I guess I cannot edit my comments, or else I was going to remove them for a major affed up. When it comes to Internet, i.e, virtual material which you can't touch or feel...branding is all there is.
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cloudjacker 10y ago

Sure, if I can short it When's the IPO, know anybody in Congress to trade the enforcement actions in advance on my behalf?

yalogin 10y ago

I don't think promising a job will make Udacity on par with ITT. I am not qualified to comment on how good they are at placing candidates. I am currently going through the course for Autonomous Robots on Udacity. I am not in it for a job and I am not even in that domain to begin with. I just want to write code for an autonomous toy car. I find the course very good, particularly for someone without a AI background. Its intuitive and very simply laid out. I really like the small videos and quizzes at the end of each. This is precisely because I have no backgroud in AI, however even I am finding it annoying when I have to review an old lecture. On the whole I really like it though.

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foobar101010 10y ago

The unasked question is why does university need to be expensive so as to create what is becoming now a deep class divide in the society causing the dumping of increasing number of youth into the "service" economy. Thus destroying the value that society could have obtained from them had they been given a chance at an education.

kyleschiller 10y ago
Lack of competition. A University's revenue is basically defined by it's capacity, which means that lowering tuition doesn't let you "win" in any sense of the word. The huge boom in EdTech startups is partially attributable to tech allowing for the easy dissemination of information, but has even more to do with a huge unmet need for talented developers in a culture that isn't particularly concerned with degrees. All we're seeing now is the logical conclusion of those forces playing out.

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ankurjain10 10y ago

I strongly feel that Udacity has HUGE potential and the recent TV ad is quite inspiring. - From student's perspective, it can't get better than this - learning from the top instructors in the world at a very low price. Learning AI at a fraction of the cost. - From employer's perspective - I have hired more than 50 engineers both at startups and at world's biggest company. I would definitely value people with a nano-degree from Udacity over a course that they studied a decade ago in the college. The students from Udacity have more practical knowledge and understand the latest concepts. In my viewpoint, the biggest potential is the reach - people from all over the world can learn advanced technologies like Self-driving cars. Who could have imagined this few years ago! I am positive that companies worldwide would LOVE to interview candidates who have studied at Udacity.

PostOnce 10y ago
Would you trust a doctor with a nano degree before one who studied "a decade ago"?
- jwagenet 10y ago
  This is a poor comparison. Over the last decade it is unlikely that the techniques and training to become a doctor have changed substantially. Sure, there are medical advances and new technologies that change how a doctor does business, but fundamentally the pace of change is slow. On the flip side, AI and ML have made significant strides within the last decade. Unless your career required you to keep up with and innovate in the space, you probably are well behind the times. A nanodegree may not stand well on its own, but coupled with previous experience it may be a way to show you are actually familiar with up to date trends and techniques on the topic.
wernercd 10y ago
Sorry to be snarky, but you come off a little strong... sounds a bit astroturfish? With that aside, I think the article makes a good points. Prices are rising and they seem to be mainly beneficial for existing professionals. IMO: Nano-degree's would only be a step above certifications - A+, Network+, etc. And a step below a 2 year degree... then most important, experience. A class from 10 years ago is definitely meaningless... after your first few jobs, college as a whole is meaningless outside of connections made and HR checkboxes to be met. For the same reason this nano-degree might help... but it'll be just as meaningless sooner - because its specialized, quickly out-dated and still less important than demonstratable experience or a 2/4 year degree.

kentt 10y ago

Betteridge's law of headlines: any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.

kuprel 10y ago

"The reality is that the for profit school’s only goal was to make money for their investors. It doesn’t matter if the students are not able to find jobs in their field" I know the founder and he really cares about people, especially his students

ukyrgf 10y ago

I wonder what a video like this does for the first impression from an employer's point of view. ITT Tech was viewed as cheap because their commercials played in the cheapest time slots, alongside adult hotlines and As Seen on TV ads. If an employer had never heard of Udacity and did research from scratch, they might like what they see. If they recognize it as one of those commercials that play in the middle of the night, they might just skip right over the resume. I was interested in pursuing a new field at Western Governors University after reading comments on sites like this and Reddit where a couple people said "I happily hire WGU grads because I know they put real work in". Then, I saw one of their commercials play on Comedy Central at 2 AM, and it immediately stopped those plans for me. You can't take anything seriously when it airs after this: http://www.perfectsmileteeth.com/ http://www.perfectsmileteeth.com/

andybak 10y ago

I'm usually quite good keeping track of TLA's but it's late and I've drawn a blank on what ITT stands for. Wikipedia is being no help: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT Anyone? (PS - I'm not ashamed to ask. I think it's a tiny public service to ask the meaning of an acronym as it reminds everyone else that these aren't necessarily universally understood even in our own little tech bubble)

matlaber 10y ago
International Telephone & Telegraph https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Technical_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_Technical_Institute "By 1999, ITT Corporation (which had merged with Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide the year before) had divested itself completely of ITT Tech's shares. The schools were allowed to continue using the "ITT" name under license."

gigatexal 10y ago

Also not an employee, but the major difference between udacity and the ITT (sh*t school that it was) is the vendor created nano-degrees, the pay-as-you-go structure, and the ability to learn real world things.

the_watcher 10y ago

I'm a fan of MOOC's in general (at least as a concept), and support them charging for things like nanodegrees, in theory. While I do agree that the commercial is eerily similar in tone to the ITT Tech ads most of us remember, $2400 for a nanodegree is much cheaper. Further, so long as they continue to not be tempted by the federally backed loans spigot, people pay for these out of pocket, as opposed to levering the hell out of themselves. While that presents it's own issues, it wildly reduces the incentives that the excesses of federal loans has led to, as the fact that much of their market simply don't have that kind of money to outlay at once. Also, I've got a few friends who have gotten nanodegrees from Udacity, and every single one has been more than satisfied, which may color my opinion a bit. That said, I'm a firm believer in the idea that there should be options for those of us who prefer a structured curriculum of courses, but aren't interested in the breadth education required from a traditional degree, and that is priced in a way that someone who lives frugally can save for and pay for up front, out of pocket.

crispytx 10y ago

I just finished taking the first of their Android Basics courses (User Interface), and I thought it was excellent. The course was free however. I'd be hesitant to pay $200 a month though for the non-free courses. In my opinion, Udacity's courses are high quality, but also expensive.

eranation 10y ago

I think it's not. First thing people tend to forget is that aside from then nano degrees, they offer a master of science in computer science degree from Georgia Tech (a top 10 CS graduate school) for about $7,000. Sebastian Thrun, Udacity's CEO and founder, ex google VP (developed their self driving car project) and a Stanford professor, initiated it, AT&T donated money and Zvi Galil (college of computing dean) and the GT faculty took the challenge and built it with Udacity's assistance. There are already several graduates, and evidence shows the rigor is ad high as on campus. It just can't be compared to ITT without having in mind they enabled the world best "ranking to cost" ratio program in the world in my opinion. Source: I'm a GT OMSCS student.

opinionsarelike 10y ago

yeah and articles like this make medium the new Enquirer

wolfgke 10y ago

I just want to remind the people that the original business model of Udacity (and Coursera) was something different: Udacity/Coursera wanted to offer the courses for free. It is a fact that employers are searching for employees who are smart, self-determined and love to learn new, complicated things on their own. So they wanted to make money from making their database of learners with their list of completed courses etc. available to employers/recruiters etc. for pay. If it had worked out, I must say that it would in my opinion not have been a bad idea. P.S.: Different topic, related business model: I am still waiting for a postmortem on Stockfighter: https://twitter.com/tqbf/status/771533037666390017 https://twitter.com/tqbf/status/771533037666390017

languagewars 10y ago
I think they ran into the problem that running the programming competition sites costs a lot less and has little maintenance compared to building and updating the classes. It was doubly difficult since they needed mostly applied classes to have students that were interesting to employers and finished in under 4 years.
- wolfgke 10y ago
  > think they ran into the problem that running the programming competition sites costs a lot less and has little maintenance The skills you need for programming competitions are in my opinion quite different from the skills that you need for a "typical" programming job. Programming competitions "usually" mean hacking together a barely working program using ugly tricks that any project manager would strongly frown upon. Also one does not care about maintainability, understandability etc. Also there a programmers (like me) who love to learn new things (such as in MOOCs), but hate the time pressure and competitiveness of programming competitions and thus never participate. In other words: I would be very careful to hire people by looking at programming competitions. > It was doubly difficult since they needed mostly applied classes On the other hand: This could have been used to bring in some of the cost: If there are employers who would love to hire graduates with knowledge in CurrentHotTechnology, they could sponsor the development of courses for that.

thoughtRelay 10y ago

Genuine. That is the one word that comes to mind if I was asked to summarize my experience as a student with Udacity over the past 16 months. I have been working in the technology industry for several years now. If your goal is to work in the tech space, then it’s especially important to commit to lifelong learning. Working thru various Udacity courses has refreshed long dormant forgotten facts from university days. In addition, I have gained new skills and knowledge which to further build upon. But the one aspect I think I value the most is the interaction with the other Udacity students, project reviewers and Udacity instructors. Each person brings a unique composite of varying experience which has broadened my perspective. I realized I lived in a bubble and my bubble was very small. The bubble is still there today, but witnessing some of the transparency coming from Udacity has helped my bubble to grow. Up front cost is a valid concern for a student. I applaud Udacity for keeping education available at zero cost. I can't even imagine the effort involved in behind the scenes to compose educational material for a global audience. Further, to make that material available on a global scale all while trying to balance a pertinent curriculum with changes in the fast-moving technology sector. For the perspective student, I would advise caution when reading some of the marketing material from Udacity. I view it as "marketing speak". I personally find some of the "guarantee job" promo's distasteful. But I do not view it at the same level as say a typical twitter stream or a politician running for office promising everything under the sun if only "you elect me!". I have had some negative experiences while enrolled with Udacity. I do recall having a beef during the rollout of the new classroom that occurred earlier this year. But that’s an execution aspect and executing at 100% is a tough bar to maintain. If only I maintained my New Year’s resolutions 100% of the time ;) The one thing I can say, unequivocally, is the genuine sincerity of the people that work at and with Udacity. I do believe they sincerely care for a student’s success. Where that success bar lies are going to be unique for each person and as such, the road to that success will vary and of course change with time.

ipsin 10y ago

I'm no fan of ITT Tech, but when the author says "ITT was never an accredited school", that's not true, right? My understanding is that it was accredited by the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS), which was recognized by the Department of Education as an accrediting body until about 3 months ago[1]. [1] http://www.esrcheck.com/wordpress/2016/10/10/department-of-education-upholds-recommendation-to-remove-acics-accreditation/ http://www.esrcheck.com/wordpress/2016/10/10/department-of-e...

mgadams3 10y ago
I don't think the author is accurate at all with that statement. Outside of the EQUIP initiative that was just launched for the first time in 2016, there is no way to get your students approved for federal student loans (Title 4) unless your institution is accredited. ITT Tech made something like 90% of their revenues from Federal student loans... very predatory. It's possible ITT tech started without accreditation and they earned it over a half decade period of time ("earning" doesn't ensure quality... it means you jumped through the hoops and haven't deliberately walked away with students money without providing at least the illusion of education)
wccrawford 10y ago
When I went there (around 2004, IIRC), they claimed to be "accredited", but their credits were unlikely to be accepted elsewhere if you transferred. I asked, and that's what they said. They did, however, accept many of the credits I had from my local community college, and I was able to test out of a few more courses.

mdevere 10y ago

Udacity is awesome and almost entirely free to use. Through Udacity I have learned the basics of computer science, lowish-level web development (python/webapp2), ... then later some more advanced web dev tooling (Gulp, linting, etc.) It's what I recommend to anyone who asks, what's the best way to learn how to code. It's: 1. Udacity - Intro to computer science 2. Udacity - Steve's Huffman's web development course 3. and from there you're up and running and can make your own path

thght 10y ago

Just watch the Udacity add from 2016. Besides the price tag on that video (paid from students money), most scenes look more like science fiction than the reality of what we achieve with the jobs we do! It's business as usual. The problem with courses is not only money, it is also valuable time spend. Another issue is that Courses often tend to give you the false impression that you master something once you've completed it. There is always that difference between selling a course and what students actually gain. Why not spend your time to become a better autodidact, and use this vast free resource called the internet? Maybe it's just me, but I really don't want to depend on paid courses.

wccrawford 10y ago

I see people posting prices here. Why can't I find the prices on their site? Nothing turns me off a service like being unable to find the price without signing up and/or starting a "free trial".