It seems that the NYT article misunderstands what online courses are for. The purpose isn't to replace four-year undergraduate college, but to serve the vast ma

It seems that the NYT article misunderstands what online courses are for. The purpose isn't to replace four-year undergraduate college, but to serve the vast majority of people for whom that model is impractical. There are a lot of people who want to learn things who can't afford this American institution of playing aristocrat for the 4 years in which society judges them to be economically marginal. The 90% attrition rate of MOOCs, by the way, is the result of a course model that's still being fleshed out and the fact that, absent a high degree of previous investment, social expectations and abundant free time, very few people are going to stick with a long-term program. Ten percent yield for a free MOOC is great! For my part, I think the question of whether these courses should be served synchronously (with schedules and deadlines) or asynchronously is unclear, and I'm not sure how the trade-offs of each will be balanced. It's an exciting space, though. I don't think online education will replace the university, but it might replace the institution of four-year college. Academia brought this on itself. The majority of the leading professors have long held the attitude that teaching is commodity grunt work and research is what they really do. Technology is responding, by bringing teaching to the masses. If the result of this is that middle-class families stop dedicating 850 millihouses per student to tuition, then I can't see how that's a bad thing. I'd like to see undergraduate college live through this, but I wouldn't mind seeing it shrink back to something for people who are genuinely interested in learning the material, and something affordable for people of average means.