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Assuming a correlation between quality and price, what would be the advantage of choosing a cheaper school in such a system? A parent would simply choose to sen

Assuming a correlation between quality and price, what would be the advantage of choosing a cheaper school in such a system? A parent would simply choose to send their child to the most expensive school they could afford, leading to some not particularly desirable phenomenon (think, total lack of social mobility).

nostrademons 12y ago
In theory, there should be ample room to innovate in low-cost high-quality instruction. Think of Khan Academy or Udacity: you get world-class instructors delivering clear lectures at scale. There are tons of just plain inefficiencies in the public school system, where it wouldn't be hard to improve both price and quality if it were a fair, competitive market. In practice, the main problem is that it's very difficult to judge the quality of an education until decades after you pay for it, and so there's a large signalling effect. In the absence of hard quality signals, people (both consumers and those who would judge the consumers, like colleges or jobs) rely on price as a proxy, assuming that the effect you mention holds. For me, the most interesting market in the economy today is credentialing. That's what people actually pay for in higher ed, and that's the one keystone you need to topple for a revolution in education to happen. Unfortunately, it seems to take decades for a credential to gain legitimacy, because most of its value lies in the unconscious beliefs of the public.
- nmrm 12y ago
  > there should be ample room to innovate in low-cost high-quality instruction. Lots of other countries and US states seem to be doing very well without MOOCs, which indicates there are probably more fundamental changes the US can make. That aside... MOOCs seem like a panacea. Individual experiences with MOOCs help reinforce this perception for many reasons: * Most people take MOOCs in areas where they have previous experience or are intrinsically motivated. * MOOCs tend to cover technical material, which is far easier to teach than sophisticated reading or writing. * MOOCs tend to cover introductory or intermediate university material, and assume a certain level of intellectual maturity that many teenagers do not yet possess. * Many high school courses are far more difficult (for high schoolers) than university-level courses (for high school graduates). In particular, most CS 101 courses probably rank somewhere between high school Algebra I and Algebra II courses in terms of time and intelligence required to master the concepts (for relevant age groups). Effective instruction at the secondary level requires knowing your students and reacting to their individual strengths and weaknesses. Most often, and especially at the secondary school level, it's impossible to teach effectively without actually spending lots of time in front of your students. "Delivering the content" is not enough -- you have to determine (in real time) whether students understand and help fill in gaps. So although MOOCs can probably play some role in improving secondary education, they will never replace the classroom teacher.

nostrademons 12y ago

In theory, there should be ample room to innovate in low-cost high-quality instruction. Think of Khan Academy or Udacity: you get world-class instructors delivering clear lectures at scale. There are tons of just plain inefficiencies in the public school system, where it wouldn't be hard to improve both price and quality if it were a fair, competitive market. In practice, the main problem is that it's very difficult to judge the quality of an education until decades after you pay for it, and so there's a large signalling effect. In the absence of hard quality signals, people (both consumers and those who would judge the consumers, like colleges or jobs) rely on price as a proxy, assuming that the effect you mention holds. For me, the most interesting market in the economy today is credentialing. That's what people actually pay for in higher ed, and that's the one keystone you need to topple for a revolution in education to happen. Unfortunately, it seems to take decades for a credential to gain legitimacy, because most of its value lies in the unconscious beliefs of the public.

nmrm 12y ago
> there should be ample room to innovate in low-cost high-quality instruction. Lots of other countries and US states seem to be doing very well without MOOCs, which indicates there are probably more fundamental changes the US can make. That aside... MOOCs seem like a panacea. Individual experiences with MOOCs help reinforce this perception for many reasons: * Most people take MOOCs in areas where they have previous experience or are intrinsically motivated. * MOOCs tend to cover technical material, which is far easier to teach than sophisticated reading or writing. * MOOCs tend to cover introductory or intermediate university material, and assume a certain level of intellectual maturity that many teenagers do not yet possess. * Many high school courses are far more difficult (for high schoolers) than university-level courses (for high school graduates). In particular, most CS 101 courses probably rank somewhere between high school Algebra I and Algebra II courses in terms of time and intelligence required to master the concepts (for relevant age groups). Effective instruction at the secondary level requires knowing your students and reacting to their individual strengths and weaknesses. Most often, and especially at the secondary school level, it's impossible to teach effectively without actually spending lots of time in front of your students. "Delivering the content" is not enough -- you have to determine (in real time) whether students understand and help fill in gaps. So although MOOCs can probably play some role in improving secondary education, they will never replace the classroom teacher.