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The Present
four-year school. They may find
competency verses grade-based
evaluations more attractive as
well. For example, Western Gov-
ernors University in Washington
State offers several BA and MA
degrees entirely online, provid-
ing very flexible scheduling,
competency-based evaluation,
and it is a fully accredited public
state university.
“
Would an employer faced
with hiring a computer-science
graduate from a regional state
university hire the individual
over a person who has no degree,
but has MIT certification that
he or she has learned the same
as an MIT CS grad?” Layng
continued. “Given my private-
sector experience, my prediction
is the nod will go to the certified
MIT completer given the likely
differences in coursework and
applications written. At Stanford,
a grad-level computer-science
course was opened to the world
with no prerequisites and 160,000
enrolled, 22,000 finished, and
2,000
performed so well they
were invited to submit resumes
and many were hired on the basis
of the performance in the single
course by many Silicon Valley
firms.”
Bradley’s Glassman said cre-
dentialing lacks the enrichment
of a well-rounded education.
“
The alternative credentialing
of receiving badges or certificates
for the successful completion
of a course corresponds to only
one dimension of the role of a
university education,” Glass-
man said. “Residential colleges
and universities such as Bradley
nurture students not just in their
attainment of academic knowl-
edge and competencies, but also
in developing themselves as
leaders, communicators, problem
solvers, humanists and collabora-
tors necessary for professional
and personal success. These
abilities are derived from myriad
of curricular, co-curricular and
extracurricular activities and op-
portunities that exist every day,
all day, including weekends, on
the university campus.
“
There is a role for MOOCs
in the learning process, but they
cannot duplicate the univer-
sity experience nor provide the
background for developing the
well-rounded graduate,” he con-
tinued. “We will need to explore
how MOOCs and other online
educational methods can be
best integrated in the traditional
four-year university to maximize
the learning benefits to the next
generation of higher education
graduates.”
That said, almost half of U.S.
freshmen now attend community
colleges, usually as commuters,
and 80 percent of freshmen don’t
live on their campuses.
“
I believe we will see substan-
tial changes in the way students
obtain their education in the next
10
years,” Layng said. “Econom-
ics will be the driver. The cost of
on-ground education will push
students online.
“
I think we will see the top 10
to 20 universities remain pretty
much unchanged,” he continued.
“
For the rest, there will be great
change, and as noted earlier,
alternative credentialing provides
a huge threat. The first to feel it
will be lower- to mid-tier private
schools. The next group will be
the regional state schools; the
flagship research universities will
change little, except to provide
greater competition with their on-
line offerings for other schools.”
Bradley’s Glassman feels differ-
ently, seeing common ground for
traditional and online offerings.
“
Many traditional universi-
ties are incorporating hybrid
classes into their curriculum
that blend both online learn-
ing and classroom experiences
within the same course,” he said.
“
They have found that using this
model allows for maximizing the
benefits of teaching technology
resulting in more productive time
for classroom discussion and
hands-on demonstrations when
the students and professor meet
in person. I anticipate that we
will see an increase in the number
of hybrid classes occurring on
university campuses including
Bradley’s.”
