Definitely not trying to make a joke. If someone had the knowledge equivalent to a bachelor's level, does it seem correct that to be considered equal, the individual would have to pay for at least 3 years of school full-time (even if he tested out of easy classes) and paid ~ $50,000? This is for a cheap school, not a top-tier.
This has never made sense to me. Knowledge is knowledge - who cares where it came from? I'm not saying other things are not learned in college - yes teamwork is important and such. But you can literally learn that in any situation. What about experience? If you're not actively trying to go to school, and doing BS work, you can actually get a relevant job, show some creativity in your field, or (I wish) hopefully get an apprenticeship. I hope these come back some day - the learning is unparalleled.
Three years ago, I spoke to a friend about designing a computer science bachelor's exam. It could literally be as grueling as you want, over a 10 day period, and you could charge up to $5,000 easily. Most people I spoke to said they had concerns about people "cramming for the exam". In truth, those people do not know how to design tests. It is VERY easy to prevent cramming, especially with such material, all you need is a little creativity. By "prevent cramming" I mean creative questions that force the candidate to know the material so well that cramming --> learning involuntarily.
I chose to start with a comp sci exam because it requires the least physical resources for the exam (no circuits, no lab, no nothing). Eventually, other degrees could be created once a proof of concept had been completed.
The original reason Universities were created were for efficiency (source: Sir Ken Robinson's TED talk). Teaching 50 students by mail, making each one order each textbook and other reference texts is crazily inefficient. Locating them all in one place, having lectures for all 50 students at once, and a library where all relevant texts are held is much better. What we're seeing now is just a modern version. Instead of lectures, we have video. Instead of library, we have ebooks/internet/curated content.
Sorry if I rambled for a bit, I'm very passionate about this issue. The thing is, without power in the field, changing education is hard. This is definitely the gateway, and I'm happy that I get to see all the fantastic (but slow for me) changes. The next step is re-optimizing spending in high schools. My mother works at a high school, and the stories I hear about wasteful technology spending are hard to hear.
This has never made sense to me. Knowledge is knowledge - who cares where it came from? I'm not saying other things are not learned in college - yes teamwork is important and such. But you can literally learn that in any situation. What about experience? If you're not actively trying to go to school, and doing BS work, you can actually get a relevant job, show some creativity in your field, or (I wish) hopefully get an apprenticeship. I hope these come back some day - the learning is unparalleled.
Three years ago, I spoke to a friend about designing a computer science bachelor's exam. It could literally be as grueling as you want, over a 10 day period, and you could charge up to $5,000 easily. Most people I spoke to said they had concerns about people "cramming for the exam". In truth, those people do not know how to design tests. It is VERY easy to prevent cramming, especially with such material, all you need is a little creativity. By "prevent cramming" I mean creative questions that force the candidate to know the material so well that cramming --> learning involuntarily.
I chose to start with a comp sci exam because it requires the least physical resources for the exam (no circuits, no lab, no nothing). Eventually, other degrees could be created once a proof of concept had been completed.
The original reason Universities were created were for efficiency (source: Sir Ken Robinson's TED talk). Teaching 50 students by mail, making each one order each textbook and other reference texts is crazily inefficient. Locating them all in one place, having lectures for all 50 students at once, and a library where all relevant texts are held is much better. What we're seeing now is just a modern version. Instead of lectures, we have video. Instead of library, we have ebooks/internet/curated content.
Sorry if I rambled for a bit, I'm very passionate about this issue. The thing is, without power in the field, changing education is hard. This is definitely the gateway, and I'm happy that I get to see all the fantastic (but slow for me) changes. The next step is re-optimizing spending in high schools. My mother works at a high school, and the stories I hear about wasteful technology spending are hard to hear.