A Better Way: Part 1

Here's my vision for what colleges should do.

Use Virtual “Teachers”

Today, in most of the nation's 3,500 colleges, introductory courses, for example, Introduction to Biology, are taught primarily by an instructor, good, bad, or indifferent, lecturing to students umpteen rows away. You can often get a decent grade just by cramming for a midterm and a final, even though you'll have forgotten 3/4 of what you learned within days of semester's end.

Imagine that instead, you logged onto your home computer to find one of the nation's best biology instructors teaching Intro to Biology, using simulation and demonstration equipment far too expensive for most colleges to afford. You could replay any parts of the lecture you wanted, and at any point, you could click on words that would provide a fuller explanation of what the professor was saying.

After each 30-minute instructional unit, you would take an interactive quiz. You'd participate in simulations and other experiments online, using equipment for free that you couldn't possibly access in the real world. Even the classic frog dissection could be done online. Think of all the hassle, blood and gore that would be saved--not to mention the millions of frogs lives. Another benefit: the nation wrings its collective hands about the lack of minority instructors. Choose a minority instructor for the program and many thousands of students derive the benefits of having a minority biology instructor.

Using interactive teachers wouldn't completely replace the human instructor. Small classes and office hours would still be provided in person. But the large lecture, that boring vestige of the Middle Ages, so often blown-off by students who download lecture notes, would be replaced by interactive and virtual teachers, an approach that would enable every college student, rich or poor, to receive world-class education at a fraction of the cost.

Shouldn't You Get What You Pay For?

College: America's Most Overrated Product

In my job and working with thousands of students trying to better themselves and find a career I've often heard the words, "I'm paying good money for" ...

Colleges hold teenagers hostage. Because young adults need that piece of paper, colleges know students will come to them no matter how slipshod an education they provide. Employers increasingly demand a college diploma for anything above a McJob.

That insatiable demand for their pieces of paper allows colleges to sometimes provide a mediocre education without fear of losing students. And most colleges, especially prestigious ones, do provide a mediocre education because they are more interested in conducting research than in teaching undergraduates. So, for example, colleges heavily use the cheapest, least-effective method of instruction: herding hundreds of students into an auditorium to listen to a lecture by a professor whose main interest is an esoteric research area, not the basics that undergraduates need to know. Small classes are taught mainly by graduate students, often teaching for the first time. Residence hall life is rarely the living-learning environment so often advertised in colleges’ brochures.

It is ironic that the most prestigious, most expensive colleges are the ones most likely to provide a poor undergraduate education. They can only get away with it because of the institution's designer-label (acquired from its research, not its undergraduate education), and because the students are bright enough to create an interesting experience despite the college's neglect. How obscene to charge $30,000 a year and shortchange our nation's best and brightest.

How to Change it? ...

Ode to the Tutor

Let’s be honest for just a moment. With the current state of affairs in each state and at most colleges, even community colleges where class sizes are traditionally smaller, classes are getting bigger. Lectures halls are built to hold hundreds. And unless you’re a grad student or a special honors student you may never see a class with less than 30 people. That being said, taking a class is a terribly inefficient way to learn.


Think about it: You learn what the professor wants you to learn rather than what you want to learn. The class proceeds at the pace the professor chooses, which may well be too fast or slow for you. By the time you need to apply the knowledge in the workplace (if you ever do), you’ll probably have forgotten it.

Besides, unless it’s an online course, your body must be in that classroom Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12 to 2 PM. What if you can’t focus? What if you are kinesthetic learner and not a visual or auditory learner? That lecture class might not help you understand or “learn” a subject at all.

In contrast, consider the tutor. You learn precisely what you need, at the pace you need to learn it, with all the feedback you need, at a time convenient for you, in the comfort of your home (or dorm, library, etc), and at a cost typically less than that of a college course. You get to ask the questions, you decide what to study, you get to progress into areas you want and decide when to study them.