Jeff Selingo makes that argument that control of the parchment (accreditation) and governmental funding of student aid as the only reasons our current Higher Education system is able to sustain it centuries old traditions of having:
professors at the front of a room or at a table with an average of 16 students in front of them.
Selengo points to several examples of disruption outside of academia StraighterLine, the Khan Academy, and Badges to certify skills as well examples inside academic like MITx and Udacity.
Is the perfect storm of change brewing for higher-ed? Time will tell but when you consider the following, something has to give: ubiquitous access to information through the internet, looming global financial crisis, evidence that the system isn’t producing the result we all expect, non-traditional organizations moving in rapidly and successfully at the bottom end of the market and perhaps most importantly a weakening in the reliance on and significance of the parchment.
