CA leaders debate on education

At a forum held Tuesday, state and educational leaders and industry professionals proposed dozens of ideas for incorporating online education into public universities, but questioned whether these ideas would fit in with or change the value of a California education.

Senate President Pro Temp Darrell Steinberg and Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom spoke at the event, as well as leaders of increasingly popular online course providers like Udacity and Arizona State University Online.

Both Steinberg and Newsom said they were convinced that online education is the inevitable future of higher education, although some people who attended the forum said they doubted whether it could replace a traditional education and actually reduce costs for universities.

“The future of education across the board … is taking education out of the classroom,” Steinberg said to the audience at the beginning of the forum.

“Technology is going to go forward with or without us.”

Many of the forum’s panelists, which also included faculty members and two students, argued that the traditional way of educating students – attending lectures by professors at a four-year university – that has long been perceived to be ideal is becoming outdated.

New online course providers, such as Udacity and Coursera, have cropped up in the last few years, allowing thousands of individuals to participate in massively open online courses, or MOOCs, for free.

Keith Williams, interim director of UC Online, said, however, that it is still unclear how such course technology can fit in with a University of California education since these online courses do not provide college credit.

The UC Online program offers courses to UC and non-UC students, launched last year, though the program has had little success in enrolling students outside the UC system, which was one of its initial goals, according to a recent article by the San Francisco Chronicle.

The UC took out a $6.9 million loan to fund the program, according to the article.

Williams said some courses discussed at the forum are geared more toward individuals learning on their own, rather than students attending a university like the UC.

On Tuesday, several for-credit and not-for-credit online course providers also presented their own methods of educating individuals, buffed with an array of statistics indicating higher retention and performance rates for those who took their online courses.

Among these methods included using the flipped classroom model, in which students access lectures online but interact with professors or mentors for homework, among other “hybrid” courses.

Panelists also brought up prior learning assessment, a process by which older students can receive college credit for previous work, volunteering or other life experiences.

But the value of online college courses in providing an accredited, recognized degree was questioned by some.

Of the five-hour forum, 15 minutes were allotted for two student panelists to speak.

The two students had mixed opinions on online courses – Andrew Litt from UCLA said online courses were less effective than traditional lectures and he preferred hybrid courses with online and face-to-face elements.

Meanwhile, Sonoma State University student Hillary Hill said online courses have allowed her to avoid extra semesters and take courses unavailable at her school.

The state’s leaders in higher education have discussed online education for at least two years, Newsom said.

“Right now we’re leaning back, and that’s not (going to) cut it,” he said.

“It no longer allows us to be as relevant a system as we have been in the last half century.”

The UC Board of Regents committee on finance brought up online education as one in a list of several other strategies during the board’s bimonthly meeting in November.

As an ex-officio regent, Gov. Jerry Brown urged the board to meet with online course providers like Udacity, saying such online technology would leave the UC “in the dust.”

In its board meeting next week, the regents have allotted two hours for online education discussion.

Tuesday’s forum, however, was organized to expand on discussion that cannot be done at the regents meeting in such little time, said Dean Florez, president of the 20 Million Minds Foundation, an organization that works to make education more affordable through open-source course materials, and hosted the forum.

“Next week’s meeting is not going to be long enough,” Florez said.

“We wanted to make sure that at the UC Regents meeting they have a real grounding …  to get a full picture (of online education).”

Email Kristen at [email protected].