As part of the School of Management’s “continuous improvement” philosophy, which caters to the needs of students, Dean Upinder Dhillon recently announced an initiative to supplement the traditional classroom setting with an optional online version of Statistics for Management. The self-learning format will be provided spring semester, allowing students to take as much time as needed to engage with the content at an individual pace.
This small experiment in the future of learning is an important step in the school’s ambitious goal to distinguish itself among the premier public business schools.
Salman Khan, the visionary behind Khan Academy and its expanding archive of online instructional videos, has changed the way we as students, adults and global citizens must approach individual, long-term learning. Our increasing access to technology means we have an opportunity to learn anywhere, from the comfort of our homes to remote destinations halfway around the world. We now have the means to reinforce entire subject areas from start to finish, free of charge.
Khan gave an analogous description of deficit learning during a TED talk: “You’re an 80 percent bicyclist, so I put a big C stamp on your forehead, and then I say here’s a unicycle.” And while this seems absurd, the vast majority of our education system is based on the one-size-fits-all model in which students either retain the lecture or accumulate foundational gaps over the years. The general theory behind the Khan Academy and online learning is that one graduates to the next concept by proving mastery, not partial understanding, of the presented material.
Khan’s teaching method has profound implications for millions of people in emerging markets that may have an Internet connection but limited access to a formal, uninterrupted education. Although web-based learning cannot entirely replace instructor interaction and feedback, in many cases it could be the difference between a basic business education and nothing at all.
But the proceeding idea for massive open online courses (MOOCs) is not just an abstraction of socially minded do-gooders. This is the beginning of a shift in higher education, signed on to by elite institutions and backed by their non-profit spinoffs such as edX, Udacity and in the case of Coursera, a partnership of 33 universities providing more than 200 MOOCs to an enrollment of 1.7 million students.
Without a clear revenue stream, the open-source platform does face challenges. However, while the traditional four-year, brick-and-mortar campus is here to stay, there is a real possibility that online courses will become licensed for certification or transfer credit similar to AP exam scores, which could save thousands of dollars in overhead and non-value-added teaching instruction per student.
Although the School of Management may not be offering MOOCs just yet, it appears the school is preparing to join the ranks of a “commoditized business education,” one that is powerful in reach and content value by combining the best aspects in the overall online trend. By offering this highly effective and demanded service with a sustainable profit model, Binghamton will continue to provide its students with a more comprehensive educational experience moving forward.