That's an excitingly ambitious project. I really hope you guys pull it off.<p>One (extended) question though:<p>The first course is "a cutting-edge class in web application development for mobile devices. Not only does it use texts focused on practical application and cover tech like PhoneGap, Jo, Sencha, jQTouch, and jQuery Mobile, but it is taught by a real-world developer with decades of university teaching experience".<p>That's not a university course, that's a trade school course. Look at the "textbooks". Probably a useful one but it's not CS. I know you say "We not only teach CS/SE theory at the highest level, but also provide the practical implementation that prepares you to excel in the workplace." but to be honest that seems like a lie. I don't have much experience with teaching CS but I have some.<p>The idea that you could teach a practical (necessarily complex) toolkit at the same time or alongside high level CS concepts seems absurd. Students have a hard enough time getting those high level concepts to click but now they are mixing trade school toolkit training in at the same time? Those two goals conflict with each other. It's like using gcc internals for a compiler course.<p>I am so onboard with the online, just in time, at your own pace learning thing. But I have to say that the copy on this page has seriously dampened by enthusiam.<p>You're called "Turing College" and the only course is a trade school mobile app course covering mobile app framework libraries (at least they'll have to come back in 6 months for the new version of the course) and say things like this: "We’re teaching you to be a rock star, not just look like one on paper". WTF? Was brogrammercollege.blogspot.com taken? And blogspot? really?<p>I hope my impression is wrong, but I'm not coming away with a good one from this page.
I believe most of the new-model online/for-profit universities actually had to buy older universities to get their accreditation.<p>So I doubt that "play[ing] their game better than they do" by pursuing traditional accreditation is really the disruptive strategy here. Blow up the whole rotten credentialist system and replace it with something very different.<p>(A meta-credentialing service might be a neat startup. With an explosion of non-traditional courses, certifications, and credentials, which actually hold up as meaning something? Communicating something here is a process, trust, and even data/statistics challenge – a nice community/tech opportunity.)
<i>Just-in-time learning is the future. No ifs, ands, or buts. Any argument you might have to the contrary is not only wrong, but dangerously wrong ... The current system of teaching students everything they might need to know, just in case it ever comes up, is an artificial construct that resulted from limited access to books and a limited amount of time available for study. Just in time, on the other hand, is how we actually learn by default.</i><p>This is an interesting point. I happen to disagree, and I hoped that the author would go on to say exactly why it's wrong, especially dangerously so. It seems like the author rejects curriculum-based courses of study that provide a broad, solid foundation in favor of just-in-time courses of study, in which one learns whatever is necessary at the moment, right before applying it.<p>My main objections are that<p>* There are things you don't feel like learning that you would do well to learn. I had a lot of freedom to choose courses during school, which was great, but I am about to graduate with a lot of holes in my knowledge.<p>* No matter how smart you are, you would benefit from the guidance of a teacher --- guidance <i>through a full curriculum</i> that gives you a solid foundation and imparts onto you important patterns of thought.
What does HN think of my prediction?<p>Within the next decade, we will see the rise of the teacher superstar. They will have salaries/compensations comparable to movie stars except their performance will be teaching online to massive amounts of students.<p>We can already see a beginning of that trend with Salman Khan or Peter Norvig teaching an AI class online.
I'm not sure I follow. Am I supposed to pay $10k for an online course that I know little about their reputation, with no free trial nor guarantee from existing businesses that they actually value your certification? It's hard to imagine how you'd get early adopters to get traction.<p>I think you're looking at it wrong. You shouldn't be comparing yourself to universities. Don't compare your prices, duration and accreditation with them. You should be building something completely different from the ground up. Something that is viable in today's world, not trying to bandage existing university models to today's world. Like pg said, build your own thing, if it's really good, it will eventually replace universities without you even aiming for that.<p>Personally, I think you should focus much more heavily on the accreditation side than anything else. Just try to build a certification system together with existing tech employers, something that they would sign and put a banner in your website saying "company X approves this certificate as important for our selection process". <i>That</i> would get early adopters interested. After you have that. Offer your classes for free, make those as widely available as possible. Charge for the certificate and one on one help with those who feel they need it to get your certificate. Well, that's how I think this universities will actually get disrupted.
It doesn't quite meet your criteria for start today, but the Open University, a well respected "virtual uni", has been running in the UK for over 40 years.<p><a href="http://www.open.ac.uk/" rel="nofollow">http://www.open.ac.uk/</a><p>Fees are a little higher but only marginally at around $8000 per 120 credits for international students. (A typical degree requires 300-360 credits)<p>Many degrees can be completed over 7 or more years if it's convenient. But I think there is a minimum time as some coursework is assessed to a schedule.<p>So there is definitely a market for this type of learning, and competition almost always benefits the customer, so good luck!
Regarding the point: "Just-in-time learning is the future. No ifs, ands, or buts. Any argument you might have to the contrary is not only wrong, but dangerously wrong."<p>I don't think I agree with you there (or perhaps I just didn't interpret the point correctly). In certain fields of study - and perhaps software engineering is one - this might be true, but it does not hold generally. If tomorrow I find myself needing to write a good zero-finding algorithm in a new language, then yes, I can probably absorb that material quickly. If I find myself needing to model the temperature dependence of something using an esoteric branch of quantum mechanics, then good luck to me without 3 years of prior study in topics that didn't seem relevant to anything at the time.
This is very very a long shot project. I have watched colleges trying to get their first accreditation (I guess most likely going to be DETC in that case), but it is really a difficult process which gives them very little room outside of following the existing for-profit college business model. Plus the pricing is another issue. For example via distance CS Master Degrees at state colleges can go for under $10.000 (Columbus State, Dakota State).
The other more important thing is brand building. And developing Top Education brand burns lots of money and time. But it is exciting to watch the new approaches to Education grow. Hopefully one or another are able to break out.
A similar discussion/blog post in a thread on another trending HN post:<p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3742455" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3742455</a><p>Maybe we're all just seeing an end to the vague rhetoric about college "preparing you for life" rather than training you for the workplace.
That's really cool. Unfortunately, I'm not willing to drop $400 for an online course of unknown quality, with uncertainty about accredidation, when coursera is free. How do you plan to attract your initial users?
I think this would actually work better as a quick reference for people who are already coders - sometimes you just need to look stuff up. Target Stack Overflow rather than Stanford.