Super-cheap online master’s degree could change American higher education

More details on the main site: <a href="http://www.omscs.gatech.edu/#np-855" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.omscs.gatech.edu&#x2F;#np-855</a><p>Self-taught computer scientists should also note:<p><i>Formal admission into the OMS CS program will require a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science from an accredited institution, or a related Bachelor of Science degree with a possible need to take and pass remedial courses</i>

Personally, I have benefited more from the human interaction and relationships formed while attending university, in person, than from many of the classes themselves. The people I got to know helps me more than the formulas I learned. I believe the people is what you&#x27;re paying for when you attend an ivy league school. The math is the same.

I see this degree as a huge boon for folks in the technology sector who are already working, but want to pick up a masters degree (for professional development or promotion). This isn&#x27;t a replacement for the face to face college experience, but individuals who are working full-time don&#x27;t necessarily want&#x2F;need that socialization.<p>This is cheap enough that I could easy see tech companies offering to subsidize this degree as a perk for their employees, assuming the employee gets accepted to the program.

San Jose State suspending its online offerings indicates that online only classes may not be all they&#x27;re cracked up to be.<p><a href="http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/San-Jose-State-suspends-online-courses-4672870.php" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sfgate.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;article&#x2F;San-Jose-State-suspends-o...</a>

My experience with MOOC&#x27;s: They&#x27;re still expensive, over-priced education.<p>I&#x27;ve taken many online courses, and I&#x27;ve always felt as if I could have just researched things on my own and bought a book or two. I have yet to take an online course that I felt was worth my money. All of them consisted of: Buy these books, read this material, answer these questions. Well I can do that on my own for free thank you.

This is an aside, but I wonder how much longer the law schools will be able to deny admission to the bar to people with on-line law degrees.<p>You are allowed to take the California bar with an on-line law degree, but that&#x27;s unusual.<p>Obviously, the law schools have a huge incentive to prevent this from happening, and they hold an ace card that traditional MS degrees don&#x27;t have - it is flat out illegal (illegal as in you can be put in prison) to practice law unless you do the education exactly as specified by the law schools.<p>Computer Science departments may confer a useful degree and body of knowledge, but there&#x27;s no professional association that can deny (under threat of fines and imprisonment) people without an MS in CS from writing code.

The Georgia Tech MS is an incredible deal!<p>Just wanted to chime with a few other interesting online degree programs, particular helpful for :<p>1. Post-Bac Computer Science B.S. Program from Oregon State. Takes 1-3 years to complete: <a href="http://ecampus.oregonstate.edu/online-degrees/undergraduate/computer-science/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;ecampus.oregonstate.edu&#x2F;online-degrees&#x2F;undergraduate&#x2F;...</a><p>$450&#x2F;credit x 60 credits = $27K<p>2. Stony Brook University Electrical Engineering Online: <a href="http://beeol.ee.sunysb.edu/index.shtml" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;beeol.ee.sunysb.edu&#x2F;index.shtml</a><p>If Pre-reqs met, ($245&#x2F;credit in-state &#x2F; $742&#x2F;credit out-of-state) x 41 credits = $10-30K<p>My story: 31, attending a decent PA state school getting a 2nd (and maybe 3rd) BS in Physics and CS, in-state full tuition &lt; $9k&#x2F;year. Went to a more expensive school in Philadelphia for my first Bachelors in Information Systems. Moved back to PA from Bay Area, had Data Analyst-type skills, applied to Startup School and got denied (naturally), but didn&#x27;t have strong programming experience to get in a startup. Hope to return to the Bay, only prepared this time.<p>Yeah, I could&#x27;ve spent years self-teaching everything I needed to know, but found it helpful to go through a formal academic program to save time. However, I&#x27;m also supplementing my learning through Codecademy and MIT OCW.<p>But we definitely need more rigorous and legitimate online programs because so many people want to go back to school but can&#x27;t because of family&#x2F;work obligations, and the popularized online degree programs are degree mills at best.<p>Subjects such as CS and EE can be taught well online, but to teach Lab Sciences online would be impossible, unless simulations would be considered a substitute for actual Lab work. Medical School&#x27;s another impossibility.<p>But if I knew about these online programs beforehand, I would&#x27;ve strongly considered it before quitting my job and being a full-time student.

I was thinking an interesting startup would be one that matches people taking online courses into study&#x2F;support groups. Then each person has to put down say a $100 deposit, and the group only gets their deposit back if everyone in the group completes the course.*<p>As a bonus the money taken from groups that don&#x27;t complete the course could be distributed to the groups that did so you could actually make money from taking courses.<p>Anyone interested in working on this??<p>* There would be exceptions for illness, etc.

In the past, the only way to acquire a deep understanding of a topic was to attend a university and study in a traditional class setting. As such, employers made hiring decisions based on the merits of one&#x27;s Alma mater; in the early days of higher education, individuals attending top schools were the only ones who had access to the highest quality instruction.<p>Today, the biggest threat to Higher-ed is the movement towards open courseware, largely spearheaded by MIT (see here: <a href="http://bit.ly/9GawDQ" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;bit.ly&#x2F;9GawDQ</a>). However, open courseware cannot be a threat to large institutions as long as hiring is based on a paper degree rather than the amount of acquired knowledge and specialized skill one has attained.<p>I believe these online degrees are a rather expensive way to solve this problem.

My only concern is that some ongoing identification&#x2F;verification takes place so the degree doesn&#x27;t get &quot;gamed&quot; by being on line, thusly lowering it&#x27;s value.

This is going to change the higher education not only in USA but worldwide .... kudos to all who put this kind of effort in disrupting the long due stagnant eco-system ... it is going to be proven as a god-sent-gift for a student coming from a poor financial background from 3rd world countries ...

This is a great first step, but what America needs is a quality, inexpensive, Bachelor&#x27;s degree program. I hope it will happen, but it&#x27;s not an obvious evolution from this GT initiative.

Does anyone know if it is possible to use this degree for VISA purposes?

IMHO, this is a great step towards democratizing education. No way should it cost $200,000 for a bachelor&#x27;s degree.

No GRE .... superb