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| Yes | 43% | 118 votes | Total: 275 votes | |
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Add to FavoritesCan you learn as much from the Internet as you would from a college? My first vote would be decisively in favor of the Internet. Except that "the Internet" and "college" aren't mutually exclusive "concepts."
When we talk about college in the sense suggested by the question, we appear to be talking about it in a bricks-and-mortar sense as opposed to the "Internet" as a virtual environment, also bearing in mind the Merriam-Webster's definition of "Internet" as "an electronic communications network that connects computer networks and organizational computer facilities around the world." This causes several problems. In the first place, many colleges and universities are now providing instruction to their students via the Internet through distance learning, for example.
But increasingly universities are using Apple Incorporated's iTunes podcast technology to provide free educational access to the public through Apple's iTunes University. In October 2008 both Oxford and Cambridge universities said that they would make available to the public, 150 hours of video and audio material of lectures and ideas from world leading thinkers. Cambridge said it would "lift the veil" on its university using iTunes to broadcast lectures and talks from its experts, into the public domain.
Among the contributions will be that of Joseph Stiglitz, former chief economist of the World Bank and the winner of 2001 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. Oxbridge will join two other British universities, University College London and the Open University in providing lectures on iTunes University.
There are over 165 American universities already participating in iTunes University. They include Princeton, University of California (Berkeley), MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Utah State, Tufts, Johns Hopkins, Rice and University of Washington. Harvard University Extension School offers full courses such as Understanding Computers and The Internet; and Introduction to Computer Graphics and CPU Programming. MIT's MITOPENCOURSEWARE is offering Philosophy of Love in the Western World, a seminar on the nature of love and sex.
Degree-seeking students can now do limited for-credit courses through the Internet. It is therefore not difficult to foresee an economic model based on total Internet-based instruction at the college level. In this scenario, students would only go into a walls-and-mortar setting to do the actual examination. Professors would not have to carry around research papers submitted in college and would have more time to meet with students individually. This would be an enormous benefit to the environment, as travel would be dramatically reduced.
However after 10 years in university, in my view the walls-and-mortar university model is overrated. No university could provide me with the pleasure and knowledge I derived from reading Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev, Baldwin, Camus, Sartre, Steinbeck or Capote. I had to have my dictionary next to me when I read Norman Mailer and Henry Miller, but that is how I learned. This is how I expanded my vocabulary and the authors provided me with models for writing. The point is a 45-hour course is hardly enough to get a total education: the professor will say, for example, "Read chapter four, pages 75 to 96 and chapter seven, pages 134 to 178". And that sums up your relationship with that book. You get the essence of ideas from university courses. It is almost like fast food. If you studied Information Technology ten years ago in university, for example, unless you upgraded your knowledge recently, that degree is of limited value to you today. There is a freshness about the Internet that would probably override that problem. And if you take a degree program like journalism -one of my undergraduate degrees- many of the stalwarts in newspaper world never attended college. Walter Winchell had a profound impact on 20th century journalism but he didn't attend college.
Can you learn as much from the Internet as you would from college? Ask Microsoft founder Bill Gates or Virgin's Richard Branson. They either didn't go, or didn't finish college, but they haven't done too badly.
Learn more about this author, Colin Dennis.
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No
I suppose you could answer yes to this question if all you're concerned with is "book-learning." I happen to be of a mind that you learn more outside the classroom than you can ever learn inside. One of the most important aspects of college life is meeting people from different walks of life, different backgrounds, different cultures. Something you'll never get from an on-line education is the social interaction you'd receive if you experienced the campus.
In almost any aspect of adult life, whether you're a carpenter, a Wall Street mogul or a social worker, one of the most important things you need to master is social interaction. Maybe of most importance is learning to socialize with people you've never met before-people from a different background. Nothing can prepare you for this as well as hands-on experience. And you can't get hands-on experience via the internet. Yes, there are social networking sites on the internet. But, you can never compare what you learn by meeting total strangers at a college party to what you learn by spending time on myspace and facebook. This is especially true if you're receiving a "virtual" education.
When I was 17 and was first starting college, I was incredibly shy. I knew how to laugh it up with people I was already familiar with-friends and associates. But learning to feel comfortable around people I've never met before is something I'd never learned. I had a roommate in college who was very insistent on my joining him whenever he went to a social gathering of any sort. I often resisted, but more often than not, I gave in and attended. I can never thank this former roommate of mine and those with whom I attended school for teaching me this important lesson. I'm now in the social services field. I will very often go over to someone's house whom I've never met. One of the first things I need to do is to make a family comfortable with meeting me. I could never have mastered this skill without the real college experience.
Now, I want to make this clear as well. I really do believe that there is a place for an internet education. Especially for someone who is interested in pursuing a master's level, or higher, degree. There is probably a reason for wanting to pursue the advanced degree and that reason probably revolves around work. It is very difficult to find time in one's life and work schedule to also pick up and attend classes in a classroom. Assuming that the student has already mastered the above-mentioned social skills, an internet education for an advanced degree may be just the right thing.
Can you learn as much from the internet as you would get from a college education? The answer varies depending on how you define learning. But, for my money, an internet education could never fully replace the experience one would receive from a college aducation.
Learn more about this author, Paul Schingle.
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