Serendipity35

It is always dangerous to make predictions. Titling your article "Education 10 Years from Now" invites skepticism at the starting gate. But we do it in education all the time. We try to predict trends in technology, pedagogy, society, funding etc. Sometimes, as in the case of the MOOC, all those things seem to matter.

The piece I read shows the perceived value of a state college education as and so it attracts good teachers and facilities. But the cost is high and it keeps going up at a rate that is not sustainable.

What is interesting in the article is that it sees community colleges as being in a good position to partner with those state colleges to provide whatever is lacking for their distance students. Hmmmm... That's a niche that I'm not sure community colleges will want to occupy.

What the community colleges can offer are exam rooms and moderation, sports, labs, etc.  All this allows the 4-year students to have a more affordable price.

Colleges are confused. They are not sure of what to do about students with lower abilities, social media, MOOCs and parents and students questioning the value of that expensive diploma.

I suppose this can be seen as an opportunity for community colleges, but it can also be seen as making them further subservient to the "real" 4-year schools. 

In this prediction, the increase in the perceived value of the community colleges is connected to online learning. 

The article proposes that "the customer base for education is now the employer. An employer can find what he wants in an employee with or without and institutional accreditation. Students will be quick to follow the path to employment, since institutional education costs have risen and value has eroded, students will be looking for schools that accredit on a much broader basis than simply competence and standardized tests."

That article at Impartable.com looks at two tools that they offer to serve students: School with its social learning platform (Teachers/Facilitators and Content) and analyzed big data of the student. Their different model of accreditation gives the employer: an analysis of his aptitude for employment and ability to learn; his skill set and personality type; red flag issues like authority and peer conflicts; peer and school subject mastery assessment.