A look at “OPMs”, companies which manage online courses for universities like Harvard and Yale, and take a 60% cut typically from tuition fees
The price of college is breaking America. At a moment when Hollywood celebrities and private equity titans have allegedly … Tweets: @bluegrasscap , @abbasabbasov , @ricetopher , @ernestezeugo , @kevincarey1 , @emilyjodell , @alexshebanow , @giladedelman , @ralphratheriled , @bleuguy , @bethanyletiecq , @zeitgeistfilm , and @koehrsen_will Tweets: @bluegrasscap : When Hermes & LVMH began online distribution, they did NOT seek to lower their prices or cheapen their brand image. The same framing can help explain why online courses of Harvard & Berkeley are not lessening the burden of tuition vs offline courses. http://www.huffpost.com/... http://twitter.com/... Abbas Abbasov / @abbasabbasov : A must-read for anyone in higher ed! This quote stuck with me: “Instead of students receiving a reasonably priced, quality online degree, universities are using them as cash cows while corporate middlemen hoover up the greater share of the profits.” http://twitter.com/... Dr. Chris Rice / @ricetopher : Curious why this (excellent) piece doesn't discuss 1) online edu is expensive to do well, even when not OPM built, 2) faculty senates often vote to keep tuition the same so as not to cannibalize on-campus programs, & 3) state policy often requires tuition equality online vs F2F? http://twitter.com/... Ernest Ezeugo / @ernestezeugo : This longform piece by @kevincarey1 is about why online education hasn't made higher ed cheaper. It's about the insidious nature of secretive for-profit companies called OPMs and colleges putting profit over mission. It's a must read. https://www.huffpost.com/... Kevin Carey / @kevincarey1 : 1/ A few years ago I wrote a book about technology and the future of higher education. I had hopes tech would make learning better, more accessible, and more affordable. Today I published a long article about what happened next. It's not a happy story. http://www.huffpost.com/... Dr. Ej / @emilyjodell : At 38 colleges, including Yale, Princeton, Brown and Penn, there are more students from the top 1 percent than the bottom 60 percent. http://www.huffpost.com/... Alexander Shebanow / @alexshebanow : “The upper ranks of these companies are a who's who of refugees from controversial for-profit colleges. [...] OPM executives include [...] Kaplan executives [...], a former University of Phoenix vice president and a president at Career Education Corporation...” http://twitter.com/... Gilad Edelman / @giladedelman : It's hard to summarize this utterly astonishing @kevincarey1 piece on how the original promise of online higher education became, instead, a massively corrupt cash cow for universities and corporations. So you should just read it. https://www.huffpost.com/... Jessica Dai / @ralphratheriled : “By contrast, master's programs are a black box...no requirement to publish any admissions data. This means universities can dramatically lower their admissions standards and enroll thousands of highly profitable students without sullying their brand. ” Ahem, library school. http://twitter.com/... Rahim S. Rajan / @bleuguy : What role should 3rd party providers play? Clearly, most colleges don't have the expertise to do this. Yet why they're forsaking 60% of tuition or why they don't care about equity or affordability is beyond me. The inability of higher ed to think itself out of a box is stunning. http://twitter.com/... Bethany Letiecq / @bethanyletiecq : Thanks @kevincarey1 for this great piece. George Mason University is working really hard to acquire and convert a for-profit uni. Your article is beyond sobering and what we faculty fear as publics put profit over people. @AAUPMason http://twitter.com/... Peter Joseph / @zeitgeistfilm : All students should mass default - on purpose. “The U.S. now has more student loan debt than credit card debt—upward of $1.5 trillion. Nearly 40 percent of borrowers who entered college in the 2003 academic year could default on their loans by 2023...” https://www.huffpost.com/... Will Koehrsen / @koehrsen_will : Georgia Tech charges only $6600 for their online Computer Science Master's program, ranked 8th in the US. This is 1/10 the cost at Columbia which is ranked lower. http://www.huffpost.com/... http://twitter.com/...