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This article was absolutely fabulous. I come from the community college setting, and this rings all too true for me.

At the community college I attended, it was a feeder school for many Orange County students. There was a general feeling of "High School Part 2" and an incredibly laid back climate. There also happened to be over 26k students, and classes were constantly too full. After having to schedule an appointment 3 weeks in advance with a counselor to discuss my options of getting into some B level school, I was told it would take me 6 semesters, or 3 years. I decided to learn to code.

I dropped out, hit the library, and started learning. Then, I applied to, and got accepted, into Dev Bootcamp. However, my mom ended up getting diagnosed with breast cancer, and in an effort to stay closer to her, I ended up getting accepted into General Assembly's Web Devlopment Immersive in Santa Monica. I decided to take a path of books, library study time, and self guided learning utilizing the many resources available to me such as; weekly coding sessions with Keith from DBC, Stack Overflow, and Google.

"The “beginning of the unbundling of the American university” is how one observer has described the transformation. All it will take for students to avail themselves of this emerging opportunity is a clear sense of where they’re headed, lots of self-motivation, and good access to information about what mix of skills is likely to lead to a promising career."

This above statement could not be more correct. Although the tools are out there for you to learn and become whatever it is you want to do, there is almost too much information. You need someone to guide you through the obstacles on your own individual path.

One thing I do hope we see more of, is a push for continued learning and education. It appears the vast majority of people entering and graduating from our 4 year Univerisites, view college as an end all to education. There needs to be a bigger push for learning in general. I suppose this is easier said than done, however.




I think of the educational path that you’re taking as the “auto-didact web development model”. There are several factors that make this path viable (educationally and as a conduit to employment), including:

• a vibrant sector of the economy driving job growth;

• wide sharing of domain knowledge within an online community;

• accepted patterns of skill demonstration and social proof (beyond the traditional credential of a degree);

• low startup and ongoing cost of materials (computer ownership and access to commodity servers);

• willingness of professionals to act as mentors (whether through profit motives or generosity).

As a lifelong autodidact with an educational path that has been less structured than the above, I’m interested to see if elements of this pattern can work for self guided education in other fields... creating systems of non traditional educational guidance and credentialing. Part of the "the unbundling of the American university”, as you put it.

[Edit: formatting]


I think there should be more emphasis towards self guided education in other fields. However, in a lot of ways web development and other sectors of programming, is an anomaly. Tech is one of the few true meritocracies left in this world, where it really doesn't matter where you came from as long as you can program. One of my instructors at GA is a fantastic programmer, and he dropped out of high school.

Your points for why tech works as a viable path are hard to reproduce in other fields, however that doesn't mean it's impossible. That needs to change, and I think companies likes Udacity which not only provide courses, but also support, will lead the way in this paradigm shift.


Akin: One top-tier resource (i.e. that particular book on a topic that is clear, explicative, and authoritative) can be worth 10 second or third tier resources.

Someone new to a field or topic will benefit greatly by direction to those best resources (and away from the confusion and time-sink of others).

----

Similarly, if you are at school and taking classes. It's worth a lot of effort to get into classes taught by those professors who, big name or not, really care and know how to teach. Even if their class is "more difficult". What the hell are you paying all that money for, if not to be suitably challenged to learn and achieve more (with good explanations and choice of materials)?


THis path is possible, but it doesn't solve every problem. You can't be (or, better, I'd prefer you refrain from being) a self-taught brain surgeon.

If you (plural) are to bring the US back to its former glory (and higher education plays a major role here), you'll need more than shiny web apps.

I'd start by outlawing reality shows. ;-)




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