What Happens When Technology Lowers the Cost of a College Education

If these tech options are available, why would students ever physically go to class?

And if students never go to class, why would we need brick and mortar campuses?

And if we don’t need brick and mortar campuses, why wouldn’t the cost of education go down?

I don’t see why it wouldn’t go down – a good chunk of college costs goes towards room and board, and meal plans. If these spaces aren’t needed, then why should students have to pay for them?

I’m not saying that technology will render physical campus spaces obsolete – I’ve talked to multiple distance learning and lecture capture experts who have said they don’t anticipate brick and mortar campuses going anywhere in the future; aside from an education, students attend college for the experience of living away from home, to establish themselves in a new tribe and pave a new path for their future.

What I am saying is I think that technology will help reduce the cost of higher education, and will set new standards for what a college education looks like. Each entering freshmen class brings new lists of tech demands, and colleges have to fulfill those demands if they want to stay relevant and top of mind to keep up enrollment and make money.

This is good news for future college attendees, but maybe not for colleges.

With technology attaching itself to the DNA of higher education, I think that colleges will have to get creative with technology when it comes to raking in revenue. Maybe they need to open up more online classes, establish new MOOCs, invest in more lecture capture equipment.

I’m not sure what the answer is.

What I do know is that colleges have an endless spectrum of technologies to choose from to help them get the job done, and copious resources to get there.

One of those resources is students – what brought them to your school? What do they want technology-wise for their college experience? What does your college need to do to give them what they want? Will the investment pay off with the generations to step foot on campus after the class of 2020?

That’s for the end users to decide, and for colleges to find out.