DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education [Paperback]

Anya Kamenetz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2010

The price of college tuition has increased more than any other major good or service for the last twenty years. Nine out of ten American high school seniors aspire to go to college, yet the United States has fallen from world leader to only the tenth most educated nation. Almost half of college students don't graduate; those who do have unprecedented levels of federal and private student loan debt, which constitutes a credit bubble similar to the mortgage crisis.

The system particularly fails the first-generation, the low-income, and students of color who predominate in coming generations. What we need to know is changing more quickly than ever, and a rising tide of information threatens to swamp knowledge and wisdom. America cannot regain its economic and cultural leadership with an increasingly ignorant population. Our choice is clear: Radically change the way higher education is delivered, or resign ourselves to never having enough of it.

The roots of the words "university" and "college" both mean community. In the age of constant connectedness and social media, it's time for the monolithic, millennium-old, ivy-covered walls to undergo a phase change into something much lighter, more permeable, and fluid.

The future lies in personal learning networks and paths, learning that blends experiential and digital approaches, and free and open-source educational models. Increasingly, you will decide what, when, where, and with whom you want to learn, and you will learn by doing. The university is the cathedral of modernity and rationality, and with our whole civilization in crisis, we are poised on the brink of Reformation.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Kamenetz, author of the alarming personal finance expose Generation Debt, drops another bombshell on the emerging cohort of young Americans, this time regarding higher education. While she mounts a standard (though illuminating) attack on spiraling tuition and the bottomless pit of student loans, Kamenetz also questions the fundamental assumptions of modern American education culture: the twin, contradictory ideas that college must be universally accessible, and that the smallest accepted denomination of educational currency is a bachelor's degree from a four-year, liberal arts institution. Kamenetz explores those ideas' fallacies as they play out daily in American classrooms, as well as students' myriad alternatives, from community colleges to online learning collectives. In great detail, Kamenetz explains the flawed economic models that underpin higher education, the faulty premises they maintain and the government's failures to address them. Kamenetz's approach is methodical and balanced, showcasing extensive research and thoughtfulness, while acknowledging one of the chief problems with reform: no one wants to experiment on their own child. This volume merits consideration from high school students and their parents, as well as educators preparing a generation for uncertain job prospects, an information economy still in its infancy, and the steady erosion of geographical barriers.

From Booklist

Kamenetz (Generation Debt, 2006) tackles the U.S. higher education system. Starting with a history of college development, she delves into how poverty, race, and class converge in the halls of higher learning. She then asserts that everything about how we live and what we hope for is tied into the collegiate dream of success, which has been persistently sold to the American middle class. But why hasn’t this promise been fulfilled for so many? Kamenetz pinpoints political reasons, and makes the case that serious changes must be made pertaining to how colleges serve their students and make their money to prevent a decrease in the value of college degrees and a widening gap between social classes. Kamenetz offers many statistics and studies to back up her statements, yet she moves so quickly from one to the next, and this is such a short book for such a weighty topic, it ends up being a useful introductory summary rather than a source of in-depth conclusions. --Colleen Mondor

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Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing (April 1, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1603582347
• ISBN-13: 978-1603582346
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (51 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #68,794 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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106 of 112 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Of How Much Worth IS "That Piece of Paper"?, May 16, 2010

By 

Kevin Currie-Knight "Education Grad Student" (Newark, Delaware) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education (Paperback)

We've all heard it: "I'm just taking this class to get 'that piece of paper.'" Or, "It will sure be worth it when I get 'that piece of paper.'" As a graduate student, I can attest first hand that much of university life is little more than a 'degree mill.' And that is where DIY U starts off: with a problem. How, the author asks, can we justify our faith in college education when there is little or no evidence that the ever-increasing price is worth the ever-diminishing returns?

First, this charge of college being a "credential mill" is not new with Kamenetz. William James alluded to it in the early 1900's in his essay "The PhD Octopus." More recently, Charles Sykes wrote Profscam: Professors and the Demise of Higher Education in frustration over it. Now DIY U. The first half of the book is Kamenetz's explanation of the history, sociology, and economics of our "college for all" hopes and how they've (ironically) led to a very tiered system. What started with the intention of getting more folks to college via Pell Grants, the GI Bill and other government subsidies has led to, at once, a work force that was 'graduate' hungry, and at the same time, rising prices in college costs. What does that spell? A situation where making money demands going to college which fewer and fewer can afford to do. Put differently, a college degree is more or less of value today not because of the education it provides, but the fact that one MUST go through it to stay competitive with others. And so the cycle continues.

But is it financially worth it? Inevitably, there comes a point where prices get high enough to render 'keeping apace' a not-good-enough return. And, says Kamenetz, we are long past that point. She details several studies which show (as Sykes had years ago) that the price of college and the debt it generally leads to is not matched by the economic gains one can expect. As she puts it, the trade-off is only worth it if one is of the means to do it without incurring huge debt, which most aren't. IF debt must be incurred, maybe there are other options.

And there are. This is the point of the book's second half. Community college, tech schools, online universities, etc, etc. All of these are looked on with disdain by the ivory tower academy (I've had many a discussion with professors of precisely this inclination). But, we are past the point where we need to ask: aren't there a whole lot of professions that simply don't require a four year degree? (A strange ally here is Charles Murray, whose book Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality makes this point very elegantly. But I am betting that Kamenetz and Murray are in different political camps.) Kamenetz points out that, in this day and age, it is also becoming easier to learn on one's own using tools like google books, itunes university, youtube/edu, and many, many other sources.

Here, though, is where I find major fault with the author's analyses. While I am very much in favor of 'non-traditonal' avenues of education like online universities, tech schools, etc, Open Source education (of the kind also favored by John Taylor Gatto in Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher's Journey Through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling) is a bit premature for several reasons. First, we are absolutely ignoring the value of having an external instructor that has more expertise in the field than the learner. Learning is only partly about access to materials; it is also about how those materials are packaged, filtered, etc; services which render instructors much more valuable than 'go it your own way.' Put directly, one need not only get hold of information, but know what kind of order to process it in, have it presented and represented in different ways, and know what information is of use and what information is not. Individuals left to their own devices may not always be the best at doing this, particularly in fields they are not familiar with already.

Secondly, there is a problem our author doesn't address: "that piece of paper" serves a function as a type of endorsement by the university that the holder of it has mastered certain things (bluntly, "jumped through certain hoops.") Were one to engage in Open Source education, how will future employers be able to tell that candidates for, say, a job in engineering have mastered certain engineering tasks? With a degree, there is (at least reasonable) assurance that the candidate has learned the relevant things. With Open Source education, this type of gauging becomes a lot more time consuming, costly, and just plain problematic.

Lastly, I think the author gets a bit hung up on the "information wants to be free" paradigm, so aptly argued against by recent detractor Jaron Lanier (You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto). To apply Lanier's argument, it all comes down to quality control that, in the world of "free," does not necessarily exist. When information is available for free, it generally means that it is not done by someone making money or a career from the product, which may often mean that it is an amateurish work. Yes, I know how snobby this sounds, but it is also true. (And when it is not, such as public domain books, or videos of lectures given by professors on itunes, these are only professional BECAUSE their 'freeness' is a byproduct of them having done it for a profit elsewhere or at another time.) Long and short: the author seems to get hung up on the idea that, thanks to the internet, we can get information much more freely than before. Lanier would simply add to that that this does not in any way guarantee that the quality is as good as before.

So, there we go: three stars. Kamenetz brings up some great points, like the fact that we simply have to be open to new models of higher education because the ones we have aren't necessarily doing the job. Where she fails to convince me is on the idea of Open Source education as a viable model to replace or even supplement the university. Perhaps a full-length argument on this will be a sequel to this otherwise engaging and stimulating read.

38 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Call to Transform Higher Ed, April 26, 2010

By 

Theresa Welsh "The Seeker" (Ferndale, Michigan, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education (Paperback)

(What's this?)

Everyone says they want a college education but fewer people in the US have a real chance of getting one. And why do young people want that college degree? Because they've been repeatedly told they need it in order to get a good-paying job. They've been fed the numbers that show that average earnings are highest for those with with advanced degrees, followed by four-year degrees, some college, and lower pay for only high school or no high school diploma. In the United States, there is a profound belief, seemingly upheld by these numbers, that a college degree is the ticket to the American Dream.

But the reality, told so eloquently in this small book by Anya Kamenetz, is that many find themselves priced out of going to college and those who go find themselves drowning in debt and more than half who start never get a degree. Because college has become so expensive, there is concern among students about the monetary value of their degree. Will it really pay off in terms of their salary over their working years? Is it worth taking out all those student loans? Should parents mortgage their house (oops, with the mortgage crisis, probably not an option), spend their retirement savings, or take out commercial loans to send their kids to college?

Is that even the right way to think about higher education? Is it just all about money? Whatever happened to the intrinsic value of an education? As it turns out, there have never been more options for learning, if we stop thinking about learning as only happening in classrooms in ivy-covered buildings on rolling green campuses. In this book, Kamenetz takes us on a tour of the smorgasbord of learning opportunities. Many of these are rooted in technology that can bring together teacher and student over any distance, can offer instant information on any subject. The internet has truly been the disruptive technology of our age. Many colleges now offer internet classes, but some newer approaches have used the technology to basically change the way information is delivered. What the author calls "the sage on the stage" - the lecture system - is being replaced with online learning that adapts to each person's learning style.

A new batch of "for profit" colleges (think University of Phoenix or Kaplan University) are experimenting with more approaches that attract and keep students. The traditional university gets its prestige, not from graduating students, but from its research activities and its exclusivity (the number of students it turns down). It is not focused on imparting students with knowledge, but on building up its "brand" and its image through its distinguished professors, who may spend little time with actual students. The for-profits have turned that around and concentrate on students. I found it a bit disheartening to hear that the profit motive is driving innovation in education. Shouldn't we as a society, through public education, be providing the means for every person to develop their skills and make a contribution? Have our institutions of higher learning let us down in a massive way?

I found the information in this book energizing, provocative and truly transforming in its potential. Since I confess to having been born just after World War II ended, I know I am not the generation that the author wants to reach with this book. But I have long thought the use of a college degree to screen out job applicants has been a poor policy on the part of employers. When I worked for a Fortune 500 company, part of my job was preparing presentations for managers. I remember one presentation that touted the fact that they planned to hire "Ivy-League MBAs" without any reference to what these hires would be doing; it was all about the prestige. Another time I saw this company lose an amazingly talented young man who was working as a contractor, but who they would not hire because he lacked a college degree. Shouldn't hiring decisions be made on the basis of who can best do the job, not on whether or not they have an MBA from Yale?

Speaking of my generation, older people are also attracted to these new options for learning. The January-Feruary issue of the AARP Bulletin had an article called "Free E-Learning." It listed a bunch of websites that offer learning in many subjects, and the article began with the news that all of MIT's academic courses are available online. I visited all the sites listed and added many to my bookmarks. Since I am retired from full-time work, I do not care about gaining an academic credential, but I do care about the chance to learn and these are wonderful resources!

For people like my 25-year old daughter, who does not have a college degree, what Kamenetz tells us about new ways to showcase your abilities and basically compete with the "degree as credential" is relevant. My daughter's talents are artistic and she has taken lots of classes, but her friends in the creative arts tell her that a college degree is generally not worth the cost, and that creating/doing something that shows ability is a more compelling path to opportunities. Kamenetz gives us examples of people who have used the educational resources out there to learn what they needed to know, then just started using it to make a lving doing what they do best and want to do. Perhaps as time goes on and more people take this route, companies will begin to look at people in terms of their skills and talent, not just their college credentials.

There have always been people who educate themselves for what it is they want to do with their lives. Others seize an opportunity outside college that may not present itself again. Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard because he knew the time was right for small personal computers to take over some of what had been only possible with mainframes. Instead of taking classes, he dropped out and spent his time writing a version of the BASIC language for the Altair computer, which enabled it to do real work, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Sure overall, college graduates earn more, but maybe it's time to think about a diversity of ways people can find their future, and about ways our institutions of higher learning can adapt to new realities of economics and technology... and better serve the American people.

I really loved this book, with its vision of a new and improved educational environment, in which self-education flourishes! Thank you, Anya Kamenetz for writing it.

22 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Read for all Educators, March 29, 2010

By 

Kenley Neufeld - See all my reviews

This review is from: DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education (Paperback)

I enjoyed the book and took away many new ideas and links/resources to followup for my personal learning network. It is a fast read (couple days) and I would encourage all educators to pick it up - well worth the time. In fact, I intend to pass a copy on to my President, Vice-President, and Dean.

As an educator always trying to innovate and try new methods for opening the classroom, the book's content resonated with my philosophy and experiences. For the past 16-years I've been a librarian and teacher in both high schools and community colleges. I love that the community college experience is highlighted in the book. Currently I teach an online class on social media and all the content is available on the open web - no restrictions! Though most of the book was familiar territory for me, I particularly found the history of education chapter to be useful to provide perspective on our current state of education.

Will continue to reflect on these themes.