There are two types of disciplined people: those who take consistent action through sheer willpower and those who do it without the use of willpower.
As student debt reaches new highs every day, it’s more urgent than ever to look at ways to reduce the costs of degrees. Here are some ways to do that.
First of all, we should shorten degrees when possible. After all, isn’t it strange that most degrees have the same duration regardless of the complexity of the underlying field? Some degrees can and should be shortened. That would mean fewer years of tuition to pay for, which would lower student debt and increase education access.
Another way to lower the cost of degrees is to reduce the number of administrators. Yale has close to one administrator per student, which is too much. Reducing the number of administrators would lower costs, resulting in less student debt and higher access to education.
A third consideration is that, contrary to common belief, education is cheaper than ever, thanks to the internet. Instead, it’s the cost of certification that skyrocketed. Let’s put this insight into use.
For each subject, the government could pay the best 2-3 teachers in the country to record a masterclass and make that available for free to anyone interested. That alone would make education much better and more accessible. Colleges would become a place to practice and receive tutoring – and competition with other tutoring providers would lower costs. Finally, certification could be offered by stand-alone public institutions, at a much lower price than currently, thanks to the unbundling of campuses and education and the consequent reduction in teacher and staff person-hours needed.
Doing that would also remove the massive conflict of interest coming from the same institutions teaching and certifying the professionals whose competence our society and economy rely upon.
Is this idea crazy? Not so much. As Nassim Taleb wrote in his Antifragile, lecturers teach birds how to fly. In other words, much of the success of graduates compared to the general population isn’t due to what college taught them but to the fact that graduates are selected from the smarter or better-connected part of the population. If much of the value of degrees comes from the selection process, couldn’t we unbundle that?
In 2023, thanks to the scale technology can provide, the time is ripe to offer a cheaper, more accessible, and more inclusive alternative to the current college system.
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