thomas wrote:
>Interesting post. Perhaps those of us who are opposed to this sort of
>thing should contact Harcourt and indicate our refusal to use their
>products in our classes. Just a thought.
>
>Tom
nice idea an' all but didn't occur to me because i don't assign the tripe they put out so big deal and why would they give a hoot anyway..... so i kind of agree with the following, much to my despair:
Tom, et al, Re: Harcourt U. (geez, if you don't look too closely, it almost looks like Harvard U.) and Columbia U's distance learning projects -- with all due respect, I think this battle is already over. These things are going to happen. The ecology of institutional and program survival will be where the wars are fought: accreditation problems, success in recruiting students, will the marketplace "reward" those students over time... Faculty are a no-brainer. We have our price, and it is pretty low.
Here at the Univ. of Chicago our enlightened administration (yes, the same one that closed John Dewey's Dept. of Education here last year) is busy getting our top-rated MBA program up and running as a distance degree option, and word on the street is that they've already corralled at least one of our Nobel-level economists. The writing is on the wall. The half-life of these programs is an empirical question, but I wouldn't be surprised to see them live long and prosper.
smooches,
jane fondly