How do
you set up an accredited university? You buy one. Then you convert it into a
100% online school.
The
secret to all this is the fact that small colleges are going out of business
all the time. They have one asset worth retraining: regional accreditation.
Everything else can be sold off.
Let's
assume that Peter Thiel, who is a libertarian, wanted to set up a libertarian
University. He would wait until one of these struggling colleges goes belly up,
and he would buy the assets. The real estate is irrelevant. It can be sold off
for commercial development. They could be rented out to businesses that wanted to
have seminars. It really doesn't matter. The school would retain ownership of
the library, but only for accreditation purposes.
The
regional accreditation board will want to see that the college has a
comprehensive curriculum that is suitable for accreditation. This is easy to
achieve.
There are
about a dozen majors that accredited colleges normally offer: mathematics,
physics, chemistry, biology, English, history, political science, sociology,
psychology, education, philosophy, business, and economics. Lots of small
colleges don't offer an economics major. They just offer a business major.
Each of
these majors offers a one lower division course that is required for entry into
upper division. the upper division courses can be limited to 60 semester hours,
divided by three, or 20 one-semester courses. There might be one or two
elective courses.
Each
one-year course requires 90 50-minute lectures. A typical college course has
three lectures per week for 15 weeks in a semester. Then there will be at least
one textbook or equivalent, or possibly three or four monographs. There will be
a workbook. There will be some computer graded examinations.
So, we're
talking about 20 courses times approximately a dozen majors. That is 240
one-semester courses. Then there have to be the lower-division courses, so add
another dozen one-year courses. Certainly, it will take no more than 300
one-semester courses to fulfill the requirements of accreditation. Put
differently, it would be 150 one-year courses.
The
college can hire the services of a libertarian scholar who knows the key
intellectual players in a number of fields. The best one I can think of would
be the Mises Institute's David Gordon. The president of the college would then
contact approximately four dozen scholars. He would make this offer: produce 90
50-minute lectures, a workbook, and a reading list. This would take care of a
one-year course. For this, each scholar will be paid an advance on royalties of
$10,000.
This
would be an up-front cost of about $1.5 million. Chump change.
The
courses would sell for $100 per semester. That would be $200 for a one-year
course, times five courses per year per student. That is a grand total of
$1,000. Add another thousand dollars for marketing and administration, and the
student gets a bachelor's degree for about $10,000.
Instructors
would get the $100 per semester fee. They would have to grade a midterm and a
final. But remember: half of these would be true/false and multiple-choice.
This is what AP exams use. They are standard operating procedure. College
professors use them all the time. A computer can grade these. Any instructor
with a Ph.D. can grade the essay part of a midterm in 10 minutes or less. A
final might take 15 minutes.
Let's
assume that the instructor enrolls 200 students. That is $20,000 per semester.
But let's assume that Thiel actively markets this. The professor enrolls 500
students. Now he pulls in $50,000 per semester. Do you think there are
libertarian professors of English who would like a shot at an extra $100,000 a
year, plus summer vacation student income? I think so.
These
people work maybe 20 hours a week at their existing campuses. So, they double
their hours. So what?
Unlike
classroom-based education, online students go at their own pace. So, midterms
and finals would not have to be graded in two or three days. They would dribble
in all semester. There would be no jam-up.
If there
are large classes and lots of money rolling in, the instructors can quit their
existing jobs. Some of them may not be in academia. They may be doing low-paid
work. They would jump at this opportunity to get into college teaching.
There are
thousands of part-time professors with Ph.D. degrees who get paid $20 an hour
at community colleges. They are called adjunct professors. Would they jump at
this?
They
would not get tenure. The competition would be fierce. Thiel could get the
cream of the crop.
This
program could easily be set up within 24 months after the purchase of the
defunct accredited college. If the instructors all have a doctorate, there will
be no question about their qualifications for teaching in any university. There
are lots of libertarian instructors out there who have Ph.D. degrees, and who
are teaching in poverty-stricken colleges for $50,000 a year.
This strategy
has been pioneered by profit-seeking universities that have bought up
struggling colleges, and which then charge astronomical prices for the courses.
They get these young people into debt to get a degree from an obscure college
in a liberal arts field.
If
whoever puts up the initial money is willing to hire people with a Ph.D., and
he is willing to price the courses where they ought to be, there is no question
in my mind that a college like this would have 5,000 students within five
years. The money would roll in. For positioning purposes, it would be wise to
keep it as a nonprofit institution. That would raise no yellow flags to the
accreditation committee.
The
lectures can all be put online, either as screencasts behind a tuition wall, or
just put online on YouTube. The value is the degree, not the lectures.
The core
books in the upper division courses in the social sciences and humanities could
be selected from the publications of the Liberty Fund and the Mises Institute.
Students would get a first-rate liberal arts education.
I know
this college project could be done. I have already done it with the Ron Paul
Curriculum. I would be happy to show Thiel or an associate how to reproduce
what I did with the RPC. It has taken me about 3 1/2 years. If I had had
$10,000 of advance royalty money per course, it would have taken me 24 months.
I could do this as the president of the college, but I have other fish to fry
in my remaining years. I have to finish my multi-tiered books on Christian
economics. It's a task for some young hotshot with a Ph.D. in anything and a
burning desire to create a first-rate undergraduate college.
It would
not take a multibillionaire to launch this project. A good old-fashioned
multimillionaire could do it. The main expense would be to buy the defunct
college. The professors would all be fired at the time of the bankruptcy. If
the rich man agreed to pay off the debts, then this purchase would be duck
soup. The creditors would be ecstatic. As for the fired faculty, who cares?
Like drones that are cast out of the hive after they have performed their
service, the unemployed professors will have to fend for themselves.
This
strategy is so obvious that I don't see why the Koch brothers didn't do it
years ago. My assumption is that they're just not interested in doing anything
radical in the field of higher education. Thiel is.
Thiel
could buy the courses now. He could then wait for the inevitable collegiate
bankruptcies during the next recession. There will be plenty of choices.
If he
wanted to set up a scholarship program for inner-city kids, that would be easy.
He could do the same for students in the Third World. They would have to take
three liberal arts courses with CLEP exams. That would cost them about $300.
The eligibility score would be 65 or higher out of 80 on each exam.
Anyway,
this should be a reminder that all is not lost at the collegiate level. All it
needs is somebody with a few million dollars to spare and the vision to do it.
It is not a matter of a lack of money. It is a lack of leaders with vision.
