Education cost are in a constant increase from as demonstrated by this NY Times article. Once upon a time, the American dream was to send your children to a university so that they could have a better life than you. Now it seems that we send them to a university to acquire debt and a certificate for courses they could have learned from other sources.
My premise is this, many courses still operate by the model that the instructor is a content delivery and assessment machine. Content can be delivered by other machines more effectively. Assessment should be a be provided by a 360 degree view including self, peer, and mentor review and feedback. So what is the role of an instructor in the 21st century? What is the role of the university?
As I was reading other articles and blogs from #change11, I ran across this and realized that Jo spoke for me in the post:
http://jolinfield.edublogs.org/2011/10/10/change-in-higher-education/#respond
I see the university of the future as a place of practice. There is a need for lab environments. Nobody wants their doctor educated by self directed learning with no practical experience in a safe environment. The days of 120 students sitting in an auditorium listening to lectures are coming to an end.