Online Ed Banned In Minnesota
Time marches on, but the world gets stupider and stupider. Will Oremus blogs at Slate:
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the state has decided to crack down on free education, notifying California-based startup Coursera that it is not allowed to offer its online courses to the state's residents. Coursera, founded by Stanford computer science professors Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng, partners with top-tier universities around the world to offer certain classes online for free to anyone who wants to take them. You know, unless they happen to be from Minnesota.A policy analyst for the state's Office of Higher Education told The Chronicle that Minnesota is simply enforcing a longstanding state law requiring colleges to get the government's permission to offer instruction within its borders. She couldn't say whether other online education startups like edX and Udacity were also told to stay out.
As the Chronicle notes, with admirable restraint, "It's unclear how the law could be enforced when the content is freely available on the Web." And keep in mind, Coursera isn't offering degrees--just free classes.
Another group of politicians that doesen't know how this internet thingy works.
You can fence yourself in... but you cannot fence the world out.
SwissArmyD at October 18, 2012 10:39 PM
I guess they can try to block all educational content in the state, but it's freely available everywhere.
http://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm
nonegiven at October 19, 2012 12:11 AM
What are they going to do -- kick in your door for surfing the internet?
Jim P. at October 19, 2012 6:06 AM
Minnesota, like Iran, will soon have to build it's own internet to keep all the bad people out.
Matt at October 19, 2012 6:14 AM
Mind = blown. Government stupidity pains me. I mean actual, legit heartache.
Obtaining the state's permission to teach within that state.....wonder how much that COSTS. One of the myriad issues facing society is that college is still out of reach for a lot of people. Sites like Coursera offer a small but potentially meaningful contribution, free of charge and highly accessible, but the state government of Minnesota says "not without our permission".
Joe at October 19, 2012 6:15 AM
It seems that still more politicians are taking bribes from the teachers' union. If I lived in Minnesota, I would take an online course just to give the corrupt bastards the finger. Passing laws that cannot be enforced is really stupid.
Bar Sinister at October 19, 2012 6:34 AM
This is egregiously backwards of Minnesota. The future of education is online, global, and free. Only credentials, testing, tutoring, and live lecturing will be monetized.
Professors will have to follow the model of the music industry. Just like a song is available for free via piracy has destroyed music publishing, the professors will have to give away their recorded lectures on YouTube, Khan University, or some other site. Only the best will have an online audience. And just like the music industry today, the money will be in the live performance, not the publishing. The children of the rich will pay for a front row seat with Lady GaGa or with the Freakonomics guy, just to get the live experience with the star. The rest of us will listen online for free. We might pay for tutoring and testing if we want to earn the credential, or just listen for pleasure.
I wonder if the real motivation for this is Minnesota acting to protect the inertia and status quo of institutionalized eduction, overrun by pricey administration and teacher's unions. It's a model that is obsolete and should be destroyed in a Schrumpterian act of creation.
Tyler at October 19, 2012 6:44 AM
Let me get this straight - free online courses which don't offer a degree? And that state wants you to get permission first?
The first thing they need to do is browse the catalog and find: "free online tutorial about the first amendment - Freedom of Speech" - They might actually learn something.
Charles at October 19, 2012 6:44 AM
Thank goodness the people of Minnesota have a government willing to protect them from Stanford professors, who probably have no idea what they're talking about, and will just waste Minnesotans' time with misguided lectures about how to program computers.
Everyone who posts anything on the internet should of course first get a license from all 50 states, plus Puerto Rico and at least 25 countries, certifying that their content is accurate and helpful.
In the meantime, I better add a disclaimer to my own website: "WARNING: This content has not been approved by the State of Minnesota. Read at your own risk."
This is right up there with requiring a license to braid hair. Ugh. If I were a taxpayer in Minnesota, I would not be happy.
Walter Moore at October 19, 2012 7:04 AM
hah! Now they need to ban Ehow, about.com, and maybe wikipedia, too. Got to keep knowledge out of the hands of the underclasses.
Frank at October 19, 2012 7:59 AM
Don't tempt them. I'm sure there are people slithering around out there with that very idea.
Old RPM Daddy at October 19, 2012 8:12 AM
I've told this story before, but it is worth repeating - you can't fish in Minnesota without breaking a law.
Folks, we elected Al Franken as a Senator. Need I say more about our education level?
Dave B at October 19, 2012 8:17 AM
Unless that law was written in the last 10 or 20 years, then you're seeing what happens when a disruptive technology comes along.
It disrupts things. Sometimes, even longstanding laws...
I R A Darth Aggie at October 19, 2012 8:19 AM
"Everyone who posts anything on the internet should of course first get a license from all 50 states, plus Puerto Rico and at least 25 countries, certifying that their content is accurate and helpful."
Not. funny. at. all!
Really, there is a congressman (I think somewhere in Ohio) who has proposed several times to slap a tax on email. yes, on your email, a penny charge on each email that you send. So, far his idiot idea has never gotten out of committee; but, you never know . . .
Charles at October 19, 2012 10:26 AM
I will put it simply, if Ohio was to stop me from taking my class at Coursera, I would tell them to shove it up their ass. MN residents should do the same and Coursera should say they are not bound to that state's laws since they don't operate there. Let the courts fight it out until they get tired and let the law go.
Zak at October 19, 2012 12:17 PM
Really, there is a congressman (I think somewhere in Ohio) who has proposed several times to slap a tax on email. yes, on your email, a penny charge on each email that you send.
I like that idea. I don't send all that much email, and could well afford a penny tax. But the people who want me to learn a second language, refinance my mortgage, or somehow think I need some help with the performance/size of my penis, now maybe that would be a problem for them. And I would love for them to have problems.
Steve Daniels at October 19, 2012 2:23 PM
Haven't these idiots heard of the Commerce Clause? No state can ban any product or service from being brought into the state from outside its borders unless Congress gives permission, which I hope will never happen.
The only question is how long it will take a judge to notice this bureaucrat's fit of presumption and deliver her a well-earned smackdown.
John David Galt at October 19, 2012 2:35 PM
Dave B: "Folks, we elected Al Franken as a Senator."
He ended up in the position, but whether or not the people elected him is questionable.
Ken R at October 19, 2012 5:36 PM
I've taken several courses from Coursera. Frankly the content has been better than many classes I've paid money for. You get a certificate of completion, but no college or continuing education credits, so why do they need to be certified again?
Julie
Julie Chris at October 19, 2012 6:24 PM
There's a military saying that goes something like, "Never give an order you know won't be obeyed." The obvious logic of this is that if that order is going to be disobeyed, it will hurt the good order and discipline of the unit, and decrease respect for authority. So if we transpose a unit command structure for state government in this example, what reason is there for any Minnesotans to respect any of their state's laws? And following that train of thought, why would they obey other laws they disagree with, especially if that disobedience has a very small probability of having negative consequences?
spqr2008 at October 22, 2012 12:10 PM
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