explanations.app

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I was disillusioned with how even the "world-class technology universities" like MIT are, in reality, rife with backwards, traditionalist dogma about education, like "if we release video material than students will only sit in their rooms". You'd think alright, there are definitely merits to prioritizing in-person experiences in theory. Then you see the reality...2 TAs outnumbered by 30 students, wait-times of 1 hour, ineffective, rushed help when it's actually your turn. Or just a surprisingly many terribly-explained classes. The proximal cause for stagnant teaching quality even in "top" universities, is that teaching simply isn't their top priority. In research institutes, why are faculties selected in the first place? They were selected based on their ability to do cutting-edge research that secures more funding and keep the lights on, and not how well they can teach first-year chemistry. It's approximately true to say that, universities don't have teachers - they have researchers who happen to also teach. Moreover, universities compete on prestige, not education quality. Various literature from Freakonomics, Gladwell's Myth of Meritocarcy and The Abundant University give compelling facts that universities behave consistently with the scarcity-based business model of the luxury market. The undisputable fact is they kept the "supply" i.e. number of students they accept, constant over the last decade. Do we trust that, or their PR statement: "We want to expand opportunities to more students around the world?" (and somehow failed despite operating within $50 - $100 billion of endowment) The fundamental problem is not with these universities, but the education system's incentives. As Munger said: "Show me the incentive and I'll show you the outcome." There are so many people around the world - many non-teachers - who teach really well. Let's properly reward great teachers, and make their explanations affordable through economies-of-scale with blackboard videos.

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1yr ago