Flash Forward: A University Without Professors.

 

By Toxteth Appleteat

Editor’s note: This is satire, and hopefully not a predictor.

For Immediate Release

INTRODUCING FREEDOM UNIVERSITY

Leading the way in for-profit education

 

Freedom University (FU) is the first of its kind to offer an education dedicated to mass, fast-track degree completion programs, without the burden of faculty bogging down the process. FU is proud to give ordinary people easily affordable access to the experience of higher education.

“It really is an innovative model in higher ed, and we feel that we are at the forefront of the technology revolution,” states Reagan Rand, Ass. Dean of the Koch School of Business. “Unlike our predecessors in public and private colleges and universities, we are able to graduate a large number of students using our own proprietary online learning management system (LMS) and cutting-edge content from our partnerships with academic publishers.”

The most unique feature of this academic enterprise is that there are absolutely no professors or personnel who teach students, creating a truly special, student-centered learning initiative. An innovative system of automated teaching and learning modules and tests are administered through the university’s LMS. Students are able to complete a bachelor’s degree in six months for as little as $50,000. FU Administrators agree: it’s a bargain!

“The reason we are able to charge so little tuition is that we no longer are obligated to pay professors’ salaries” Rand says. “This frees up a lot of the budget, which can be directed towards important expenditures, such as our new state-of-the-art football stadium for our Fighting Greenbacks. It has also allowed us to invest in our new i-Personal Assistant, which students can download to remind them of assignment deadlines, and to provide other academic support.”

Says Freedom University President and CEO Scott Walker, “our slogan is, ‘education made easy.’”

When asked how a university can function without faculty, University President and CEO Scott Walker (former Governor of Wisconsin who was responsible for reorganizing the University of Wisconsin public system) had this to say:

“When we think about what a university should do, we think students should be able to get their diplomas as quickly as possible and get out into the workforce. That is our mission. And we can do that by investing in technology, rather than people. I have had years of experience dealing with university faculty as the Governor of Wisconsin. For the most part, faculty oppose technology and innovation and complain a whole lot.

“We can educate students much more efficiently and on a much larger scale using our technology system–and our system doesn’t gripe about it. Besides, what do faculty even do anyway? They basically deliver content. And we can do that ourselves. So we just cut out the middleman.”

Walker went on to describe his own experience in college, and how it has shaped his philosophy for the way FU is structured. “Part of the reason I dropped out of college was because of my professors. They were really mean and were always pushing me to see other points of view, but that’s not what people want. I don’t need to learn about Karl Marx or socialism to know it’s bad. Here at FU, students don’t have to go through that. Our slogan is, “education made easy.” I think that sums up what we are really about: helping students get in and get out as easily as possible with a degree in hand. It’s a value we all ascribe to here.”

For more information on Freedom University, visit their website: www.goFUrself.edu.

 

For more Modern Disappointment on issuses in higher education, see:
Adjunct. The modern indentured servant.

Invisible in Life as Well as Death.

The Charlatan in the Room: The secrets of your part-time professor.