[HN Gopher] Germany's State Distance-Learning University
___________________________________________________________________
Germany's State Distance-Learning University
Author : Tomte
Score : 111 points
Date : 2020-12-12 09:27 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.fernuni-hagen.de)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.fernuni-hagen.de)
| godelmachine wrote:
| Are these courses accredited by WES Global Services?
|
| If I completed Masters from this university and apply for
| Canadian PR, would I be getting extra CRS points for completing
| Masters from this University?
|
| Thanks beforehand for taking interest in my questions
| Tomte wrote:
| From Wikipedia:
|
| "The University of Hagen is a member of the European University
| Association (EUA), European Association of Distance Teaching
| Universities (EADTU) and it is accredited by ACQUIN, FIBAA
| (Foundation for International Business Administration
| Accreditation) as well as AQAS (Agentur fur Qualitatssicherung
| durch Akkreditierung von Studiengangen)."
|
| I guess if Canada recognizes any European university, it will
| recognize this one. Hagen is only different because of its
| remote learning approach, legally it's exactly the same as any
| other German university.
| aitait wrote:
| Fernuni is a public/government university. The big thing is that
| you get a UNIVERSITY degree that is recognized in Germany. This
| may have implications, e.g. doing a MS after a BS there or
| getting a University degree after you attended a poly-technical
| college, both entitles you to better career options in the public
| service.
|
| They have also several other niches. E.g patent lawyers are
| getting trained there after their STEM degrees.
|
| AMA
| therealmarv wrote:
| There are many more in Germany. It's not the only one. E.g. WINGS
| in Wismar.
| k__ wrote:
| Aren't the others privat (or no university?)
|
| Edit:
|
| They want 2300EUR per semester.
|
| Hagen wants 11EUR plus 100EUR per course you take, and fulltime
| is 3 courses per semester.
| [deleted]
| k__ wrote:
| I'm studying at the remote university since 2011.
|
| AMA
| bambataa wrote:
| What kind of time commitment do you have? Do you study in
| addition to working full time?
| k__ wrote:
| I did 1-2 tests/exams per semester.
|
| Took me 4h a day for 2-3 weeks per test.
|
| I don't really do anything fulltime. But yes, I work besides
| my studies.
|
| The good thing is, every test gives you 10ECTS, so even when
| studying fulltime, you only have to do 3 per semester.
| Bombthecat wrote:
| Uhh 9 years /or ten?
| k__ wrote:
| Yes. lol
|
| Did everyting besides my thesis, just can't find a
| topic/time.
| jahewson wrote:
| The UK has a similar concept in the well-regarded and successful
| Open University. They're even accredited in the US.
|
| http://www.openuniversity.edu/
| Tomte wrote:
| Many Germans use it over the FernUni, because (a) there are
| many, many more courses, and (b) you don't need Abitur. The
| FernUni is a traditional university with traditional limits to
| access.
| godelmachine wrote:
| Is it accredited by WES Global Services?
| gallegojaime wrote:
| Shameless plug for the UNED, as well. From what I've heard,
| it's very similar to FernUni: they have exam points you attend,
| and the rest is online and with UNED books (they used to have
| these hilariously Soviet-like designs).
|
| I considered it for my studies, since my area's universities
| were pretty far away. They're as strict as the regular Spanish
| universities and you'll get the same degree.
| iagovar wrote:
| Studying through UNED is pretty hard though. Spanish
| universities are still pretty opposed to other countries
| style of _handholding_ education that Bolonia (tried) brought
| to Spain, and UNED is probably the most extreme version of
| that.
|
| Also, depending on the faculty, UNED books can be pretty bad
| (and expensive), although I heard this changed lately.
|
| From what I gather from people in other countries, they also
| require you to study and to be competent, but it is extremely
| rare to find teachers and professors with ridiculous
| standards that you often find in Spain. So, If you have the
| opportunity, save yourself the pain. You'll still learn, be
| respected and it will be easier.
| cosmodisk wrote:
| I studied there.Graduaded with PS15K debt. While it's highly
| accessible,the quality of studies is a bit hit and miss tbh..
| toby- wrote:
| I studied with the OU too, though only a Diploma of Higher
| Education (equivalent of 2/3rds of a Bachelor's; I think
| Americans would call it an 'Associate's Degree'?).
|
| I found the material of good quality, and the
| tutorials/lectures I attended were fantastic. I did,
| admittedly, feel that the level of support could've been
| greater, but for a predominantly distance learning education
| that's par for the course, IMO.
|
| The debt is indeed a bummer! Still, their fees are lower than
| most other UK universities right now, and my study landed me
| my current DevOps position, so I'm very happy.
| GordonS wrote:
| I did a BSc in Computing at the OU, completing it around
| 2010. I was also very happy with the quality of the courses
| - I don't recall any module being sub-par.
|
| While I didn't personally feel like I needed support, there
| were others in my tutor groups that did, and it was
| apparent that the level of input from tutors varied wildly
| - I recall one that offered weekly 1-on-1s for anyone that
| wanted, and another that took days or even weeks to respond
| to any query whatsoever.
|
| My wife is now studying at the OU, and her more
| contemporary opinion echos everything I said above.
| bambataa wrote:
| I'd be very interested to hear from anyone who has studied at
| FernUni.
|
| I have been toying with the idea of doing some kind of maths or
| comp sci degree for a while now. It would have to be part time /
| remote because I'm not willing to stop working. The only suitable
| thing I've come across is Georgia Tech's online masters.
|
| I considered the Open University but their CS courses look poor
| and it has become too expensive for something that would be a
| hobby.
|
| However, I'm not really sure what FernUni would offer over just
| buying OU books on Amazon and working through them.
| Tomte wrote:
| > However, I'm not really sure what FernUni would offer over
| just buying OU books on Amazon and working through them.
|
| A very active Moodle instance, graded homework and access to a
| tutor.
|
| If you're in Germany: regular homework discussions with a tutor
| at your local regional center.
|
| Not to be underestimated: a whole cohort of other people that
| are going through the exact same material and exact same
| homework at the same time.
|
| Also, some external "motivation". "I need to submit my homework
| tomorrow" is much more urgent than "I originally planned to
| read chapter 3".
| newsgourmet wrote:
| At the very least, an official degree. You can legally call
| yourself MSc or whatever degree you went for.
| senend765 wrote:
| Is this a 'viable' alternative to a US-based bachelor degree?
|
| One of the reasons why I haven't bothered to get my degree is due
| to the cost. I'm not interested in one for obtaining jobs, but
| mainly situations that have a hard requirement for a degree (ex:
| obtaining a work visa).
|
| I'm not familiar with the differences in degrees between
| countries, but assuming a person is already competent in German,
| I don't see the downsides (barring that "obtaining a first job"
| mention earlier, I'm sure employers wouldn't like it) to this
| path versus a degree from the USA.
| knuthsat wrote:
| I always found it a bit confusing why US citizens don't just
| get their degrees in EU, should cost much less.
| est31 wrote:
| Graduating from an american university gives you an american
| network. This can become quite useful later in life if you
| want to spend your career in america. Building the network
| later on is still possible but harder.
| runawaybottle wrote:
| This network only matters if you went to Ivy League or
| similar schools.
|
| Networking with your average person in a state or random
| private college is the same as networking with someone you
| meet at a Meetup.
| est31 wrote:
| Sure, ivy leauge etc gives you the best contact networks,
| and this is probably what distinguishes it most from the
| non ivies that still offer good education, but even your
| non-ivy-leauge peers go end up having careers, and can
| open doors for you. Indeed you can also hang out at
| meetups but I feel like you'll have a harder time.
| topkai22 wrote:
| This isn't correct in a wide variety of circumstances.
| The top end of schools have networking opportunities that
| are in a league of its own, but school based
| networking/affiliation remains important regionally,
| especially for large state universities. I've definitely
| known instances where the deciding factor for someone in
| a hiring situation was they went to the same university
| as the boss (decades apart), and the regional alumni
| networks of some of these universities can be
| influential.
|
| Now it's true the further down the prestige chain you go
| the less it matters, but saying that networking via
| meetups Birmingham is equivalent to the network you'd get
| via having gone to U. Alabama or Auburn seems unlikely.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| You need the money upfront. Admissions requirements will be
| harder to meet. Teaching quality may be lower, leading to
| less retention and lower grades.
|
| The first is the real killer. You can't use financial aid.
| You could maybe use a private loan, but I am not aware of
| anyone giving those out for foreign schooling.
| leipert wrote:
| Why do you need the money upfront? If you move here on a
| student visa, you are also able to work here and support
| yourself financially.
|
| Also most fees are payed on a half-year Basis, Students
| have Access to cheap housing. For example the city I live
| in (Leipzig) has yearly Uni fees of ~500 EUR, monthly
| lodging for ~300 EUR. Assuming you work weekends, you can
| easily earn ~800 EUR per month which gives you enough
| wiggle room to eat at the Uni canteen (price per meal 2-5
| EUR, heavily subsidized by the state). In the study breaks
| you are able to work more.
|
| Edit: University Leipzig lists [0] the following costs of
| living on "average" per month:
|
| 231 EUR lodging; 140 EUR food; 50 EUR clothing, cosmetics;
|
| 45 EUR ISP, mobile, netflix; 50 EUR partying; 35 EUR misc;
|
| 30 EUR books & materials; 40 EUR for fees and local
| transport
|
| => 621 EUR month
|
| [0]: https://www.leipzig-studieren.de/studium-
| organisieren/was-ko...
| yorwba wrote:
| To get a student visa for Germany, you need to prove that
| you have at least 10k euros to cover your living expenses
| for one year: https://www.study-in-germany.de/en/plan-
| your-studies/require...
|
| Also, students from most countries are not allowed to
| work more than 120 full (8-hour) days per year:
| https://www.daad.de/en/study-and-research-in-
| germany/first-s...
|
| If you can find a job that pays significantly more than
| minimum wage, that's not going to be much of an issue,
| but otherwise you might have to control your spending
| very carefully.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Working students are paid, at the very least, 15 Euro per
| hour. Mostly tax free, you only pay a token amount for
| social security. Max. weekly working hours are, if I
| remember well, 10ish during semesters. During semester
| breaks, no such limits apply. And going from the number
| of non-EU working students I met and worked with, it
| can't be that hard to be eligible. Not sure about the
| legal details, so I could be wrong.
|
| Fun fact, in my last working student job before
| graduation I earned more net during the brake per month
| than in my first full time job in the first 6 months. Of
| course, being full time counts towards retirement and a
| couple of other things working students are not eligible
| for. But still.
| leipert wrote:
| I wasn't aware of the 10k Euros, makes sense. TBH a smart
| idea anyway, because in the first few months after a move
| to a foreign country you are likely spending more time on
| learning language, culture, dealing with bureaucracy,
| etc.
|
| Also interesting that you are not able to self-employ as
| a foreign student. This is how I worked most of the time
| while studying.
|
| Anyhow, spending money carefully is kinda implied with
| the numbers above. But we were mostly discussing money
| spent compared to the US, here is an example. Let's
| assume you want a BSc in Computer Science. According to
| [0] tuition alone is around ~25k USD for an affordable
| Uni in the US, while 870 EUR monthly expenses [1] TOTAL *
| 36 months around = 37930 USD for a BSc. And this is
| comparing a rather low tuition with average total cost of
| living in Germany.
|
| [0]: https://www.geteducated.com/online-college-ratings-
| and-ranki...
|
| [1]: https://www.unicum.de/de/studentenleben/geld-
| finanzen/lebens...
| itronitron wrote:
| Many Americans have credit cards with limits in the several
| thousands at least, so paying up front shouldn't be a
| blocker.
| [deleted]
| jansan wrote:
| I have an economics degree from that university. Before that I
| got a mechanical enginerring degree from a conventional
| university and must say that for me the Distance learning
| University totally sucked compared to the "real" university.
| Social life is IMHO very important for studying. At the
| converntional university we had a great group of people who
| helped and motivated each other. And we had a lot of parties and
| fun. Not so at the distance learning university, which was dull
| and boring. There was nobody who motivated you, nobody you could
| have a good time with. I think there was one meeting in person,
| which was quite horrible, and of course you do not make real
| friends within a week.
|
| On the other hand I heard from a friend, who is very introverted,
| that he liked studying at the distance learning university quite
| a lot. So it looks like it depends what kind of person you are.
| k__ wrote:
| I have a computer science degree from a regular university and
| studied a master at Hagen.
|
| I found Hagen much better, they had really good scripts.
| strangegecko wrote:
| Do you feel the economics degree helped you career wise, was
| this in preparation for a change?
| eastendguy wrote:
| The neat thing is that any foreigner can study any subject at any
| University in Germany _for almost free_. The only drawback here
| is that obviously most classes are in German, so knowledge of the
| "awful German language" (Mark Twain) is required.
|
| https://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/texts/twain.german.html
|
| If you are interested, here is a good starting point:
|
| https://www.uni-assist.de/en/
|
| Edit: Changed "free" to "almost free"
| foepys wrote:
| > awful German language
|
| Ich komm dir gleich ruber! /s
|
| Speaking and writing German is a bit complicated but for
| rudimentary understanding of texts you do not need to know as
| many words as in English.
|
| If you are looking for Computer Science there are many English
| lectures available.
| philshem wrote:
| It's a 19th century essay from Mark Twain about the
| difficulties learning German as an English speaker.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Awful_German_Language
|
| The title translated into German is "Die Schrecken der
| deutschen Sprache" ("The Horrors of the German Language")
| which is more appropriate.
| wadkar wrote:
| Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache
| uoaei wrote:
| Specialist vocabulary for specific disciplines is also quite
| graspable.
|
| (Disclaimer: I say this as a physicist, where all the German
| words for physics concepts are quite straightforward.)
| DataDaoDe wrote:
| > The neat thing is that any foreigner can study any subject at
| any University in Germany for free.
|
| This statement is not true. It is the case though that many if
| not most public German universities have costs that run in the
| very low thousands i.e. 1-5k for total degree costs.
|
| However, there are some drawbacks to the way this system works.
| For one, you will be hard pressed to find online degree
| offerings or continuing studies options from public
| Universities (i.e. these types of low costs offerings) that
| allow you to continue your education while working fulltime.
| Most of these come from private institutions or specific
| programs which have higher costs typically running in the 10k+
| cost range area.
|
| Its great if you are a student graduating from high school and
| going to university - you won't be burdened with high costs.
| However, the public system largely still neglects (this lone
| University being the only example in all of Germany which I am
| aware of) many other situations where people might want to
| further their education.
|
| We do have something called Volkshochschulen, which is in some
| ways similar to Junior Colleges in the United States and
| provides some level of extended studies at a public level, but
| anyway, I won't go into details, suffice it to say the systems
| don't translate one-to-one onto each other and there are cons
| with our system as well.
| aitait wrote:
| "Volkshochschulen"
|
| Volkshochschule are "low level" community training courses.
| Yet many people successfully learned Languages there. It is
| far below a University or a poly-technical college. It has
| nothing do do with a real degree.
|
| FUN FACT: I read once a Serbian guy took a course there in
| Economics, had the certificate translated into Serbian and
| the translator translated "Volkshochschule", to "Peoples
| University" and became an Economics professor with this
| certifica in Serbia until the whole scam became public.
|
| To give you the perspective: Basically every guy here on
| Hackernews could give a "Python course" there or something.
| for 2 hours every week for 6 months and one of the attendees
| would manage to become a CS professor with this.
| est31 wrote:
| > this lone University being the only example in all of
| Germany which I am aware of
|
| Yes indeed this is the only state run distance-learning
| university, but I'd argue that you only really need one such
| institution. After all, you can study from anywhere :). They
| have regional centers in many German towns, but for most
| courses you only need to be there for the exams at the end of
| the semester, so you can also study hours away from the next
| regional center.
|
| And it's quite successful. By number of enrolled students,
| it's the largest university of Germany at 77k, with the
| runner up having only 56k students.
| benibela wrote:
| With covid, every university became a distance-learning
| university
| DataDaoDe wrote:
| Agreed. Its fantastic we have any such place. However,
| having had conversations with friends and family outside of
| Germany, they usually hear the costs and then imagine the
| system in the USA or their home country just with much
| lower costs. And this is just not the case. Our German
| system is a very different system from the USA at all
| levels which complicates direct comparisons.
|
| Regardless, I think initiatives like this one which in
| general provide more opportunites to more people to better
| their lives is something I would like to see more of, not
| just in Germany but all over the world.
| estaseuropano wrote:
| The system in Germany is much less stratified than US, UK
| or even China. There are few "top" universities if you
| look at the global rankings, which probably comes from
| both the lower budgets and the lower incentives to
| compete on the ranking metrics. But the German
| universities consistently perform well; Germany really
| has no bad (public) universities.
|
| The atmosphere is very different and having studied in
| the UK i see the merits of both: a UK university
| basically runs like a school with a very strong support
| system and 1:1 touch with academics. In Germany its
| really a more "mass" approach in lectures and then
| seminars with lower ranking staff, not the actual
| professors. Also less other support e.g. psychologists,
| tech support,.. To succeed at a German university you
| have to grow up ;)
|
| Also interestingly German universities seem to be much
| more political places. The UK I experienced as filled
| with extracurricular stuff, while in Germany there's much
| less of that and in return a much more vibrant political
| and debate culture.
| estaseuropano wrote:
| That lone university is exactly intended to be the only one.
| No reason to compete if there's no economic reason to
| compete. They are qualitative, reasonably priced and tend to
| have good reviews.
|
| Sadly the Fernuni is in one way stuck in the past: for many
| (all?) courses there are mandatory presence seminars. You can
| do the exams at many places in Germany (e.g.
| Volkshochschulen) and at all embassies and Goethe institutes
| abroad, but for the seminars you have to still go in person
| it seems. Else I would long have done a Fernuni degree.
| morelisp wrote:
| A small nitpick: A Volkshochschule is usually better compared
| to a community college (open to "everyone" and the main
| inexpensive option for adults seeking more education outside
| their career). "Junior college" is closer in connotation to a
| Fachhochschule or even a Berufsschule.
| Tomte wrote:
| Isn't a community college a real professional education?
|
| Volkshochschule courses are usually languages, painting,
| photography, cooking etc. The teachers are usually non-
| professionals. The course is usually about ten weeks of one
| or one and a half hours.
| morelisp wrote:
| Community colleges in the US serve three roles:
|
| - Onboarding students directly out of secondary schools
| who don't yet have the academic requirements or financial
| ability for university, usually with intent to use this
| as a springboard to a cheaper university education;
| usually this terminates with a transfer to a university
| (and may or may not include an associate degree);
|
| - Providing formal education for people interested in
| changing or advancing their career; usually this
| terminates with an associate degree;
|
| - Providing formal but "casual" adult education, which
| includes the kind of courses you find at a
| Volkshochschule but also simply introductory tertiary
| courses (many of which would actually be final secondary
| courses outside the US) - the teachers are usually
| professionals but there's no expectation for the students
| to "use" the knowledge and auditing may be as common as
| taking the course for credit.
|
| The main thing I want to point out is to avoid
| translating Volkshochschule as "junior college" which has
| an increasingly negative connotation in US English. Most
| decent junior colleges have expanded their programs and
| rebranded to full community colleges (or even
| universities) now and the term is mostly used for
| private, for-profit, vocational training.
|
| (I should also add these terms vary a lot across English-
| speaking countries; I'm just referring to the US here.)
| wirrbel wrote:
| There is an administrative fee usually that is in the low 3
| digit range per semester, I'd assume it's still below 200EUR
| per semester and usually includes a ticket for the local
| public transit. When I studied a real fee was introduced
| (2007 iirc) and abolished again before I graduated.
|
| Volkshochschule is not a college but does offer yoga and
| knitting classes, some language classes and maybe a computing
| class for seniors.. nothing that would prepare you for a
| career
| ratww wrote:
| The language is pretty great beyond the surface, IMO. Most of
| the common hurdles (akkusativ/dativ, long words, and also
| number order) are dealt with in the first months of german
| learning (A1 level) and are not really an issue in real life. I
| still might misgender objects from time to time, but it can
| also happen in the other three romance languages I speak. It's
| also fun when it happens and the jokes are a good mnemonic
| device ("the sun is not a boy, how dare you").
|
| Also I agree with foepys that you can do more in German with a
| smaller vocabulary. Schlag is also used in sports and music :)
| Plus, people like to downplay it, but most people here do speak
| english, so if you have difficulty, it's ok to ask in english
| when you're 1:1.
| FlyingSnake wrote:
| The good thing about German is that it's not hard to get to
| B1 level, however things start getting harder after that. I,
| for one, am stick on the B2/C1 plateau for a long time, and
| lots of expats struggle with it.
|
| I would love to see how you tackled the Adjektivdeklinations
| issue in German. For me that has been an achilles' heel, and
| there's simply no easy way around it.
| looping__lui wrote:
| I feel that English probably is the most effective language
| for anything science/engineering/business related. It's so
| much easier to express yourself in good and convincing and
| clear ways (plus as the lingua franca in many of those
| domains, there isn't necessarily a great German translation).
| So I actually prefer having any conversations in these fields
| in English, even w/ German colleagues.
|
| In Law though, nothing seems to beat the preciseness of the
| German language. It's very good in expressing exactly what
| the relationships and rules should be. Some people love it
| from the "literalistic" point of view - but I just like the
| efficiency of the English language and the distinctive humor
| that a lot of english speaking authors put in their writings;
| so I can't speak to that. The German language feels to me
| like it wasn't made for science, engineering or fun but
| rather law and bureaucracy.
|
| Just my personal two cents.
| Tomte wrote:
| German was not quite the lingua franca of mathematics, but
| something many mathematicians learned at least to some
| degree, before the World Wars. That's why so many German
| words have survived there (take eigen vector, for example).
|
| Also Western philosophy had a slightly German-language
| bend.
|
| I doubt there is a substantial body of science that can be
| expressed much better in English. It's probably a wash,
| with some words and concepts easier to express in this, and
| some in that.
| [deleted]
| looping__lui wrote:
| Image processing, machine learning and computer vision
| come to my mind. How do you translate "Convolutional
| Neural Networks", "back propagation", "loss function",
| "noise-contrastive learning", " Generative Adversarial
| Networks" in German? It's not "just a few words" but you
| will essentially end up speaking German with mixing it
| 30% with "english words that bring the actual science and
| innovation across".
|
| No meaningful papers in these domains are published in
| German...
| yorwba wrote:
| You could translate these as "faltendes neuronales
| Netzwerk", "Zuruckubertragung", "Verlustfunktion",
| "Rauschkontrastlernen" and "generative Gegnernetze".
|
| Of course most people don't do that, because they learned
| the terminology in English and there's no particular
| reason to invent a completely parallel set of made-up
| terms. But if there were such a reason (e.g. if English
| literacy were uncommon among German computer scientists)
| it could be done.
| Tomte wrote:
| Right, but that was not the issue. The issue was a
| language suited for rules and relations on the one hand,
| and a language of humor and expressiveness on the other.
|
| Of course, today everyone publishes in English. And of
| course, many English words are used in German academia.
|
| But there is no inherent property of the English
| language, why it is better suited to communicating topics
| in machine learning.
| wadkar wrote:
| > It's so much easier to express yourself in good and
| convincing and clear ways (plus as the lingua franca in
| many of those domains, there isn't necessarily a great
| German translation).
|
| It's easier to express because Englisch is _the_ lingua
| franca of those fields. It would have been a totally
| different case had some other language, say French or
| Mandarin had been at the forefront of scientific literature
| advancement and dissemination.
| adminu wrote:
| I don't know about that. Precision is something desirable
| in science and engineering.
|
| My experience is quite the opposite anyways, I often felt,
| English sentences lacked clarity that you could have in a
| German sentence
| estaseuropano wrote:
| That's why English works well for professional
| discussions: the ambiguity is a tool. The obvious case
| being 'you' and the implied level of formality, but also
| plenty other words/phrases have a similar effect.
| wadkar wrote:
| Ironically, I concur :-)
| Tomte wrote:
| Re: cost at this university:
|
| "A complete bachelor's program costs between 1,600 and 2,400
| euro, while a master's program costs between 1,000 and 1,200
| euro. These estimates are based on course costs of 20 euro per
| credit hour, plus a student body contribution of 11 euro per
| semester."
| eastendguy wrote:
| That is what I would consider free, or in other words:
| tuition costs << living costs
| Tomte wrote:
| Wasn't meant to be a contradiction, I just found the
| numbers on the web site and thought I'd throw them in.
|
| BTW, I never knew, but they run an efficient operation, it
| seems.
|
| My Alma Mater, the University of Stuttgart, has 23k
| students, 5.3k staff, including 265 professors. They run on
| an annual budget of 536 million Euros.
|
| (All numbers from Wikipedia)
|
| The FernUni has 76k students (3x), 1.3k staff (1/3),
| including 90 professors (1/3), on an annual budget of 90
| million Euros (1/6).
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| I suppose not needing many facilities nor (I think)
| research output means you gain a lot of efficiency.
| leipert wrote:
| I assume that the amount of research that is done, papers
| produced, etc. is much higher in traditional Unis
| compared to the Fernuni.
|
| If you look it through the reverse lense, the ratio of
| professor to student is much worse than your alma mater.
| So one professor has to take care of much more students,
| exams, etc.
|
| To me the Fernuni seems great if you want to study while
| having a job, during a pandemic, are just interested in
| the degree, are not a in-Person Person, are a Self-
| motivating learner or live far away from a Uni City.
|
| The traditional Uni seems great, if you want to
| experience social life, are a study group kind of person,
| want to go into academia, like noodles for 2EUR in the
| Mensa. Also a lot of STEM or medicine that needs access
| to research facilities will be easier in a traditional
| Uni.
| Tomte wrote:
| I wonder why they don't have a real philosophy degree program
| (only some courses within a cultural program). Also theology.
| Both should be relatively easy to do in that setting.
|
| They even had an electrical engineering program, one of my
| colleagues got a Master there, but they shut it down a few years
| ago. I suppose the lab work was too difficult to support.
| k__ wrote:
| Don't they have a philosophy master?
| sgt101 wrote:
| The change to The Open University in the UK (to remove subsidy
| and drive it's fees up to ~2/3 the cost of other universities)
| has to be one of the worst things that has happened in the UK in
| he last 10 years. My Dad did an OU degree late in life and it was
| really important to him, I think that an opportunity - like the
| one in this story or like the OU - for people to find another
| direction later in their lives, no matter what their background,
| is hugely important.
| klelatti wrote:
| I remember when some OU tutorials were broadcast on the
| television (BBC) in the UK. Anyone could watch and as a
| teenager I remembered being entralled by some of the maths
| courses [1] - it probably influenced my career choices in the
| end.
|
| In a way it was a precursor to similar material on YouTube and
| MOOCs - technical material freely open for all.
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVn27MHl1sA
| gfaure wrote:
| Incidentally, it's wild seeing the physical models of 3D
| surfaces in the Open University video you linked -- nowadays,
| the equivalent visualisations can be obtained so quickly, at
| such low cost, and reach so many more people.
| klelatti wrote:
| It is wild! I was struck looking at these agaim after so
| many years how similar they are in spirit to modern
| equivalents - I actually find the physical versions a bit
| more engaging. Both are so much better too than can be
| achieved in a physical classroom with just a whiteboard.
| the_only_law wrote:
| OU is so strange to me. Last time I looked at is, as an
| American, I could not qualify for any of there technical
| programs given my nationality, but I could try some of there
| legal programs. I also really like the option they provide to
| sort of make your own degree, but seems impractical given the
| biggest benefit of university, especially an online program, is
| solely credentialing.
| bencollier49 wrote:
| Completely agree - I was enrolled in the OU at the time. It
| seemed like they made the change to stop the OU from
| steamrolling traditional universities when they introduced
| tuition fees for regular degrees. The OU could easily run
| courses for the low prices they used to charge (~PS4000 for a
| degree?), but it would banjax our new commercial university
| system.
| richardwhiuk wrote:
| To be clear, they removed subsidies for people to get a degree
| at a level to which they already had a degree, AIUI. i.e. if
| you already had a masters, then they was no subsidy for getting
| a second.
|
| Personally, this feels fair enough - it's not clear why this
| sort of education should be subsidized.
| RobertKerans wrote:
| > Personally, this feels fair enough - it's not clear why
| this sort of education should be subsidized.
|
| The core aim of the OU is to help build the economy & promote
| social mobility. One of the ways this can occur is via easy
| access to retraining as job sectors die (either locally or
| nationally). If a degree-level education is required, OU is
| one of the few realistic ways of acquiring that education.
| Substantially increasing the price of degrees closed this
| path off for many. Whether a person has a previous degree
| shouldn't really factor into an ability to retrain if
| necessary (and yes, successive governments since the 80s have
| given lip service to the need to provide for this and done
| nothing, allowing this was just more of the same)
| eggsmediumrare wrote:
| If you add in a term after which you could get a subsidy, I'd
| agree. Retraining is going to be very important.
| bencollier49 wrote:
| That's not correct. The regular prices of courses increased
| by large multiples.
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/education/2011/aug/08/open-
| unive...
| chrisseaton wrote:
| I once thought about doing an OU degree as a hobby when I got
| to a point in my life when I had some spare time for learning.
|
| Wow turns out they're astronomically expensive and even a
| simple bachelors takes a stupid number of years.
|
| Also maybe it's just my field but I never see any research
| output from the OU either, and I don't know any academics
| working there at all, so I don't know what kind of standard of
| staff you're getting.
|
| I'm not sure who's spending money on these things?
| Beldin wrote:
| Hi from the Dutch OU (not affiliated with the UK one, but
| similar in certain aspects).
|
| The standard of academic staff is much like any other uni: we
| try to get the best we can.
|
| Here's our department's publication page (i haven't updated
| it since March though): http://cs.ou.nl/publications.php
|
| (Quality: three TACAS'20 papers this year... and most of our
| departement doesn't target that conf)
|
| Our programmes are accredited by the same institution as
| other programmes of all other unis in NL. The accreditation
| committee was even impressed with the quality of our bachelor
| theses in comparison to other universities.
|
| I definitely think there's room for improvement, but the
| Dutch OU is a serious university, and aims for a high quality
| of teachers and teaching materials.
| sgt101 wrote:
| I've seen strong research from OU people in knowledge
| management, and in knowledge representation. Their webpags
| give an overview of the interests in compsci.
|
| https://www.open.ac.uk/stem/computing-and-
| communications/res...
|
| Ok - they're not Stanford, but they are a pretty respectable
| bunch.
| bencollier49 wrote:
| It used not to be so expensive. :-(
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