{"id":40221,"date":"2013-05-29T18:49:43","date_gmt":"2013-05-29T22:49:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danielschristian.com\/learning-ecosystems\/?p=40221"},"modified":"2013-05-29T19:16:41","modified_gmt":"2013-05-29T23:16:41","slug":"thanks-professor-william-k-s-wang-for-your-work-re-predicting-the-unbundling-of-higher-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/danielschristian.com\/learning-ecosystems\/2013\/05\/29\/thanks-professor-william-k-s-wang-for-your-work-re-predicting-the-unbundling-of-higher-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Thanks Professor William K.S. Wang for your work re: predicting the unbundling of higher education"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m grateful for the following comments on this blog from Professor William K.S. Wang from earlier today:<\/em><\/p>\n

I have published three articles on the unbundling of higher education (the first in 1975; most are available through an internet search): \u201cThe Unbundling of Higher Education,\u201d 1975 Duke Law Journal 53. \u201cThe Dismantling of Higher Education,\u201d published in two parts in 29 Improving College and\u2026 Read more University Teaching 55 (1981) and 29 Improving College and University Teaching 115 (1981) \u201cThe Restructuring of Legal Education Along Functional Lines,\u201d 17 Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues 331 (2008)(discusses legal education, but applies to higher education generally); abstract below<\/p>\n

THE RESTRUCTURING OF LEGAL EDUCATION, by William K.S. Wang<\/p>\n

ABSTRACT<\/p>\n

Currently, law schools tie together five quite distinct services in one package, offered to a limited number of students. These five functions are: (1) impartation of knowledge, (2)counseling\/placement, (3) credentialing (awarding grades and degrees), (4) coercion, and (5) club membership. Students do not have the opportunity to pay for just the services they want, or to buy each of the five services from different providers.<\/p>\n

This article proposes an \u201cunbundled\u201d system in which the five services presently performed by law schools would be rendered by many different kinds of organizations, each specializing in only one function or an aspect of one function. Unbundling of legal education along functional lines would substantially increase student options and dramatically increase competition and innovation by service providers. This offers the hope of making available more individualized and better instruction and giving students remarkable freedom of choice as to courses, schedules, work-pace, instructional media, place of residence, and site of learning. Most importantly, this improved education would be available on an \u201copen admissions\u201d basis at much lower cost to many more individuals throughout the nation, or even the world.<\/p>\n

In order to explain how to restructure the existing law school system, this article will discuss the five educational services presently performed by law schools, the disadvantages of tying these services together, a hypothetical unbundled world of legal education, the advantages of the unbundled system, answers to some possible objections to the system, and some recent developments in the use of technology and distance learning in law schools.<\/p>\n

The main theme of this article is the advantage of unbundling. A more modest sub-theme is the benefit of use of technology and distance learning.<\/p>\n

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Also see:<\/em><\/p>\n