Rollins
College in Winter Park, FL, plans to go all-online by fall 2017, according to
the campus publication, The Sandspur.
The school
is moving all coursework online into Blackboard and other virtual environments.
Since most students will be able to connect with their classes via Internet
from anywhere they can get online service, Rollins has decided it no longer
needs space for classes to meet. The college will sell off most of its lecture
halls to finance the technology infrastructure.
One wealthy
student has already expressed interest in acquiring one of the halls to convert
into a private residence.
Use of print
textbooks will be abolished in favor of e-books or any other online material
the professor chooses. “Simply put,” commented Vice-Vice Director of Education
Eli Nobbes, “Wikipedia is a great place for accurate summaries, and fanfiction
is quickly replacing what, for many years, has been uncontested ‘classics’ with
more modern, and superior, adaptations.”
Rollins
plans to keep its campus library but intends to ditch the books and convert the
space into a technology center.
If all of
this sounds a little extreme, be sure to catch the very last sentence in The Sandspur report.