The End of College

Creating the Future of Learning and the University of Everywhere

By: Kevin Carey

Narrated by: James Yaegashi

Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's summary

From a renowned education writer comes a paradigm-shifting examination of the rapidly changing world of college that every parent, student, educator, and investor needs to understand.

Over the span of just nine months in 2011 and 2012, the world’s most famous universities and high-powered technology entrepreneurs began a race to revolutionize higher education. College courses that had been kept for centuries from all but an elite few were released to millions of students throughout the world - for free.

Exploding college prices and a flagging global economy, combined with the derring-do of a few intrepid innovators, have created a dynamic climate for a total rethinking of an industry that has remained virtually unchanged for a hundred years. In The End of College, Kevin Carey, an education researcher and writer, draws on years of in-depth reporting and cutting-edge research to paint a vivid and surprising portrait of the future of education. Carey explains how two trends - the skyrocketing cost of college and the revolution in information technology - are converging in ways that will radically alter the college experience, upend the traditional meritocracy, and emancipate hundreds of millions of people around the world.

Insightful, innovative, and accessible, The End of College is a must-listen and an important contribution to the developing conversation about education in this country.

©2015 Kevin Carey (P)2015 Recorded Books

Great Overall

Could have left out about 1/4 of the content and still delivered a wealth of information.

40 pages of content inflated to 250 pages

The book's main points are certainly interesting, but as with so many books like this, the author was compelled by publishing industry customs to make the book bulky enough to feel like it's worth what they charge for it, when in reality, it could have been a 40 page book and lost no fidelity.

Also, the narrator sounds like a late night infomercial pitch man. It's not the worst narration I've ever heard, but it does sound so much like a sales pitch that it makes you even more skeptical of the author's thesis.

Lastly, the author certainly does a lot of authoritative prognosticating with what sounds to me like not much more substantiation than a well-educated hunch about what the future will look like, especially towards the end where he starts dispensing advice.

The Promise for the Future

It is clear that education is not meeting the needs of students or our country. This book articulates the history, challenges, and opportunities. The message is well structured and documented.

interesting insights into our broken higher ed sys

The history associated with the creation of Anerica's Higher Ed system is fascinating. I have spent a great deal of time in US industry, working with many Research Universities around the world. I share the authors concerns and diagnosis.

I do not share the authors optimistic assessment of the reconstruction of the US higher ed system. The destruction of the brand value he predicts may happen, but it will occur over a much longer time frame than he imagines, several generations I think.

There too is a danger that the digital credentialling he envisions will simply lower the bar in many business spaces.

Solid analysis of a dynamic landscape

Seth Godin said higher education is going to change in the next decade as much as newspapers did in the last one. I am a student working toward a PhD education and I found Carey's perspective enlightening and a deep dive into Godin's premise without getting lost in the weeds. I would recommend.

I hope Kevin Carey is correct

Kevin Carey provides a history of why college became so expensive and provides some optimistic assessments of how college costs could be brought down to reality with future technology.