Zoom University

Prediction: Most traditional colleges and universities will either be nonexistent or look drastically different by 2040.

If you have thoughts on this topic that you want to share with me, shoot me an email at wandzilak@hey.com or DM me on Twitter.

From the business model of colleges to how they educate students needs to be completely ripped up and changed. It is a system that has been almost unchanged for centuries, and the process to change a big part of many people’s lives won’t be without bumps and most likely outrage.

I want to make one thing clear: the current pandemic has not caused the need for colleges to reimagine themselves, it has only accelerated their eventual demise and has provided an opportunity for startups and insurgents to reimagine higher education and what classrooms can look like in a virtual/remote world.

Let’s first examine the root of this problem. The higher education business model (yes, it is a business) is extremely dated. For centuries, the process has looked the same, but costs have increased dramatically. What was once a place for the financially wealthy or intellectually elite has become a necessity in today’s society, but the format and pricing structure has remained unchanged. A bloated bureaucracy with high costs ranging from facilities management to overpaid teacher tenure, this is not a nimble or…