Without a rope

"Without a rope, people bind themselves" - so true

Learning Zen

"Learning Zen is a phenomenon of gold and dung. Before you understand it's like gold; after you understand it, it's like dung." ~Zen Master

Laugh to Grow

“But when you're in front of an audience and you make them laugh at a new idea, you're guiding the whole being for the moment. No one is ever more him/herself than when they really laugh. Their defenses are down. It's very Zen-like, that moment. They are completely open, completely themselves when that message hits the brain and the laugh begins. That's when new ideas can be implanted. If a new idea slips in at that moment, it has a chance to grow.” 
― George Carlin, Last Words

Ideology creates destroyers of life

There are times when men's passions are much more trustworthy than their principles. Since opposed principles, or ideologies, are irreconcilable, wars fought over principle will be wars of mutual annihilation. But wars fought for simple greed will be far less destructive, because the aggressor will be careful not to destroy what he is fighting to capture. Reasonable-that is, human-men will always be capable of compromise, but men who have dehumanized themselves by becoming the blind worshipers of an idea or an ideal are fanatics whose devotion to abstractions makes them the enemies of life. ~ Alan Watts

Zen Tiger

One day while walking through the wilderness a man stumbled upon a vicious tiger. He ran but soon came to the edge of a high cliff. Desperate to save himself, he climbed down a vine and dangled over the fatal precipice.

As he hung there, two mice appeared from a hole in the cliff and began gnawing on the vine.

Suddenly, he noticed on the vine a plump wild strawberry. He plucked it and popped it in his mouth. It was incredibly delicious!

Diminishing cost of education

For a number of years, people have been able to obtain an education on the cheap. MIT Open Courseware, coursera are a couple. There are a plethora of them available for students to learn how to code. One of the biggest limitations of these places is obtaining accreditation.

University of the People is one of the newer university where students can obtain a degree for $4000. Students only pay for tests at $100 a piece. Currently, they only offer two programs, business and computer science. All classes are 100% online. This sure beats the pricing model of other distance learning programs such as University of Phoenix.

I am wondering, what will the impact be to the higher education industry? I am thinking that traditional universities will have to differentiate themselves to justify the much higher cost of obtaining a diploma. Alumni networks will be one of them. Career mentorship and development will be another. What other ways do you think traditional universities will be affected? How will they adapt?

Any other on the cheap universities that students can obtain accreditation that you've heard of?