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**Posted by the MIT Alumni Association on behalf of subbukdg@gmail.com**
Very interesting and valuable initiative. It is interesting that you have listed the following as the needs:
• Are in-person lectures a thing of the past?
• What does the classroom of 2020 look like?
• Should we rethink the 4-year system of residential education?
They assume the solution before defining the problem. The real questions you (and MIT) need to address are:
1. Why STEM education and where are the jobs (not only for the students of MIT, but for all STEM Graduates)?
2. How are these jobs changing?
3. What do we need for education as a result of such changes?
When you address these questions you will then end up with the list of needs. Some of those listed by you may be among them or they may not be?
I have spent a couple of years thinking about this and please see attached a summary of my study.
Comments
Your attached document addresses a key issue.
MIT abandoned the teaching of "handbook engineering" skills in the post WWII curriculum revisions. The career paths that were lucrative for MIT graduates in the 1970's (design jobs at industrial firms, coding of computer programs) have moved off-shore. MIT must now ask the basic question of what type of education will provide unique value to the students of the next decade that justifies the high tuition.