The MOOC’s Not the Thing

Almost everybody in higher education is either figuring how they can make the MOOC (massively open online course) craze work for them or they are tearing their tweed jackets and skirts over it as they anticipate their sections of 12 or 15 being eaten by online gatherings of 20,000.

Angel investors are feeding beasts such as Udacity, Coursera, and EdX with their millions.  The toniest of institutions are rapidly aligning themselves with the new MOOC producers.  Those schools which are merely quite good need not apply.

It seems that everyone is making ready for a new world in which Harvard and MIT export their courses to the masses of students anxious to learn from the very best.  Khan Academy is scary enough.  What about HarvardX?

As irresistible as the premium MOOC seems, I think the change that is coming will take a different form.  I don’t think it will actually be the Harvards and MITs leading the charge.  Neither do I think the change producer will be the MOOC with thousands of students.

Tilt the prism just a few degrees and then you will have a better image to view.  What is going to happen is that educational publishers (and maybe some highly motivated individual academics, such as Jim Collins) are going to remake higher education.

Existing universities are not going to participate in their own destruction by outsourcing giant chunks of their operations to elite institutions.  What they will do, though, is work with educational publishers (and entrepreneurial individuals) to radically reduce the cost structure of teaching students.

The change is a simple one.  For a wide variety of courses, it would be easy to combine a package of text, short lectures that can be downloaded, slide packages, activities, and exams into a ready-made class.  The great professors, not the great institutions, will do this with the educational publishers in much the same way they do now.  All that is missing is to flesh out the current book, slides, tests, and reviews combo with some lectures and other activities.  Were he not now dead, James Q. Wilson (the dean of American Government professors) would easily be able to round out his famous textbook offering in just this way.

When these packages are ready, institutions hoping to cut cost will be able to hire master’s prepared instructors to facilitate the courses.  They won’t need to do the hard work of preparing content.  All of that will be done for them.  Neither will they need to plan.  Again, pacing will be part of the package.  All the instructor will need to do is to facilitate discussion, answer questions, and grade tests and papers.  With that workload, it will not be too difficult for a single instructor to handle five or six sections in a semester.  Because individuals with doctoral-preparation will not be needed (the doctor will be the one who comes in the package), the pay scale will be lower and the load per instructor will be higher.  If such a change can be accomplished, the savings are potentially immense.

I hasten to add that I am engaged in an exercise of prediction rather than of desire.  I love universities the way they are.  Teaching my own section of students who follow a plan of learning I have created for them is a joy.  It is especially wonderful if they are energetic participants in the exercise.

But I recognize that higher education is the latest sector to enter the path of Schumpeterian creative destruction.  When Schumpeter’s storm gets here, it will be via a revolution and expansion in educational publishing (by adding various media) rather than through the domination of MOOCs farmed out by the Ivies.

Tim Keller, Rachel Held Evans, and the Virginity of Young Christians

There is a fascinating tale of a brief Q & A with Tim Keller at the Christ and Pop Culture blog.  When asked about obstacles to revival, Keller pointed to fornication.  In other words, it is difficult to spiritually awaken people who have hard-wired a particular sin into their lives and have essentially committed to it.  If repentance means a large structural change, such as ending a co-habiting, sexual relationship, then it becomes that much less likely.

The part of the exchange that especially drew attention was the following:

Keller illustrated the point by talking about a tactic, one that he admittedly said was almost too cruel to use, that an old college pastor associate of his used when catching up with college students who were home from school. He’d ask them to grab coffee with him to catch up on life. When he’d come to the state of their spiritual lives, they’d often hem and haw, talking about the difficulties and doubts now that they’d taken a little philosophy, or maybe a science class or two, and how it all started to shake the foundations. At that point, he’d look at them and ask one question, “So who have you been sleeping with?” Shocked, their faces would inevitably fall and say something along the lines of, “How did you know?” or a real conversation would ensue. Keller pointed out that it’s a pretty easy bet that when you have a kid coming home with questions about evolution or philosophy, or some such issue, the prior issue is a troubled conscience.

Now, in my view, what Keller said is a very pastoral insight.  It is the kind of thing you learn from long experience dealing with church members and their children.  It also happens to be the kind of thing many of us have observed in our own lives.  For example, one of my very best friends had long been on fire for God.  When he became disappointed with his marriage, he suddenly became an expert critic of the Bible and questioned the concept of God’s authority.  We can see, in that instance, that the life circumstance prompted the doubts.  The values he had long embraced precluded leaving his wife.  So, he worked on deconstructing those values and justifying new ones.  One might also recall Augustine, whose conversion was held up to some degree by the fact that he had a mistress.

John Stonestreet of Summit Ministries and Prison Fellowship posted the story to his Facebook page and prompted feedback from Rachel Held Evans, who has become a successful writer on Christian topics, notably her experience as a Bryan College student and then again on trying out “Biblical womanhood.”  She took offense to what Keller said and wrote the following:

I’m often asked to speak on the topic of why young people leave the church. This. This is why young people leave the church. Because our questions aren’t taken seriously, because our value tends to be linked inextricably to our virginity, because our ideas are dismissed as silly.

I want to address one piece of what Rachel had to say.  ”[O]ur value tends to be linked inextricably to our virginity . . .”  To argue that the church has made something of a fetish out of virginity for young people is to essentially argue against the lordship of Christ and against the value of sexual purity.

When you are in high school and college, sex is the prime locus of the fight for sanctification.  It is the battle that is appropriate to the age.  You are on the edge of marriage during those years.

In the Christian understanding, sex is a marital act.  It is fitting that you and your spouse should have it in common only with each other.  To remain a virgin prior to marriage is to align oneself consciously with God and the church in viewing ourselves as uniquely and wonderfully human (in the image of God).  It is to renounce the reigning cultural logic which follows the popular lyric, “You and me, baby, we ain’t nothing but mammals, so let’s do it like they do on the Discovery Channel.”  In remaining virgins, we deny that we are at the mercy of animal instincts and assert that we are capable of adhering to higher laws than those which are merely biological.  To marry as a virgin is to demonstrate submission to God, love for one’s future spouse, and to offer up a witness to the world.

The church does us no disservice in emphasizing these points.  Rather, to the extent we embrace these teachings we experience a richer and fuller life both in obedience to Christ and in greater intimacy with our spouses.

Following Up on “An Astonishing Message from a Gay Sister in Christ”

Straight away, I must mention that the open letter from my friend has occasioned an incredible response.  It touches a nerve right in that amazing third paragraph.  If you want to know why that letter has been linked, reprinted, and repeated so often, the answer is there.  ”To those of you who would change the church to accept the gay community and its lifestyle: you give us no hope at all.”

It is counterintuitive.  The reader would expect this gay woman to plead for the church to accommodate itself to the times.  But she doesn’t do that.  Rather, she sees herself as a sinner and reaches for the bracing, redemptive, and cleansing blood of Christ rather than the lukewarm saliva of evolving culture.

I think there is some controversy over whether we should call this woman “a gay sister in Christ” as I have called her.  When Justin Taylor posted her letter, he referred to her simply as “a lesbian.”  In my view, the author of the letter is clearly a sister in Christ, even though she is still in the gay lifestyle.  The more I think on the matter, the more certain I am.  My whole life, I have been guilty of a variety of sins.  Sins of ego.  Sins of putting myself first.  Sins of abusing my body in order to obtain pleasure (as with chronic overeating).  I think of others who can pass through 50 years in a church with obvious sins of treating others badly without ever incurring displeasure of other church members or having a church discipline team visit them.

Homosexuals in the church, even those in the lifestyle, are in no different position than many of us are.  They are sinners who are sinning.  So, too, are the Christian college students having sex and still coming to church or any of the other people in the church who have sin in their lives.  The definition of a Christian is a person who proclaims that Jesus Christ is Lord and sees him as his/her only hope for salvation.  That definition does not entail being without sin.  It seems to me that my anonymous friend is clearly in the fold.  Indeed, she may be very close to God right now because she is so aware of her sin and so clear in pinning her hopes for deliverance in this life and resurrection in the next upon Him.  May we all examine ourselves and our plight so carefully and accurately.

An Astonishing Message from a Gay Sister in Christ

(You must make it to the third paragraph in order to understand.)

To the churches concerning homosexuals and lesbians:

Many of you believe that we do not exist within your walls, your schools, your neighborhoods. You believe that we are few and easily recognized. I tell you we are many. We are your teachers, doctors, accountants, high school athletes. We are all colors, shapes, sizes. We are single, married, mothers, fathers. We are your sons, your daughters, your nieces, your nephews, your grandchildren. We are in your Sunday School classes, pews, choirs, and pulpits. You choose not to see us out of ignorance or because it might upset your congregation. We ARE your congregation. We enter your doors weekly seeking guidance and some glimmer of hope that we can change. Like you, we have invited Jesus into our hearts. Like you, we want to be all that Christ wants us to be. Like you, we pray daily for guidance. Like you, we often fail.

When the word “homosexual” is mentioned in the church, we hold our breaths and sit in fear. Most often this word is followed with condemnation, laughter, hatred, or jokes. Rarely do we hear any words of hope. At least we recognize our sin. Does the church as a whole see theirs? Do you see the sin of pride, that you are better than or more acceptable to Jesus than we are? Have you been Christ-like in your relationships with us? Would you meet us at the well, or restaurant, for a cup of water, or coffee? Would you touch us even if we showed signs of leprosy, or aids? Would you call us down from our trees, as Christ did Zacchaeus, and invite yourself to be our guest? Would you allow us to sit at your table and break bread? Can you love us unconditionally and support us as Christ works in our lives, as He works in yours, to help us all to overcome?

To those of you who would change the church to accept the gay community and its lifestyle: you give us no hope at all. To those of us who know God’s word and will not dilute it to fit our desires, we ask you to read John’s letter to the church in Pergamum. “I have a few things against you: You have people there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin by eating food sacrificed to idols and by committing sexual immorality. Likewise, you also have those who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Repent therefore!” You are willing to compromise the word of God to be politically correct. We are not deceived. If we accept your willingness to compromise, then we must also compromise. We must therefore accept your lying, your adultery, your lust, your idolatry, your addictions, YOUR sins. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

We do not ask for your acceptance of our sins any more than we accept yours. We simply ask for the same support, love, guidance, and most of all hope that is given to the rest of your congregation. We are your brothers and sisters in Christ. We are not what we shall be, but thank God, we are not what we were. Let us work together to see that we all arrive safely home.

A Sister in Christ

The Importance of a Papal Name

Habemus Papem!

By now this turn of events is hardly cutting edge news.  We have heard about the Argentinian pope.  So, too, have we heard of his choice of a name, which is Francis.  With time, further elaboration ties this Francis to probably the greatest Francis who ever lived: Francis of Assisi.  

That old Francis is remembered for his love of God’s creatures, his otherworldliness, his care for the poor, and for simply being a holy man.  His life is a marker of something very potent in the story of the church.

We look at the short stretch of history in which we live and assume that we are part of some long, linear progression in one direction.  Thus, we assume that everyone was a committed Christian back in the past and that the church has lost and continues to lose ground in inexorable fashion over the centuries.  But this is not so.  The church waxes and wanes.  It is sometimes very clear and penetrating in its prophetic challenge to the broader society.  At other times, it becomes very worldly and comfortable with the establishment.  Oddly enough, we tend to see its worldly successes as the time of its greatest impact.  But the opposite is the case.  

In those times when the church operates just like any other important institution wielding power in predictable ways, we see that individuals rise up and begin to call Christ’s own to return.  Return to God.  Follow Him.  Stop resting on the ways of the world.  Protestants look at Martin Luther as one of those people.  But there are others.  Francis of Assisi was one of them.  

Perhaps this Francis will take his place in the ranks of the great reformers.  May it be so.  We Christians are watching.

Remembering an Encounter with a Young Pastor in a Park

Several years ago my wife and I were at a park playing with our son (then just a toddler).  We noticed a younger couple having a wonderful good time playing with their child around the swings.  Somehow it happened that the two wives starting talking together as did the two husbands.  I discovered that the young man was a Lutheran seminarian or pastor in training.  At that moment I was worrying about gay marriage (this was well ahead of the controversy we are embroiled in today). The young pastor asked me, “Why are you so concerned about that?  Isn’t it evident enough that men are made for women and women for men?  Hasn’t God made it clear in His creation?”  At the time I was annoyed, but the message has remained with me.  Why should I struggle and worry about the nature of marriage?  God has made it more than clear in his design.

Today, I find myself frequently remembering what he said to me.  Marriage is changing rapidly.  Though the democratic results have largely been in favor of traditional marriage, all of us can feel the massive change that has occurred among elites and the young.  It is coming.  Marriage may well be altered for a long time to come.  And yet I remember that God has made the matter evident.  If we make this change, it will be on us and on the way we have chosen to alter our minds.

When I ponder what the young pastor said, I sometimes think that I should give up on any concept of culture war.  Why insist on something when great masses of people seem bent on going a different way?  But I can turn that thinking around to twist myself in a knot.  There have been times when great masses of people were convinced that dark men were not men.  And yet had not God made it evident that they were men?  Indeed, he had.  Anyone could see that the black man was a man and not a beast of burden.  We experienced judgment in the form of a terrible war and the subsequent malformation of our politics and culture which continues to this day.

I think we must be faithful by reasoning in the public square and by championing the truth as we have light to see it.  That is the task before us whether we prevail or not.  But fundamentally, the most important war is the one being fought by the young pastor.  That is the war of the spirit.  When our spirits are submitted to God, he will show us the way.  The question is whether we will be interested in knowing Him.

A Refreshing View on Gender and the Workplace

I wanted to stand up and cheer after reading this exchange in the Wall Street Journal between an interviewer and Lauralee Martin, chief of Americas at the commercial real estate giant Jones Lang LaSalle:

WSJ:  Real-estate brokerage traditionally has been a male-dominated business.  How do you think you could help other women at JLL succeed as you have?

Ms. Martin:  I will have to say that I haven’t personally spent a lot of time thinking about gender, and maybe that is why I have done well.

Bravissimo, Ms. Martin!