Stephen Downes

What Robert Cosgrave posts here may be a manifesto, but as he says at the conclusion of the post, "these changes are going to happen anyway. Global higher education systems will look like what I've described by about 2030." Now the model will not be exactly as he describes, but it will be close, I think. Here's what's in the manifesto:
- all higher education institutions need to be entirely autonomous, as non profit entities;
- a state supported student loan model, largely following the Browne Framework;
- to be eligible for loan funding, all of a modules material must be open access
- an open rating and reviewing system;
- an ideal of Deep Modularisation - the Bologna Process taken to it's logical extreme;
- by picking off the bottom rung prerequisites online first, you can access higher education without bothering with the Leaving Certificate;
- tripart governance: student loan and funding systems; labour markets and outcomes; quality management agency;
- tax incentives are strong for donations to long term institutional endowments.