COVID-19 will force universities to reinvent themselves, lower prices

Faculty at my university recently received a call for proposals to develop innovative online courses—especially large enrollment, introductory courses—for the fall semester. Similar initiatives across the country will prove as disruptive to my colleagues as automation for assembly line workers.
Lecture classes with hundreds of students are essential to the business model of residential universities. Those pull down average course delivery costs and subsidize smaller seminars, supervi