E-learn Weblog of Willem van Valkenburg

On my flight back from the US I watched the documentary Ivory Tower on the costs of higher education in the US. The documentary is made by CNN and gives a nice overview of what is going on in the US. Especially for non-US people it is interesting to watch. The movie has a 6,9 rating on IMDB.

Anyone who regularly follows higher education news in the US will see a series of familiar themes and stories:

• The skyrocketing of tuition and the declining state contributions to public higher education.
• College graduates not getting a job and their ridiculous amounts of student debt.
• The race among institutions of higher learning to have the biggest and the best facilities to attract more students.
• The lure of campus party life
• the promise of MOOCs.

This documentary combines all of these things together in a compelling and provocative visual way that makes contemporary issues in higher education a bit more interesting to follow than they might otherwise be.

Below is the trailer of the movie. I was broadcasted last week, I don't know if the full documentary will be published online.