Google is about to launch his online university. The courses will last a maximum six months and their cost should not exceed dollars 300. At the end of the course - more intensive than ever - students will undergo a test and, in case of promotion, they will obtain one of the "Google Career Certificates”, designed for those who intend to specialize in the most requested sectors of the digital world. In fact, the Big G university will not have all the faculties: its goal is to train professionals able to immediately enter the job market related to the web. For this reason, course content will be updated much earlier (and more often) than in traditional universities.
Competition from Google is likely to inflict a hard blow to the universities, which offer courses of much longer duration and – in the United States – have decidedly high costs, to the point that many students remain in debt for many years after graduation.
Then there is something to consider the Covid factor: with the pandemic raging, most universities are having difficulty managing courses and it is probable that face-to-face teaching will be penalized throughout the next academic year. This situation could really benefit Google, which with its new online courses aims to steal an important market share from normal university centers.
Of course, doubts abound. The most common concerns the duration: how will Big G manage to condense training courses that normally require several years of study into six months? And again: given the reduced times and costs, will the quality of training really be able to compete with that of traditional universities? It will take some time to find out. At the moment, in fact, it is not yet known when the Google-branded online courses will start. From Mountain View, however, ensure that not much is missing.
