A Free Accredited Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science – How Do We Get There?

[MNomadic]

Freecodecamp.org article link

2021 has been a big year for the freeCodeCamp community:

• We provided more than 2.1 billion minutes of learning to millions of people around the world.
  
• We published our 300-hour Relational Database Certification teaching SQL, Linux, and Git interactively – right inside VS Code.
  
• We shipped a project-oriented learning overhaul to freeCodeCamp's Responsive Web Design certification.
  
• We published more than 130 full-length video courses on our community's YouTube channel, and more than 1,000 text-based tutorials on our nonprofit's publication.
  
• We made steady progress on the Data Science Curriculum Expansion and will ship parts of it in early 2022.
  
• We even published Learn to Code RPG, a video game simulation of the process of learning to code and getting a developer job.
  

So you may be wondering: what's next? How do we help even more people from here?

Our goal:

To provide a computer science bachelor's degree...

from an accredited US university...

for free.

We want this degree program to be freely available to anyone anywhere on the planet – regardless of their socioeconomic background, or their ability to obtain a US visa.

[bjcheung77]

Wow, that's good for them.  I think there maybe a place for them if they get enough funding and also partners/supporters willing to fork the bill.  Having said that, it seems like they're trying to "be the next" UofPeople, starting off with a CS degree and maybe something else in the future.  Tuition technically is free at UofP, they just have "fees" for applications and exams.  If these guys move into a similar model, it may somewhat "better" their funding... they won't be able to sustain free without someone forking the bills...

[MNomadic]

Wow, that's good for them.  I think there maybe a place for them if they get enough funding and also partners/supporters willing to fork the bill.  Having said that, it seems like they're trying to "be the next" UofPeople, starting off with a CS degree and maybe something else in the future.  Tuition technically is free at UofP, they just have "fees" for applications and exams.  If these guys move into a similar model, it may somewhat "better" their funding... they won't be able to sustain free without someone forking the bills...

True. I think they should hit up some of the tech billionaires. I know the Gates foundation has spent a lot funding education initiatives like Khan academy and Mackenzie Scott has donated billions towards education and workforce training.

I don't have any experience with UofPeople, but I have used a bunch of freecodecamp's courses/resources over the last few years and definitely found them to be of good quality. I think that if they can get the funding and navigate the accreditation process, they'll be able to design a superior CS program and maybe other specialist degree programs like data science and cybersecurity.

[ashkir]

The idea of them becoming accredited is awesome. Hopefully someone familiar with navigating this can help them. I heard it's an expensive process.

FYI: I sent this to the dean of UMPI's YourPace program. This link said they're looking for a university to partner with. UMPI has expressed interest in an online computer science degree... Maybe they can partner up.

[bluebooger]

I would love to see WGU's Bachelors of Science Data Analytics and Data Management https://www.wgu.edu/online-it-degrees/da...ogram.html drop the data analyst nanodegree from udacity and use some stuff from freecodecamp or use the
"Google Data Analytics Professional Certificate" from coursera https://www.coursera.org/professional-ce...-analytics
or the IBM Data Science Professional Certificate https://www.coursera.org/professional-ce...ta-science? from coursera

would also like to see them drop the totally useless Comptia A+ certificate and replace it with Discrete Math

I think those changes would make the WGU degree much better

[SteveFoerster]

If anyone can do it, it's Michael Saylor and his team. They'll get there.

[ashkir]

If anyone can do it, it's Michael Saylor and his team. They'll get there.

I would love to see Saylor work on new classes and push forward again. This is awesome.

[cardiacclep]

This would be great to see......seems like the accrediation hurdle is huge gate keeper keeping the acceleration of affordable education at a slower pace. Free Code Camp and courses like Dr. Serverance provide more value that many college courses. The future should look like the sampling of courses from the best teachers where an aggregate of courses can be accepted universally. I feel this is happening.........Outlier comes to mind in this approach. The old expensive approach just cannot sustain much longer. Exciting times in higher ed technology.

[MNomadic]

An update!

https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/freeco...ee-update/

In short, they have a long road ahead in order to develop all of the courses and navigate accreditation. They're anticipating the possibility of it taking a decade so don't hold your breath. Though they do plan to start releasing their first few courses in 2023(probably not accredited). Also, they plan for it to be self paced.

Things they need:

- money/donations (of course)
- teachers/instructors/professors
- course beta testers

They have their AS Mathematics and BS CS mapped out(the AS ladders right in to the BS):


Associate of Science in Mathematics
Philosophy of Knowledge
History of Computation
College Algebra
Foundations of Critical Thinking
Precalculus
Ethical Reasoning
Calculus I
English Rhetoric and Composition
Probability and Statistics I
Health and Wellness
Calculus II
Probability and Statistics II
Professional and Technical Writing
Calculus III
Discrete Mathematics
Economics of Technology and the Labor Market
Linear Algebra
Theory of Computation
Organizational Behavior
Applied Quantitative Reasoning

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science
Introduction to Computer Science
Data Structures and Algorithms
Electronics and Embedded Systems
Software Design and Engineering
Computer Systems and Architecture
Relational Databases and NoSQL Systems
Fundamentals of Computer Networking
Algorithmic Design and Analysis
Applied Computer Graphics
Full-Stack Web Development
Principles of Information Security
Human-Computer Interaction
Foundations of Data Analysis
Applied Data Visualization
Foundations of Data Engineering
Supervised and Unsupervised Machine Learning
Deep Learning Methodologies
Applied Natural Language Processing
Applied Computer Vision
Software Industry Interview Preparation

The whole thing sounds exciting to me even if their goal will hard to accomplish.

[blablablox]

Wow, that's good for them.  I think there maybe a place for them if they get enough funding and also partners/supporters willing to fork the bill.  Having said that, it seems like they're trying to "be the next" UofPeople, starting off with a CS degree and maybe something else in the future.  Tuition technically is free at UofP, they just have "fees" for applications and exams.  If these guys move into a similar model, it may somewhat "better" their funding... they won't be able to sustain free without someone forking the bills...

but didn't worldquant succeed into doing that already? and they didn't do a fee model like uopeople, how can they afford maintaining their master's degree?