A trailblazer in online education: Richard Bishirjian has founded Yorktown University, a conservative cybercollege without a left-wing agenda. And because of online efficiencies the price is right

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Feb 4, 2002 | by Stephen Goode

Richard Bishirjian is a pioneer two times over. With the encouragement of Paul Weyrich, he founded Yorktown University, an online, for-profit school. But Yorktown also is a conservative institution of higher learning, which makes it a rarity among American colleges and universities and one of a kind when it comes to online institutions of higher learning.

Yorktownuniversity.com opened its virtual portals in 2001 and has 52 professors. Each course leading to the bachelor of arts degree (the school does not offer a bachelor of science degree) costs $399. How the university delivers its courses to students can be experienced by visiting http://yorktownu.blackboard .com. Students may transfer credits from other institutions and may qualify for Yorktown University credits through related life experiences.

Questions about the school can be answered by calling (866) 899-1787, a toll-free number. A good university, Bishirjian tells INSIGHT, is one "that reflects and nourishes its people." That's what he sees as Yorktown's mission: to provide a challenging place where conservatives can receive a solid education free from the goo-gooisms of the left-wing agenda that Bishirjian sees as prevalent among American colleges and universities.

Insight: One of the big attractions of online higher education is how cheap it is compared with the costs at traditional colleges and universities. That's true both from the college's point of view as well as that of the student, isn't it?

Richard Bishirjian: My guess is you can have a fully functioning, serviceable [online] university with senior scholars doing really credible work at every level for 3 percent of the costs of a physical university.

The efficiencies of the Internet economy allow us to offer courses at very low tuition. Recently a doctor called from Idaho saying that his son wanted to go to St. John's College in Santa Fe [New Mexico]. Now that's $30,000 a year and more. How will St. John's and other places that charge $30,000 a year, or even $15,000, be able to continue to compete with state institutions charging $4,000 a year?

But that young man could come here for $3,000. So cost is a major consideration. It's not unusual to hear about students acquiring $100,000 indebtedness while going to schools like Duke University for four years.

Another point: Right at the beginning I calculated that to contract for 40 faculty, pay their moving expenses and get them located at a physical university would cost $6 million -- startup outlays that aren't necessary if you're online.

Insight: So the Internet offers a means to lower the costs of a college education at a time when they're becoming prohibitive, especially at private institutions?

RB: There are a great many problems in education, but we can say that the new technologies may well help us to live within our means and better husband the resources that we have. I think the Internet will do that.

I personally think that 50 percent of all the existing private colleges and universities will be out of business in 20 years. They're hurting right now as student bodies are shrinking.

But the upside is that undergraduate education in America is utterly saturated with all kinds of educational products at very good rates. So I repeat: Why go to an expensive private school when you can go to any state institution or community college at much less cost? The trouble is that public education is hurting, too. We're now in a recession and the income states have to subsidize education just isn't there. Already there's a great deal of resistance to breaking ground for new buildings.

It would take a paradigm shift in thinking to deal efficiently with these problems, but if you made that shift you might never have to build another university. All that needs to be done is to include within the planning of the four-year curriculum the requirement that one year be done online. That is, provide for three years at a physical university instead of four, and one year online.

Insight: You're pioneering not only an online university but a conservative online school. What makes you think that there is a market for such a thing?

RB: Because I couldn't imagine requiring anyone else to put as much time in their studies at an institution hostile to their values as I did as an undergraduate at the University of Pittsburgh, a school that was very hostile to my values.

The character of our students at Yorktown University largely has been shaped before they come to us. They know that the faculty they ordinarily would encounter at colleges and universities in America would be hostile to what they think and know is right. Many of our students complain that [when they're at traditional colleges and universities] they have to constrain themselves because if they talk about their views on abortion and other issues they offend their faculty and tend to be penalized.

The Internet offers an alternative for these people. Look at it this way. Cable television allows the creation of communities of interest because the economies of operating a cable system do not require a national audience. All you need are all the food lovers, and you have the Food Channel, or all the sports lovers, and you have ESPN or other sport channels. Just so on the Internet where we can create a conservative community of interest, starting with a conservative faculty and moving on.