According to an article in Inside Higher Ed, the New York Times will now be teaching college:
Two years ago, with revenue from its celebrated print product in a nosedive, the New York Times Company starting poking its nose into the lucrative market of distance education, providing technology, marketing, and archival resources for non-credit courses taught by professors at colleges around the country through Epsilen, its online course delivery and networking platform.
This spring, in conjunction with a handful of colleges, the Times will actually start awarding certificates to students who pay to take its online courses — moving beyond its previous involvement, which focused on individual, non-credit courses.
Together with Indiana’s Ball State University, for instance, the Times Company will offer a course on video storytelling, at $235 a semester.
The Times Company is not just offering journalism-related courses, however. Inside Higher Ed reports that three other colleges are working with the media company on certificate programs:
Pennsylvania’s Rosemont College is offering a Times-sponsored $1,950 certificate in entrepreneurship.
The City University of New York and the Times are working together to produce a $930 certificate program in immigration law.
In addition, Trenton, New Jersey’s Thomas Edison State College and the Times are co-sponsoring an almost $4,000 certificate in something called “nurse paralegal studies.”
Ah, nurse paralegal studies. Way to make use of the the Gray Lady’s expertise.
