<p>I guess I wasn’t clear.</p>
<p>The fact that’s its online doesn’t really change the basic premise. There is a difference in price because Stanford elected to offer students who were NCFD a lower price. It’s not that $700 is the whoelsale price and $2500 is markup. In all likelihood, neither price reflects the actual specific cost of teaching one linear algebra class by X professor for x number of weeks. But one reflects the price of taking a class as a university student, and one reflects a special price created for a unique category of students. </p>
<p>I’m also guessing that it’s not in Stanford’s best interest to start undercutting its regular course delivery system by offering online courses for dirt cheap. Students would elect to take more of their courses that way, and that would begin to compromise the interactions that make Stanford the community that it is. For all I know, Stanford elected to make it cheaper for high school students as a sort of goodwill, knowing that linear algebra is important enrichment for math-advanced students. Again, not because $700 is the true ‘sellers cost’ to borrow newmass’ language, but because that’s the price they happened to set.</p>