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"One strategy for these colleges to avoid extinction is to diversify-to avoid a precarious reliance on residential students. And one way to do that is by adding online programs to the mix. The challenge for many small colleges is that they see online courses as at odds with their very identity. After all, these institutions embrace intimacy as central to their mission, with close, mentoring relationships between faculty and students, and deep, comradely connections among students-essential ingredients of highly engaged learning. For many, online fails to meet these crucial education ambitions. Instead, they reject virtual instruction as alienated learning, with isolated faculty and students coldly facing inert computer screens-not one another."

Even though all classes will be held online, first-year students must live in a residence hall in San Francisco and take classes together in real time, deviating from the "anywhere, anytime" model prevalent in online education.

The idea is simple. Online and DIY learners unite at a beautiful mountain resort to live an extraordinary lifestyle in a dynamic community of smart and motivated people.