- This tuition payment option is currently limited to a single course at the prestigious American university.
- Payments must be made through the Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) Commerce platform.
- Wharton is the second university in the US to accept payments in cryptocurrencies.
The famous Wharton business school of the University of Pennsylvania in the United States has just launched the course “Economics of Blockchain and Digital Assets,” and will accept tuition payments for the course in cryptocurrencies.
Students who enroll for the blockchain executive education program starting this week have the option of paying in Bitcoin, Ethereum, or the USDC stablecoin.
In this way, Wharton becomes the second university in the United States to accept payments in digital currency. Payment options available to those who enroll in the course include PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) and credit cards.
To enable payments in cryptocurrencies, Wharton and Coinbase Commerce have reached an agreement. Students will not have to pay Coinbase the 1% fee that it usually charges traders for using the platform.
It is not clear if the payment of the fee would be absorbed by the school, as it will not be transferred to the students. A Coinbase spokesperson said that tuition payments can be made from any digital wallet.
This cryptocurrency payment option is currently limited to students taking the blockchain and digital assets education course. The online course will last six weeks and is specially designed for professionals with studies in finance.
"It costs less than one Ethereum [token] at current prices," said Reed Cataldo, one of the representatives of the university that administers the course.
This is the first course in the university that accepts payments in cryptocurrencies. But the university spokesperson considers it likely that Wharton will adopt blockchain payment for other schools later.
"We designed this program for business professionals and executives with a variety of backgrounds, including traditional finance, management and technology," said Kevin Werbach, the program’s professor and academic director.
Philadelphia-based Wharton plans to partner with blockchain consultancy Prysm Group to launch the certification program.
On The Flipside
- The University of Pennsylvania is already familiar with funding in Bitcoin. Earlier this year, the Ivy League school reported accepting a cryptocurrency donation from a generous anonymous donor who transferred $5 million in BTC. The money was used to finance a finance innovation project.
The first university to accept payment for tuition in cryptocurrencies in the US was King’s College in New York in 2014. In the rest of the world, several schools are accepting payments in Bitcoin such as the FPT University of Vietnam, the University of Applied Sciences of Lucerne in Switzerland, and the American University of Paraguay.
Why You Should Care?
- It is one of the first universities in the US and the world to accept payments in cryptocurrencies.
- The acceptance of cryptocurrencies is becoming universal as the crypto industry grows.
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