The impact of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) on higher education, as well as
determining its overall advantages in the future are the specific topics of
which I would like to consider in my final ePortfolio. The growth of online
education has dramatically increased with online services such as Coursera,
Khan Academy and edX continually growing in educational resources and
enrollment. Using punctual instructional videos, many MOOCs have successfully
allowed users from around the world to learn a multitude of subjects from
computer science, humanities, mathematics, business, economics, statistics and
more.
Coursera,
an educational technology service founded just last year by Stanford professors
Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller, has partnered with a number of highly prestigious universities from around the world such as Columbia, Brown, Tel Aviv and Yale
University to provide top tier education in various studies and disciplines. Coursera's
use of paid surveillance monitoring and completion certificates have led some
of its courses to be the first recognizable form of college credit among MOOCs. Today, Coursera continues to grow in membership as more educational resources and partners are offered to its users. |
| Although flawed, MOOCs have improved upon their inferior reputation to face to face education |
MOOCs,
albeit innovative, are not without its flaws. It is difficult to monitor
students who may or may not be cheating, and grade scaling can be a challenge
especially for nontechnical subjects. Furthermore, face to face interaction
provides a level of familiarity with the course professor and its students
that, at the moment, is yet to be truly immersed in the online environment. The
flaws, although apparent now, have been improving over time as more and more higher
education institutions invest money and resources in creating credible sources
of online education. As enrollment continues to increase well pass the million mark it will be interesting to research the identity and reputation MOOCs will
provide itself against established institutions of learning, especially from a
public relations standpoint.
