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.
I believe this idea is absolutely one that is "doable" and could provide for a terrific final project. The premise of this topic is very interesting, and I would love to hear just how much these MOOCs have grown (with numbers), as well as the general opinions on teachers that, perhaps, could be positive as well as negative (which was expressed through cheating concerns). I would also love to see potential statistics regarding students who use these courses, with before and after performance metrics. My suggestion for an interviewee would be somebody from a science department (or even math or statistics) here at Maryland, as these MOOCs are extremely prevalent with science classes. This topic's major pros are the relevancy of the idea (as MOOCs are probably often used here at Maryland), and both the positives and negatives regarding these courses are already discussed here (and, I'm sure, will continue to be in the project itself), and should make for an interesting debate. If there is any con with this topic, it might be that it will be difficult to hear from enough students or teachers (if Kris does decide to do so) to provide a sufficient sample size to draw any reasonable conclusions about the effectiveness or positivity of MOOCs. The audio clip provided was clear and concise, and provides no doubts that this topic can lead to a very strong final project.
ReplyDeleteKriis Salvador
ReplyDeleteI feel this post is interesting and can be accomplished. The idea of massive open online courses (MOOC’s - higher education) serving as a replacement for traditional teachings is a great topic, and the information found can be used immediately by your readers. As I was reading I noticed you mentioned the potential negatives for MOOCS such as not being able to monitor students and determine if they are cheating. This is great because you are not providing a biased view. The topic itself is detailed and I knew what to expect from your headline. Something to be cautious about is to not give an extensive summary of each individual MOOC, instead focus on your points. Your position is a little unclear whether your telling us about the benefits of MOOC’s or will MOOC’s be an alternative for established institutions. An expert who might be good to interview is a business and a computer science professor. I know you may not have time to interview two experts but I said that to give you multiple perspectives. Another idea could be whether the credibility of MOOC’s be substantial enough to write on resume’s/ applications. Great start.