When Massive Online Open Courses (a.k.a MOOCs) emerged some X years ago, I was ecstatic. I was sure that MOOCs were the Big Boom of higher education. Unfortunately, the MOOC impact turned out to be very modest. This modest impact, combined with the high production cost was one of the reasons I quit making my online course after producing two or three lectures. Nevertheless, I don’t think MOOCs are dead yet. Following are some links I recently read that provide interesting insights to MOOC production and consumption.
- A systematic study of academic engagement in MOOCs that is scheduled for publication in the November issue of Erudit.org. This 20+ page-long survey summarizes everything we know about MOOCs today (I have to admit, I only skimmed through this paper, I didn’t read all of it)
- A Science Magazine article from January, 2019. The article, “The MOOC pivot,” sheds light to the very low retention numbers in MOOCs.
- On MOOCs and video lectures. Prof. Loren Barbara from George Washington University explains why her MOOCs are not built for video. If you consider creating an online class, you should read this.
- The economic consequences of MOOCs. A concise summary of a 2018 study that suggest that MOOC’s economic impact is high despite the high churn rates.
- Thinkful.com, an online platform that provides personalized training to aspiring data professionals, got in the news three weeks ago after being purchased for $80 million. Thinkful isn’t a MOOC per-se but I have a special relationship with it: a couple of years ago I was accepted as a mentor at Thinkful but couldn’t find time to actually mentor anyone.
The bottom line
We still don’t know how this future will look like and how MOOCs will interplay with the legacy education system but I’m sure the MOOCs are the future
Boris Gorelik 