MOOCs are a relatively new phenomenon in education, with the first course appearing in 2008. They are online courses, open to anyone, at generally no cost. MOOCs are available in a number of subject areas and from both for profit and nonprofit providers. Jeff Dunn (2012) links to a concise info-graphic that details the short and rapidly evolving history of MOOCs. As evidenced by skyrocketing enrollment, MOOCs may have a major effect on the higher education landscape.
Since MOOCs are such a recent trend, many scholars are making predictions regarding their force as a major disruption in higher education. How MOOCs will impact traditional education remains to be seen, however, one can not ignore the large enrollments and learning opportunities they are generating. As they continue to grow, determining where they fit into the higher education landscape will be a large challenge for traditional universities.
One of the most interesting questions to me personally is the business model used by the partnerships between traditional Universities and for-profit MOOC providers such as Coursera and Udacity. I am just beginning to read about this, but the ethical questions surrounding student data usage and strategic enrollment management posed by Dettman (2013) bring up additional issues in the MOOC discussion beyond the usual online learning debate.
In deciding which MOOC to take, I was a bit overwhelmed with the available options. I'm one of those nerdy folks who gets excited at the idea of taking interesting courses, for free no less. Practicality prevailed and I decided to take a course that would generally be useful in my course of study and/or my work life. I initially chose Big Data in Education offered through Coursera. It seemed like a good overview of material that would be really useful as we potentially move into using "big data" into some data mining models. However, the course, which was supposed to start in August, was postponed...twice. I switched over to another Coursera class, Web Intelligence and Big Data. This course seems much more technical, as it includes programming assignments. While I consider myself fairly technically astute, I haven't done much in the past 10 years beyond writing simple SQL statements and the occasional HTML tag, and I have never programmed in Python. It is a little intimidating, but I am ready to dust off the depths of my brain that know about concepts like binary trees (in the first lesson, apparently).
Refrences
Dunn, J. (2012, December 24). a quick guide to the history of moocs. Retrieved from http://www.edudemic.com/2012/12/a-quick-guide-to-the-history-of-moocs/
Dettman J. (2013, June 7). MOOCs and the Masses: Big Data and the Question of Access in Online Teaching. Retrieved from http://www.jonathandettman.net/moocs-and-the-masses-big-data-and-the-question-of-access-in-online-teaching
