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MOOC COURSES: TOO MASSIVE AND TOO OPEN |
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Massive open online courses, or Moocs, may be higher education's current fad but they fail on two counts: mass and openness - according to the president of Stanford University, which has helped pioneer teaching via the internet. John Hennessy, the computer scientist who heads the prestigious Californian university, told the Financial Times such courses were too large to engage and motivate most students. "Two words are wrong in Mooc: massive and open," he said. His comments come as academics and entrepreneurs rethink a model that many thought would revolutionise education when it emerged in 2011. The courses, which promise free access to material being taught in top universities, have drawn millions of users around the world. Most people taking online courses at Stanford were simply "not ready for the material at the same level" as the brightest participants, Prof Hennessy said. When the first Mooc came out, 100,000 people signed up but "not even half went to the first lecture, let alone completed all the lectures", he added. Only 4 to 5 per cent of those who sign up for a course at Coursera, another Mooc pioneer to spin out of Stanford, reach the end, said Andrew Ng, the professor who heads it.
(Fonte: A. Hill and R. Waters, Financial Times 03-02-2014)
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