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{{/_source.additionalInfo}}This century has seen many innovations and transformations within the fields of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). They have brought forth new developments in education by transferring conventional learning cultures into virtual environments. ICT is enabling us to acquire knowledge from electronic platforms, namely online encyclopedias, online courses, social media sites, online video portals, online newspapers, and blogs. We benefit greatly from these developments without sacrificing much in the way of economic expenses or physical hardships.
ICT has facilitated numerous new forms of educational platforms, technologies, programs, and projects. MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) is a new terminology that has been added to our dictionary. MOOC is an online course provided through a website, and which is open to a large number of students. Besides providing study aids like lecture videos, reading materials, and problem sets, it has interactive user forums to enable students to share and learn from each other.
Coursera is a successful MOOC platform which was only launched in April 2012. As of today, it has more than 5 million students registered worldwide. Coursera has signed collaborations with 108 leading universities – not only from the USA, but also from China, the UK, Singapore, etc. It offers more than 640 courses in various disciplines, including management, computer sciences, arts, education, social sciences, and more.
Coursera states that its vision is “a future where everyone has access to a world-class education that has so far been available to a select few. We aim to empower people with education that will improve their lives, the lives of their families, and the communities they live in.”
Under the Global Translation Partners Program, Coursera is partnering with translation companies, non-profits, philanthropic organizations, corporations, and universities from around the world to translate courses into other languages. This will enable non-English speaking citizens to benefit from these courses. At present, complete lectures of selected courses are translated into Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Kazakh, Portuguese, Russian, Turkish, and Ukrainian.
Another successful MOOC project is edX, which also offers various courses for free. Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the two world leaders in higher education, have come together to develop this free online educational project. This initiative intends to educate 1 billion students.
The calls for free education are growing louder. Today in the US, the outstanding total student loan debt amounts to 1 trillion dollars, which is higher than both auto loan and credit card loan debt. More than 37 million US citizens are indebted with student loans. Some people will be paying off their education until the day they die. Even though there are a good number of community colleges which offer economic programs, many students opt to secure mainstream degrees in reputed colleges, despite the cost. The MOOCs that provide courses free of charge could revolutionize the way people are educated. In terms of real learning experience and exposure, the virtual system is no match for the conventional physical environment. But since human resources are limited, online courses can be valuable to a wide range of target groups. This new trend could bring a lot of socio-economic benefit to marginalized groups. Here are some economic values of free courses for both students and institutions:
We have not discussed the shortcomings of MOOCs, as our focus is on bringing attention to the possibilities of this platform. The way we learn is changing, and these changes present real opportunities. It is probably too early to calculate the return on investment from MOOCs, as the technology is still developing and is not yet widespread. But the early returns suggest that these kinds of programs will have real economic and social benefits for both students and institutions.