Faculty Resource Guide

What are MOOCs? 

Massive Open Online Courses or MOOCs are large online courses - often consisting of 10's of Thousands of students. These courses are usually freely available for anyone to sign up for, but they offer little, if any, institutional support and no faculty face time. 

MOOCs name  implies that these are a form of Open Educational Resources but true OER advocates, such as David Wiley, are quick to point out that they are actually not true OERs and that their name leads to confusion around what is true Open Education.  In particular, they are troubled about the fact that MOOCs do not allow for adaptation that makes true open education valuable to people in different cultures, speaking different languages, with different learning styles, or needing changes made to facilitate use by handicapped individuals.

Those studying MOOCs  know that their creators motivation can range from the  Altruistic to the Monetary. But regardless of their motivation MOOCs are expensive to produce as they require extensive amount of Intellectual Property clearance as well as  Instructional Design experts.  The former ensure all materials are openly available for anyone who signs up to use. The latter ensure that courses are well laid out,  easy to understand and as educationally useful as possible given a professor does not supply personal assistance. 

Most now incorporate Web 2.0 technologies to enable students to meet virtually and they include online quizzes or other automated feedbacks.  Several are looking at the introduction of Cognitive Tutors to monitor student progress in Labs, exercises, etc.  Despite this, current evidence demonstrates that MOOCs are presently retaining lower numbers of students and that those who enroll or succeed are those with a previous higher education degree making them a less successful means of educating undergrad. Some wonder if this points to the need to have more services available to students but their size makes this difficult to facilitate.

Issues around MOOCs

Those who supportive MOOCs say they offer:

• The opportunity to get a university education for minimal costs regardless of location.https://www.ualberta.ca/admissions-programs/online-courses/indigenous-canada/index.html
   
• A means for governments to provide the tens of millions of people who will be seeking higher education opportunities a place to learn.
   
• A means for universities to do community outreach and demonstrate the value of their knowledge.  An excellent example of this is the Indigenous Canada course offered by the University of Alberta. 
   
• A means for universities to recruit and fund students they would not have seen otherwise.
   
• A means for higher education institutions to utlize the big data gathered in a MOOC course to assess what instructional methods work best for online or blended courses.
   
• Instructors the opportunity to learn more about educational technology that can be used more effectively for both online and face-to-face courses.

Detractors on the other hand are quick to point out that they:

• Would enable larger research universities to thrive as they learn to monetize their investment in MOOCs whereas poorer Universities and Colleges would struggle with less students and hence  less tuition revuenue. 
  • Reduced revenue for non-MOOC institutions would then lead to less money for high performing researchers and less research grants in smaller institutions. 
     
  • Less revenue and fewer researchers would ultimately result in less total research output and a system of higher education have and have nots.
     
• Are presently only successful with people who already have a higher education  - people who are looking for continuing education or lifelong learning  opportunities - not first time undergraduates.
   
• Frequently are provided by a combined university partner / private sector host - and the host often requires the instructors to sign contracts that limit the instructors control of their intellectual property at a time when open access is reaffirming it with publishers.
   
• Are misdirecting investments so institutions are not supporting OERs that - because of their adaptability - hold the potential of being far more useful and effective for all students (on and off-campus alike).

Irregardless of whether one is pro or con, MOOCs still face a number of challenges they must address:

• Lack of success with undergraduates means they need to either improve learning outcomes or give up on this as a means of "educating the world".
   
• In order for them to be an attractive higher education option the issue of credit for courses must be resolved.  (MOOCs currently offer certificates of completion for people who opt to have their knowledge tested but whether this will translate into transfer credits students can use to get a degree is being hotly contested., particularly by departments who do not wish to grant credits.)
   
• Some States are looking at ways of making Higher Education more affordable for their citizens and this would make MOOCs the second best option for undergraduate students.