51–60 of 85 posts
I'm sure the acronym MOOC is obvious to those in the area, but I wasn't sure what it stood for, and it seems sloppy to me that it wasn't defined in the article. All it takes is writing "Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)" the first time it was used.
I read the original open letter and think that there's quite a bit of misleading and FUDding, of course, masterfully done coming from a philosophy prof. I approach this from a different angle: "We believe the purchasing of online and blended courses is not driven by concerns about pedagogy, but by an effort to restructure the U.S. university system in general ..." I agree with him completely here, a large part of thi…
I agree with your general sentiments, but, and you are certainly not alone in this, you glossed over the financial issues facing universities. In many cases, the budget issues facing universities are not all endogenous, unavoidable problems. I think a better strategy would be to figure out why, exactly, universities are so strapped for cash (I've worked in higher education, it isn't a simple issue) and target those i…
That doesn't mean that we shouldn't attack the problem you mention, though.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree with your general sentiments, but, and you are certainly not alone in this, you glossed over the financial issues facing universities. In many cases, the budget issues facing universities are not all endogenous, unavoidable problems. I think a better strategy would be to figure out why, exactly, universities are so strapped for cash (I've worked in higher education, it isn't a simple issue) and target those i…
This is not to say that pedagogical advances can't be made, but as you pointed out, these advances, to the extent possible, should not be influenced by budget constraints lest we end up with cheaper, but proportionally worse, education. Why do you believe that worse but cheaper education wouldn't provide a better value to students?
This concern is partially motivated by my background. I used to work for a university doing academic technology-related stuff. In my opinion, many of the technologies that were being acquired didn't contribute much to the quality of the education offered (beyond looking sexy when prospective students came in for tours). However, the tech was often extremely expensive and, in fact, required additional fees in many cases.
Speaking for my self, a UK student 14 ish years ago doing Computer Science... I found lectures mostly a waste of time. What I found was that the lecturers were simply presenting the latest chapter from the prescribed text book. So, I ended up reading the chapter the night before and just used the lecture as confirmation of what I thought I had learned by reading. Very occasionally I used the lecture to ask some quest…
But a straight up lecture? I'd rather read a book. And really, even with good lecturers, most of my real learning comes from applying the knowledge somehow: writing computer programs, writing essays, etc.
The coming widespread adoption of MOOCs is another great example of what Jaron Lanier calls Mass Unemployment Events. Driverless cars will be another. Together we trudge on towards a future requiring a basic minimum income.
Certainly, the world's economy would have collapsed when cars came and the horse and buggy creators lost their jobs, the printing press forced manual copiers out of business, automatic telephone switches made operators lose their job, etc. (Funny story: I have a professor that was in the Center of Mass group for NASA, where they painstakingly calculated the center of mass of each object and part of the shuttle, then…
But this is a pretty big assumption. I'm not saying that you can't put a price on anything--you can. But that doesn't mean that the price is accurate, in terms of the value acquired, which is what some other people are trying to point out. The market assumes you can rationally determine the real value of things, in money terms, and compare all things equivalently. But the future utility of something, let alone knowledge, is impossible to measure with any hope of accuracy.
If everybody measures everything with money based on some expectation of value--itself measured in terms of the return on investment of existing money/time--and most people are wrong, then it might have very bad long-term consequences for individuals and society.
Lots of things are lost when we replace one way of doing things with another way, and usually the dollar value of those things is never considered, but is externalized and conveniently forgotten. Same is true for the way we treat the value of natural resources (air, water, wildlife, minerals) as zero until exploited. It's a pragmatic necessity, enforced by the limits of our measuring tools, but that doesn't mean that nothing is lost.
So, when you say "standards of living have increased", what measures are being used? Past the essentials (food/water/housing/clothing/security), we get into very grey areas. Knowledge and ways of life are changing, and maybe the loss is more costly than people are willing to admit in the rush for material prosperity.
My first thought was this was another case of the "old guard" being afraid of change, but I read their letter and I actually agree with some of their points. The obvious downside is the lack of interaction with the lecturing professor. This was another point I hadn't thought of: "The thought of the exact same social justice course being taught in various philosophy departments across the country is downright scary -…
Reduction of education to simple learning of facts and information will drive the world into the ground. It has certainly already begun, as have the results. What we need is more generalized, humanist, liberal arts and sciences education, not less. I swear to you if I have to work with one more one-track single-minded robot programmer I'm going to start cursing.
For pete's sake, get some breadth and human contact—the only way to a true education. I want to see more of this type of response to MOOCs, and frankly, I wouldn't care if the entire concept was forcibly rejected from society. That would be a start.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is a limitation: questions and answers. The place professors will have value is in direct student communication.
Certainly that's the new value prop, but wasn't a lot of that previously handled by teaching assistants? Personally, I think the Udacity "continuous Socratic method" approach is better than traditional lectures because it forces constant thought and engagement.
Before, I was mostly thinking that online education is good for things with well-established and fairly uniform curricula (e.g. many math, science, and engineering courses). But it really struck me that the class in question was called "Justice". To think that we'd just have a few notable professors writing the curriculum for such a broad and subjective course is disturbing.
Speaking for my self, a UK student 14 ish years ago doing Computer Science... I found lectures mostly a waste of time. What I found was that the lecturers were simply presenting the latest chapter from the prescribed text book. So, I ended up reading the chapter the night before and just used the lecture as confirmation of what I thought I had learned by reading. Very occasionally I used the lecture to ask some quest…
Some lecturers are truly outstanding, and a joy to listen to. I went to a small undergraduate college, with small class sizes and many passionate, engaging professors, where classes were a mixture of lecture and discussion. But a straight up lecture? I'd rather read a book. And really, even with good lecturers, most of my real learning comes from applying the knowledge somehow: writing computer programs, writing essa…
Even with a great teacher, the speed at which the material is presented is never going to match each person's learning flow. Too slow for things they get instantly, too fast for concepts they have trouble with, and everyone is different.
And even debate in a small class is inefficient. Contrast a debate in a 20-person class with a debate in the HN comment threads. The class will sometimes be focused on a thread I'm not interested in. Sometimes I will want to chime in, but others are holding the floor. Time is a scarce resource and 20 students are contesting it. On HN, we can all read and comment simultaneously. No downtime.