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MIT And Harvard Start New Online Education Partnership
New submitter Lluc writes "MIT and Harvard have started a new online education partnership called edX, an 'open-source technology platform to deliver online courses.' They plan to offer classes starting in Fall 2012. Perhaps this nonprofit venture is a better method for online education than Udacity, the startup created by Stanford professors after their wildly successful free online course offerings."
Fellow new submitter alexander_686 sent in a link to the edX FAQ, and adds: "Harvard and MIT are launching edX with 60 million dollars to offer 'low fee' online classes. No word yet on classes offered or who will be teaching. No college credit but certificates will be offered. ... I hope low cost means low cost. (Under $25). I have really enjoyed the Stanford University free online classes."
This really is exciting, I hope that eventually all of these online education efforts will consolidate into one singel network offering a variety of free and low cost educational options, constantly updated and standardised on an easy to use open format, available to people around the world.
From the FAQ
Many institutions are partnering in this space. Is the MIT/Harvard partnership exclusive? Will other institutions be able to collaborate with edX?
It is our intention that over time other universities will join MIT and Harvard in offering courses on the edX platform.
Hmmm how about MIT OCW? Can they partner with edX?
OCW has some excellent class lectures to watch. I hope this doesn't mean OCW is going away, or going to fee-only.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Perhaps this nonprofit venture is a better method for online education than Udacity,
Perhaps someone from Harvard or MIT, wrote and submitted this summary/article.
Perhaps this is just a way for some universities to rake in more cash to misappropriate later while offering certificates that are not even worth the paper they're printed on.
Or perhaps this is going to be a really cool thing. We shall see, until then I'm cautiously optimistic. Seriously, Udacity FTW.
Most of the online courses fall short on the psychological aspects of teaching. They are little more than videotaped lectures with automated homework grading, and this model doesn't translate well to an online model.
By way of example, the online courses offered so far have been based on avoiding penalties instead of gathering rewards. Your grade is 100 minus the things you get wrong, and you have to finish before a deadline or get penalized.
This is reflected in the enrollment numbers: 120K students enroll in an online course thinking that MIT (for example) will provide a rewarding experience. 100K drop out because the experience isn't all that great.
Taken another way, consider a student who has trouble in the first half of the course and who gets a poor grade on the midterm. At that point, the maximum grade they can get is very low, so there's really no incentive to continue.
A different model might hold the student back until they show proficiency. Once they have confidence in the material, the system "rewards" them and presents the next chapter. The student is motivated to get the next level of achievement, and their level of understanding is greater.
All of the motivation in all of these courses comes from the student, and with no rewards along the way it turns into a grueling tedious chore. It's tough to keep slogging away for 12 weeks with only the dream of a certificate to keep you going.
If they really want to educate people, they're going to have to change their model to keep students motivated.
Until they do that, it'll still be just videotapes of college lectures.
With all the horrible things happening now in the online world SOPA/PIPA/CISPA this online education thing is a really positive development that makes me feel good about the future of humanity. I'm taking the first MITX course (6002x Circuits and Electronics). It's great to take a course that is REALLY HARD, as in you have to be comfortable with calculus and differential equations. Most online learning, with the exception of online learning that is computer science related, has been really basic up until now. I am hopeful that with the worldwide nature of these courses this is going to improve the lives of people everywhere.
I wonder about level distribution.
Go to OCW or itunesU or ed section of archive.org and there's about 20 first semester calculus video lecture series. Some are even pretty good. Then there is a steady decline until "junior year" classes where the distribution drops to approximately Zero. I'd like to watch a modern compiler class. How about a modern database design class (I was brought up in the Codd Normal Form era, it would be interesting to listen to some nosql rants).
A complete list of "interesting video lecture series I know about" : there is a decent crystallography/stereochemistry series. There is a decent thermodynamics series. There is a decent digital communications series. That's about all I've found for technical "non-freshmen level" video lecture series.
Its like a video game stuffed with noobness to get good immediate reviews, then ignore the longer term players, after all you've already got their interest/money.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
From the FAQ:
"Will the certificates be awarded by Harvard and/or MIT?
As determined by the edX board, MIT and Harvard, online learners who demonstrate mastery of subjects could earn a certificate of completion, but such certificates would not be issued under the name Harvard or MIT.
Will Harvard and MIT students be able to take these courses for credit?
No. MITx and Harvardx courses will not be offered for credit at either university. The online content will be used to extend and enrich on campus courses."
Can't take a chance on watering-down the reps of either institution. So segregate the student populations, and don't directly affiliate the names. This is what happens to a good idea after marketers, lawyers, and the bean-counters get together and have had their way with it.
When you look at the apprentice / journeyman / master system, you're supposed to get broader experience in the journeyman phase ... you go place to place, learning from other experts.
When you've got the team lead who's been trained internally and has known nothing other than working at that one place, I see that as a red flag. If you ask them why they're doing something a specific way, and they give an answer that's effectively 'because that's the way we've always done it', it's a sign that they're not going to be receptive to new ideas.
(and yet, at the same time, I also get ticked off when we hire someone new with little experience and they want to redo everything from the ground up in whatever the trendy language / framework / style of the day is, even after we explain why things are the way they are)
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
It's more than a few thousand people. Check out Stanford's Youtube channel, for example. They've uploaded multiple full lecture series on math, physics, biology, engineering, etc., and it already has 123,000 subscribers and 34 million video views.
> Until they do that, it'll still be just videotapes of college lectures.
's/just/free/g' That's a huge mod.
It's silly to compare the curent crop of on-line FREE courses with tuition-based in-class courses. Better to compare them with tuition-based on-line courses, like those of Columbia CVN or Stanford SEE. By that standard, the free courses I've seen are as good or better. And remember, each of the freebies costs $2500 less. That's a world of difference.
Will on-line courses ever approach the learning experience provided by in-class lectures or face-to-face study groups? Possibly. But given the GREATLY reduced cost, the ease of time shifting, the opportunity to learn from the very best profs (eventually), cut-rate e-learning isn't going away. In fact it's hard to imagine that it won't eventually outcompete the present college system, given the unreal cost difference.
Given the rise of Walmart and Amazon, you should never underestimate the power of delivering a product by combining 'sufficient', 'convenient', and 'dirt cheap'.
What about http://www.coursera.org/?
As an active software developer and college undergrad, I tried Udacity's CS101. It was embarassing, from a professional perspective. From a unicorn and rainbow perspective, it was kind of neat, and I began to drink the koolaid... until I realized that their automated grading system was written poorly, choking on Python code that was barely creative. I pointed this out in their StackExchange-like "forums", only to be immediately engaged by the Python defenders who called me "un pythonic" for building a reusable class library. Sigh.