Cursos masivos abiertos en línea: ¿amenaza u

oportunidad?
bbc.com / news / education-23069542

La reproducción de medios no es compatible en su dispositivo

Título de los medios ¿Qué es un Mooc? Newsnight's David Grossman explica

¿Pueden los cursos en línea con participación interactiva a gran escala y acceso abierto a
través de la web reemplazar la enseñanza presencial en un entorno universitario
tradicional? Newsnight's David Grossman examina el surgimiento de masivos cursos
abiertos en línea (Moocs).

Cuando Internet golpea una industria, el resultado suele ser bastante dramático.

Los recién llegados con modelos de negocio revolucionarios se llevan a los viejos
jugadores establecidos. Piense en lo que le sucedió a Kodak cuando la fotografía se volvió
digital, lo que le sucedió a las librerías de la calle cuando Amazon se puso en marcha.

La tecnología que permite a un profesor enseñar no solo a un alumno sino a 100.000

realmente cambia la economía de la educación superior

Ahora es el turno de la educación superior, y ni siquiera los profesores más inteligentes

pueden decir con certeza cómo va a funcionar esto.

En este momento, este cambio se centra en el Mooc, abreviatura de cursos masivos

abiertos en línea.

Básicamente, se trata de piezas de aprendizaje empaquetadas que duran unas pocas

semanas, a menudo son creadas por un profesor superior en una universidad superior y
están disponibles para cualquier persona con una computadora. La inscripción es ilimitada,
no hay requisitos de ingreso y son completamente gratis.

Los proveedores de Mooc le dirán con orgullo que su producto no es una alternativa para ir
a la universidad, es una alternativa para no ir a la universidad.

One of the big players in the Mooc world is Coursera, set up by Andrew Ng and Daphne
Koller, two computer science professors at Stanford University in the United States.

Audience leap
About two years ago Prof Ng decided to put lectures from his Machine Learning course
online, with spectacular results:

"I put one of my courses online and it reached an audience of 100,000 students," he says.
"To put that number into context, I used to teach 400 students a year at Stanford, that
means that to reach a comparable sized audience I would have had to teach at Stanford for
250 years."
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Watch Newsnight's film on MOOCs in
full on Monday 1 July 2013 at 2230BST
then afterwards on the BBC iPlayer and
Newsnight website

It was then he realised the scalability

that the internet can give education.

"I think Moocs have a huge potential.

The technology that allows one
professor to teach not just one student,
but 100,000 really changes the economics of higher education," Prof Ng says.

"Once you've created the course content it costs almost nothing to sign up another student.
What that means is we can afford to connect everyone in the world to a great education."

But not everyone agrees with this rosy assessment. Some fear that once established
Moocs will be used more and more to replace traditional universities - one professor being
able to reach hundreds of thousands of students reducing the need for professors, one
university being able to reach tens of millions of students meaning we need fewer
universities.

Refusal to teach
In California state-run universities are experimenting with Moocs in their undergraduate
programmes.

What is a MOOC?
Mooc stands for a massive open online course
It is an online course aimed at large-scale participation and open access via the
internet
They are similar to university courses, but do not tend to offer academic credit
A number of web-based platforms - including edX, Coursera and Udacity - supported
by top universities and colleges offer Moocs in a wide range of subjects

However, university staff are not happy and see this as the beginning of cost-cutting and
reduction in quality for publicly funded universities.

Professors in the philosophy department at San Jose State University have refused to
teach a Mooc on justice developed by Harvard Professor Michael Sandel and have written
him a scathing open letter in which they said they do not want to enable what they see as a
push to "replace professors, dismantle departments, and provide a diminished education
for students in public universities".

So far there are few formal credits or qualifications available through the new wave of
Moocs. It is not even clear what the business model is and how the Mooc providers, which
are mostly commercial organisations, cover their costs let alone turn a profit.
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But Prof Ng says that employers are increasingly favouring candidates with completed
Moocs on their CVs.

"It won't necessarily get you the job, but it might get you the interview," he says.

UK plan
In Britain we lag behind the US, despite the fact that the UK pioneered distance learning
with the Open University (OU) - now celebrating 40 years since its first graduations.

Now the OU is leading a consortium of 21 other universities as well as big cultural players
like the British Museum and the British Council to form Futurelearn, which will begin
providing Moocs in the autumn.

Although they do not pretend to be able to replicate the full "campus experience",
Futurelearn's CEO Simon Nelson says they intend to use the power of social media to
connect course participants.

Here students have a very one-to-one or two-to-one experience. We see that as a fantastic
model that we're not going to give up."

"This is much more than simply pumping out videos," he says. "And this isn't just a
redistribution of traditional education. This is about trying to use a connected environment
of the web to try to re-invent learning in some way."

Moocs allow education to begin harnessing the power of big data. Students can get a
precise fix on their progress, as can their teachers, if they have one. And professors can
see what works and adapt their courses accordingly.

At the moment the big players in the Mooc world are in the US and they include some of
the world's most prestigious universities - on the east coast Harvard and MIT, and on the
west coast Stanford.

In contrast, in the UK Oxford and Cambridge Universities are holding back from joining in.

Dr Sally Mapstone Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education at Oxford University, says there is a

danger of a "lemming-like rush" towards Moocs. The university already has a considerable
community education programme and puts many lectures online, but is loathe to offer
Moocs.

"We think we have a great way of teaching here through tutorials and colleges," she says.
"Students have a very one-to-one or two-to-one experience. We see that as a fantastic
model that we're not going to give up."

But that does not mean Oxford will never offer Moocs at some point. To students as an aid
to their existing coursework rather like an online text book, and perhaps to outsiders as a
showcase for the university.

Los costos en la educación superior están aumentando rápidamente. Aquí en el Reino

Unido, los estudiantes recelosos de las deudas pueden recibir una alternativa de precio
reducido al estándar de £ 9,000 al año en aranceles.
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El ex presidente de los Estados Unidos, Bill Clinton, dijo recientemente que la industria de
la educación superior debe sufrir un "cambio dramático".

"Creo que la única respuesta sostenible es encontrar un sistema de entrega menos

costoso", dijo.

El Mooc podría ser la respuesta. La pregunta es, ¿a qué costo?

Vea la película de David Grossman en su totalidad en BBC Newsnight el lunes 1 de

julio de 2013 a las 2230BST y luego en el sitio web de BBC iPlayer y Newsnight.

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