Presentation for the Online Learning Consortium's 2014 Annual Conference. This presentation looks at the results of a Delphi study about the political, theoretical, historical and economic implications of the Massive Open Online Course phenomenon. Through viewing the MOOC as a phenomenon rather than a model, participants were asked to address how the MOOC and subsequent discourse affected not only the practice of education, but attitudes toward education.
The MOOC is a Phenomenon: Expert Thoughts on the Future of Higher Education in MOOC Terms
1. The MOOC is a Phenomenon!
Expert Thoughts on the Future of Higher
Education in MOOC Terms
OLC 2014 International Conference
October 29, 2014 2:15PM – Asia 3
Rolin Moe, Ed.D. (Pepperdine University)
Twitter: @RMoeJo
http://rolinmoe.org
3. Life of MOOC
• George Siemens sees education
in digital age as a sphere of
networks
• Develops theory of connectivism,
involving human and automated
networks
• Offers test-drive class on theory in
manner of the theory (open to
anyone). Nearly 2.5K enrollees.
Students dub it a MOOC
• Somewhat similar classes
emerge; similar results
• Most enrolled have a Bachelor’s
and some graduate coursework
• Excitement within EdTech
community about potential for
model
• Growth continues despite co-option
of term MOOC
• Sal Khan produces tutorial videos
for niece; leads to Khan
Academy (and TED)
• Sebastian Thrun (Google,
Stanford) sees TED talk, inspired.
• Offers his “Intro to AI” course free
online; other Stanford profs do
same
• 160K enrollees; bedlam
• Start-ups crated (Coursera,
Udacity, edX), courses offered,
rhetoric spilled, governments
listen, administrators hired & fired.
Media dubs it a MOOC.
• Most enrolled have a Bachelor’s
and some graduate coursework
• 741 (and counting) presentations
like this entitled “MOOCs: What
do we know?”
4. 7 8 Things You Should Know
About MOOCs (per Educause)
• Learning Model
• Connected Age
• Lifelong Learning
• Game-changer
• Scalability
• Learning Analytics
• Disruptive
• Delivering Education to Consumers
5. MOOC as a Disruptive Technology
(per Christensen & Horn)
• Low-cost (& low-quality?) option
• Servicing new population
• Adoption by existing population
• Existing provider too slow
(or unable) to adapt
• A change in the marketplace and
the culture
6. Why Disruptive Technology Argument (&
MOOC = Model) is Troublesome
• Education is not a commodity in same manner as a
photocopier, a .mp3, or even trade journalism.
Many argue it is not a commodity at all.
• The MOOC model has been orchestrated by
existing high-end providers.
• Education is a social structure (Weber) and a
foundational aspect of the public sphere
(Habermas); would someone argue a disruptive
innovation in religion?
7. Shifting the MOOC Lens
MOOC as Model
(Educause)
MOOC as Phenomenon
(Veletsianos & Moe, 2015)
• Connected Age
• Lifelong Learning
• Game-changer
• Scalability
• Learning Analytics
• Disruptive
• Delivering Education to
Consumers
• Cost of Higher Education
• Higher Ed shifting to Job
Skills
• Quantitative Research
• Free Enterprise
• Technological Solutionism
(Morozov)
• Educational Research
Lacks Impact
• Cognitive Theory
8. The Evolution & Impact
of MOOCs
• George Siemens
• Anya Kamanetz
• Clay Shirky
• Audrey Watters
• Kevin Werbach
• Cathy Sandeen
• Peter Norvig
• Fatimah Wirth
• Todd Edebohls
And more
Methodology: Delphi
Study
Research Questions
1) Where do experts
agree on the impact
of MOOCs on Higher
Education?
2) Where do experts
agree on the impact
of MOOCs on
policy/culture/society?
9. The Prompts
Discussion was built around 12 quotations, pulled from
existing MOOC literature and paraphrased. Each
quotation tackled a different aspect/criticism of the
MOOC, viewing it from either a model-based lens or a
sociocultural phenomenological lens. Discussion
lasted up to three rounds, depending on whether a
prompt had reached a consensus majority of
agreement or disagreement.
#videolecture, #personalization, #data, #autodidact,
#publicgood, #democratization, #expertise,
#professors, #disruptive, #imperialism, #tierbased,
#labor
10. Quantitative Results
Four of 12 prompts reached
consensus.
1) Learning analytics will
help solve education’s
struggles (agree)
2) MOOCs are a tool to
democratize education
(disagree)
3) There are no experts in
online education
(disagree)
4) MOOCs provide an
avenue for tier-based
education services
(agree)
11. Qualitative Results
Evident themes included:
• The rise (rebirth?) of
cognitive learning theory
• A discord in the
application of
educational terms and
vocabulary
• MOOC = Online Learning
(in the mainstream)
• Economics are at
forefront of MOOC
debate
Blah blah blah tenured
humanities professor
sanctimony. Explain to me how
you occupy the moral high
ground when your students
graduate $30000 in debt and
have no marketable skills.
MOOCs reflect changes in
education. In themselves, they
are not "disruptive' (what a
terrible word - it needs to be
taken out back and shot and
never used again by
educators).
12. What Does This Mean?
• Higher Ed solutions to have
economic implications at
forefront.
• Growing discord between
MOOC developers, education
scholars, and practitioners in
regards to theory and pedagogy
(cognitive style vs modern
theory).
• Continued debate of the
purpose of higher education;
increased focus on skills and
competencies due to lack of
voices advocating for the
system.
• Many “Future of Education”
debates driven by non-edu
voices, where terms and
vocabulary are not negotiable
(business, computer science).
I came to MOOCs because I am interested in developing authentic interactive experiences for individuals. Technology is not a replacement but an augment or a supplement. What makes the MOOC challenging as well as opportunistic is the confluence of low-cost production technology, high-end institutional backing, and capital (economic, political and cultural) that has led to what EdTech researcher Alan Levine calls MOOCMania.
In both, we cannot define what a MOOC is, the student population is largely post-graduate, and the future is highly uncertain. Which story do you like better? Which story fits an existing narrative?
Also, I understand this column-based comparison can create an us vs them mentality, and that is the wrong way to approach this. That has led to people within education using terms like cMOOC and xMOOC, where xMOOC is largely a pejorative signifying all things evil. These are two stories of two things, that can work together or work separately or perhaps shouldn’t be working at all.
The argument here, which Shirky really works to make, is that Harvard isn’t going away, but places like Bridgewater Tech, or Arkansas-Little Rock, and we could assume SJSU, could, and no one would miss them if we had a MOOC.
Worth noting that the mainstream media ignores the history of online learning, both as an international practice as well as a local one, and forgets to note that the MOOC has the most in common with the education practices of for-profit colleges such as University of Phoenix.
It makes sense that the argument has been almost entirely driven by model-based voices…if you believe that a model can be tinkered and toyed and has the potential to get it right 100%, then you are going to focus on that. It’s just a model, and you can tinker with it to create what you want. Ed Psych would disagree with that assumption.
Also, you can see the seeds of phenomenon within some research, most ntably the work of Neil Selwyn, who published in IRRODL this month on similar topics
Why Delphi? It gets people together, strips the titles and Dr. Famous off the individuals and lets them chat. Discussion can move rather than be entirely constrained by the prompts. Straight phenomenology would have been a snapshot in time, but this method certainly gives you movement and has the potential to result in consensus and in some cases created vision.
LA just happened immediately, which shocked me. Expertise did not happen immediately, which also shocked me.
If everything is negotiable, then it doesn’t mean a thing.