I just enrolled for a course with the University of Virginia. Sounds cool? But here's the "cooler" part... for company, I will have over 83,000 classmates from across the globe. Yes, you read that right... over EIGHTY THREE THOUSAND!!!
That's the power of a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course).
A recent development in the distance learning space, MOOCs are increasingly being touted as the future of higher education. Here are the two key reasons that make me too believe in this prediction:
1. MOOCs are delivered online through the web medium and therefore the number of participants for a MOOC is not limited by the size of a brick-and-mortar classroom. No wonder the University could sign up 83,000+ students for a single course. And for us participants, we do not have to travel to campus to undergo the program.
2. Now here's the killer blow. MOOCs are FREE!!! Though participation and assessement methodologies for a MOOC may be similar to that of a regular College/University course, MOOC participants are not required to be registered students of the College/University, and are therefore not required to pay any fee.
Unbelievable? Believe it!
Top-notch Universities like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford have already jumped on to the MOOC bandwagon. So when are you getting back to University? :)
