I was at the edX Global Forum last week. This is a meeting attended by faculty and staff from edX member institutions. This was my second one and the number of attendees and the diversity of institutions they represent have grown tremendously. It was great to meet several new people, including several from edX with whom I have only had phone contact. Because of our early start and the fact that we have completed four courses through WellesleyX, many attendees were eager to talk to me about our experiences.

Of all the talks and sessions I attended, the best was a student panel. Nine students from MIT, BU and Wellesley (may be Harvard also) who have taken “blended” classes discussed their experiences. Wellesley student Sharvari Johari is seated fourth from the left in the picture. She did a terrific job as a panelist. In almost all the courses these students took, their faculty taught a face to face class and was either teaching the same course at the same time on edX or had used an archived edX course that the faculty member had taught before. It was refreshing to hear directly from them for a variety of reasons, primarily because they are not afraid to express their opinions.

They liked the experience overall

All the students liked several aspects of the blended experience. The most liked aspects of the blended experience was the availability of the materials outside the classroom and the “stress free” assessment. Seven of the nine students are STEM majors and the courses that they took had assessments that are multiple choice questions which allowed multiple tries and provided a detailed answers that they could look up after completing the assessment. One of them mentioned how the stress of having to get the correct answer in a given period of time is a bit too much and many a times one is penalized for making silly numerical mistakes. Whereas in this medium, the focus is on learning. If you made a mistake, the explanation provided helps guide you to do it right the next time around.

Its free! (Well, it is really not)

Several students loved the fact that this was an excellent free resource for them. One of the students pointed out how the cost of every minute in the face to face class is about $2 whereas the MOOC is free. The implication is that one is under a lot of pressure to spend the time efficiently in a face to face class at the time it is delivered vs a MOOC, where they had an opportunity to learn at their pace and because it is perceived to be free, there is less pressure. One remarked how MOOCs are like free textbooks. “Do you know how much I paid for my Chemistry textbook? $115”. In reality, the MOOCs are not free and they cost significant amount of money. However, the cost per student will be significantly less than a face to face class and also the same MOOC can be rerun, with every rerun costing significantly less.

STEM vs Humanities

Some of the experiences of STEM majors were different from the Humanities students, which is not surprising. For example, the humanities students loved the way their faculty brought in other experts in the areas to “virtually” participate in the MOOCs, either through specific lectures that the others delivered or through interviews. The STEM students would prefer to see just their own professors teaching the whole MOOC, so that there is no disruption in the way the course is taught and they needed to develop an understanding of the style of the faculty member. The humanities students clearly appreciated the diverse opinions expressed by participants in the discussion forum. As one of them pointed out, hearing about the “communist manifesto” from the faculty and discussing it with the small class is great, but when you have people who lived under the communist rule participating in the same discussion brings in a whole new dimension to the discussion, better understanding and appreciation of the topics.

Learning Style Accommodation

This came up repeatedly. I already mentioned how the assessment in MOOCs provide a great opportunity for learning and understanding the concepts. One student said how she is a visual learner and the ability to watch the videos greatly enhances her ability to understand and learn at a pace that is suitable to her. In this context, the students talked about how the edX style of reasonable length videos followed by quick assessments are better than lengthier videos. To quote a student “a 25 minute video is an event!”, whereas shorter videos are easy to watch and understand.

Conclusions

Based on the answers to questions etc, I think it is fair to say that these students felt that a degree consisting of only the MOOC courses is not something that they would go for. Of course, these are bright and highly motivated students enrolled in elite institutions, where, admittedly, the College experience that they come for goes far beyond just taking classes. However, it was refreshing to hear that these same students accepted that they all learn differently and blended classes bring a lot to the table in terms of helping the students learn better and differently. It was also clear that students in this age group are very goal oriented. Given the time they have, they are so focussed on taking courses that matter to them now. In other words, they are not exploring other MOOCs deeply because they just don’t seem to have the time. However, if a MOOC can benefit them with a course they are currently taking, it appears that they are willing to use it to help them. As one of them said, they may not all be engaged in the MOOCs fully, from start to finish, taking all the assessments etc, but still using different aspects or parts of a MOOC. This explains why MOOCs have different levels of engagements and a rather small percentage of completions. This will also explain the demography of those who complete (in some sense those who have the luxury of time and the eagerness to learn).

I have just covered some of the highlights. I wish edX shares the video of the entire session for others to see. Based on other futuristic presentations, MOOCs will continue to be a force 10 years from now. The takeaway from all of this (yet again) is that MOOCs, like every other disruption, is not an universal answer. It is clear that students who are in institutions like ours will benefit significantly from blending the best practices learned from MOOCs. While at it, why not make the MOOCs available more widely and test the waters as to how it benefits others all around the world and also see how this changes the higher ed landscape.

I am glad that we are in it, learning from it and in some ways, helping shape its future.