Finally, a clear statement from the University of Virginia Board of Visitors. Heady stuff.
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UD thanks Daniel.
Finally, a clear statement from the University of Virginia Board of Visitors. Heady stuff.
*****************************
UD thanks Daniel.
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June 20th, 2012 at 12:08PM
Pretty funny!
June 20th, 2012 at 4:16PM
It’s great satire, but the underlying issues are far from funny. The Stanford/Harvard/MIT entry into online courses has trustees, presidents, and provosts at peer institutions scrambling to get on board, and I’m afraid a lot muddled thinking is happening. A new terminology is being propagated, including “flipping the classroom” (the idea that lectures can be taken online and the classroom reserved for discussion). The biggest problem is that they can’t figure out whether the online instruction is for internal or external consumption. We’re talking about schools at which direct personal access to outstanding faculty has been their biggest selling point. The way I’m reading the UVA situation is that the alpha trustees and technology cheerleaders decreed that this is the way of the future and the president wasn’t getting on board the train fast enough. Mind the gap!
June 20th, 2012 at 4:56PM
Polish Peter: Absolutely. MOOCs are very much in flux and have nothing to do with the crappy cynical online course offerings that universities merely looking to save money are adopting. I can see why universities are watching MOOCs at Stanford, etc., with interest, but UVA shows how you can panic and fall into a trap by assuming MOOCs are more than they are.