MOOC: The Future of Education

This is my first blog post for FairJake; actually, this is my first blog article ever. My name is Francis Knowles and I will be contributing every now and then with technology related posts. I am an Aerospace Engineer by profession and a technology junkie by passion. Recently, with most people I talk to in my age group, I have found that we all have something in common; we are constantly looking for more information, whether it is the newest phone or how to use the latest version of Microsoft. We all are looking to be educated. 

This article is going to focus on education. I went to university, and 4 years later I walked out sleep deprived, with a drained bank account and an Engineering degree. Now 4 years later, I have found myself feeling that I just need to know more…not sure what… just more stuff. However, the thought of going back to school, does not seem realistic as I am advancing in my career and don’t want to get off path. So I was ecstatic when I heard about Coursera!

I was introduced to Coursera, a social entrepreneurship organization which aims at providing free education by partnering with some of the top universities in the world. Coursera is, along with a few others, a hub for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). The name is pretty self-explanatory, but since I am using the term, I’ll go into a bit more detail. MOOCs use technology as a means of providing education to thousands of people who would have otherwise not had the opportunity. Some courses have over 100,000 students enrolled; I am now one of these people. I found the idea of getting free education incredible, and more than anything else I joined Coursera out of curiosity, and then enrolled in 3 courses. The idea is simple; somewhere in the world, a professor posts video lectures on a weekly basis, assigns homework, encourages discussion though online forums and students gain, what they hope, is useful, free knowledge. Like with any other university course, you are expected to submit homework, some of which is actually graded. Grading is done by means of peer reviews, or online quizzes. The courses offered cover any topic you can imagine, from pet care and guitar lessons (where you submit recordings of your work), to genetics and quantum physics. The beauty of these courses is that you can do them on your own time and do as little or as much work as you want. You can choose exactly what you take, and can even pickup and drop courses at will. MOOCs are a new concept but one that is surely here to stay. Who knows, this could be the beginning of a change in the way we learn, and the education system as a whole. If through online education you study the same courses as someone who is enrolled in a conventional university, who is to say that they are more desirable to potential employers. I encourage all of you to explore MOOCs, and keep up to date, because the rest of the world is.