MOOC's have been all over higher education news for awhile now, generating interest from faculty and stressed out state governors. There has been much hyperbole and so far, this contemporary grump doesn't have the stomach for it. Shucks, already I can't explain how I know what I know some of the time and while I don't remember taking a MOOC, Amazon or Google probably does. However, I did get some information recently that has been gnawing at my brain for awhile and I may have to change my diet, buy a juicer, reboot, and swallow.
Last month, some very bright colleagues (much younger colleagues) had a chance to hear one of the co-founders of Coursera, a Stanford academic, speculate about the impact of MOOC's and the whole spectrum of online learning. Coursera is one of the mega MOOC providers getting much attention these days.
What interested them most about this view of the MOOC phenomenon wasn't the learner experience, it was the fact that the systems supporting these courses will quickly acquire consistent, massive, researchable data on learner behavior, learning styles, outcomes and assessments and teacher evaluation. It will have the potential to be both aggregated and personal.
Instead of 500 students in a research project on 3rd grade reading skills, it becomes very possible to research the outcomes for 2,000,000 students following 3 distinct pedagogies. To be crass, what Amazon does to your buying habits, Coursera can do to your learning activities.
There's already talk in some states of creating electronic student records from 1st grade to a bachelor's degree and combining an "electronic learner record" with MOOC's really big data is a daunting prospect. The potential is equal to the electronic medical record, surely.
Has SkyNet become self-aware and started to build Terminators? Not if the lastest Schwazenegger movie is any indication.
Are we at a significant point in the evolution of education from a social science to a hard science?
Maybe.
Addison Steele
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