Under the FAQ for MITx: If credentials are awarded, will they be awarded by MIT? As online learning and assessment evolve and improve, online learners who demo

Under the FAQ for MITx: If credentials are awarded, will they be awarded by MIT? As online learning and assessment evolve and improve, online learners who demonstrate mastery of subjects could earn a certificate of completion, but any such credential would not be issued under the name MIT. Rather, MIT plans to create a not-for-profit body within the Institute that will offer certification for online learners of MIT coursework. That body will carry a distinct name to avoid confusion. The true paradigm shift in education will happen when a student takes an "independent certification exam" related to a specific subject and is recognized as proficient regardless of how it was learned. MITx is taking one more step in this direction. The CollegeBoard's Advanced Placement Program does this now. High school students are allowed to take an AP exam whether they have taken an AP course or not. Their score on the exam (1 - 5) is a "recommendation" value that colleges agree to use to grant course credit. It costs AP students $80 to take an exam. What would happen if MIT adopted this approach and charged $99 to "take the final?" Or consider the Machine Learning course at Stanford with 100,000 registrants. Were 1/3 of them to pay $99 to take the final, the benefit to Stanford would be north of $3.2M dollars! One course. They posted 20 new courses in November alone. Compare that to what universities make by offering a residential class and the model gets clearer.