6 ms·

While what the OP mentioned is True , what i really think is that the real value of MOOCs is not in the certificate (it not that much important especially from

While what the OP mentioned is True , what i really think is that the real value of MOOCs is not in the certificate (it not that much important especially from MOOC providers) but the opportunity that it creates for people to gain knowledge , and personally speaking , MOOCs have changed my life , i live in 3rd world country where the quality of education is worse than you can imagine, but thanks to Coursera, Edx and Udacity , i managed to learn so many things , so what we should focus on , is that the opportunity it provides for people around the world to learn new things and change their lives in one way or another is the true factor that should be considered in the MOOC revolution .

ChuckMcM 11y ago
This is a really great observation. For many people they have been raised that it doesn't count unless you get the certificate. That has elements of truth to it in the job market, you need an independent third party to say that you have learned the material. However, for just as many people it has really about accelerating their ability to be effective by rapidly absorbing the knowledge and learning of people that have come before, which then allows them to push forward with that learning already in place. And that does change lives, and villages.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- verbin217 11y ago
  IMHO this is what distinguishes exceptional software engineers. They're not just trying to get a job, do well in their classes or otherwise satisfy external ideals. They just want to experience their own excellence as an end in itself. In the job market pretension is extremely effective. You can likely make a better living by optimizing appearances and neglecting actuality. If you're not able to evaluate a person's abilities you desperately need an independent third party. Notably, this doesn't imply that it's an effective pedagogical practice. A person simply intent on becoming more than yesterday has no one to fool. Their capacity for self-evaluation is preserved. They can enter into an autodidactic loop that isn't utterly bound on I/O. I suspect this is much more effective than traditional education, albeit much less convergent and measurable.
- brudgers 11y ago
  Coursera has increasingly pushed non-participation in a course's verified certificate process as a signifier of lower status as a student. Originally, certificates were a mark of academic performance and the business model was more akin to a dual license open-source project where the non-paying community was just the non-paying community; the verified certificate was solely a value added proposition based on the value of verification. The change has been that certificates have shifted toward a mark of consumer status. There has been a trend toward attaching stigma to taking the courses for free. Removing the certificates from free tracks is an obvious part of it.
  - rhizome 11y ago
    Private Universities and diploma mills have attractive business models for some organizations and operators.
Sven7 11y ago
How did learning new things change your life?
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- icebraining 11y ago
  What's the point of asking, if learning the answer won't change yours? :)
- jotm 11y ago
  By acquiring knowledge and skills that can be used to get a job or at least an internship, start a business and expand your expertise beyond what is possible locally. Just a guess.
- jzsprague 11y ago
  is this a serious question?
  - Sven7 11y ago
    Yes. He says it changed his life. I just wanted to know how.
- kiloreux 11y ago
  Although that it's not important how MOOCs changed my life , but i will tell you how , i was raised in a poor family (like really poor) , i got my first computer when i was 16 years old , and saw the internet for the first time when i was 18 years old , i always had hunger for knowledge and learning new things but never could go further than reading some old books from the high school library , when i first got the internet access it was just the beginning of the MOOCs and i was amazed by the opportunity it gives , given that i always loved computers and the "magic" behind it , i started my first MOOC at that time which was CS50 by David Malan in HarvardX (Edx) , and never stopped MOOCing from the the three platforms , now thanks to MOOCs and of course practicing on my free time i am a 20 years old full stack developer, i am still a junior developer ,but i gained enough money to change the situation of my family from worse to the better, while most of my peers still studying in our system (I am studying too and graduating this year from electrical engineering) , the real difference is between our education system and the MOOCs , i have to emphasize that there is no way to compare the quality , and of course the price (which is free) , i really encourage everyone to never stop learning from MOOCs because knowledge and new skills can create a completely change a life .
andyidsinga 11y ago
this! Once someone learns something -- they can put it into practice (or not if they were just learning for fun). It makes sense that in the future, rather than a certificate, examples of putting learning into practice would become more important. It is certainly easy to show proof of practice already with smartphones, cheaper computers and great publishing tools. portfolio trumps certificate :)
- nraynaud 11y ago
  In some fields you just can't experiment at home (often because the capital expenditure is too high), think some chemistry, some rocket design, some metallurgy etc. You need to get a job to build your portfolio, and you need a piece of paper to get the first job.
  - wolfgke 11y ago
    In chemistry rather for legal reasons.
  - andyidsinga 11y ago
    This is true, but only to the extent that we're looking at the current state of moocs - which don't offer access to those kinds of equipment. When we start seeing that happen, we're back to the focus on ability to show work, experiments behind them, and the ability to describe the work in great detail to a potential employer in order to get the job. also , for new college grad jobs in chemistry, rocket design, metalurgy -- these can most certainly be done at home, or civilian grade facilities. See also Amateur Rocket Society and the kinds of things they're up to http://www.space-rockets.com/arsa.html http://www.space-rockets.com/arsa.html
    - rpcope1 11y ago
      I have some very strong doubts that a MOOC will ever be able to offer the laboratory experience that you'd get at a traditional university (I'm not talking entry level). To do a lot of the EE work I've done in the past, you really need to know what you're doing, and a lot of the equipment, like a good vector network analyzer, is both incredibly cost prohibitive (new ones can reach a quarter of a million), and really take some expert knowledge to operate effectively (i.e. someone should be there with you to ensure the you don't break the machine). MOOCs may be good for CS, and they may be good for teaching entry level knowledge, because of the way the accumulation of very expensive equipment and experience/intelligence surrounding the field, at least for the immediate engineering fields I've been exposed to. I think it's still far better (if not the only decent way) to have a faculty mentor present and have a lot more close cooperation (as atleast I did when I was in university) when learning a lot of the specialist EE knowledge I got back when I was in school. I doubt you'll ever see MOOCs progress much in this regard, nor would I want to hire an engineer who did not have some level of hands on design and lab experience described above. Also to deflect a potential counterpoint: most of the very expensive equipment will probably never be any cheaper because it isn't built in enough quantities, and for things like good RF equipment, everything needs to be carefully spec'd and machined, and the manufacturing is very time and resource intensive (you're getting your money's worth on a good spectrum analyzer or network analyzer, typically).
carc 11y ago
Completely agree. I switched out of the finance/accounting industry to be a software developer because I fell in love with coding. I would not have been able to learn the skills to make that switch (while already working full time) without MOOCs and other awesome online resources to guide me along the way. MOOCs help us reach the goal that any motivated, bright individual can learn the skills necessary to reach their potential. Obviously we're still far away from that - but free online courses are certainly one step in the right direction.

ChuckMcM 11y ago

This is a really great observation. For many people they have been raised that it doesn't count unless you get the certificate. That has elements of truth to it in the job market, you need an independent third party to say that you have learned the material. However, for just as many people it has really about accelerating their ability to be effective by rapidly absorbing the knowledge and learning of people that have come before, which then allows them to push forward with that learning already in place. And that does change lives, and villages.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
verbin217 11y ago
IMHO this is what distinguishes exceptional software engineers. They're not just trying to get a job, do well in their classes or otherwise satisfy external ideals. They just want to experience their own excellence as an end in itself. In the job market pretension is extremely effective. You can likely make a better living by optimizing appearances and neglecting actuality. If you're not able to evaluate a person's abilities you desperately need an independent third party. Notably, this doesn't imply that it's an effective pedagogical practice. A person simply intent on becoming more than yesterday has no one to fool. Their capacity for self-evaluation is preserved. They can enter into an autodidactic loop that isn't utterly bound on I/O. I suspect this is much more effective than traditional education, albeit much less convergent and measurable.
brudgers 11y ago
Coursera has increasingly pushed non-participation in a course's verified certificate process as a signifier of lower status as a student. Originally, certificates were a mark of academic performance and the business model was more akin to a dual license open-source project where the non-paying community was just the non-paying community; the verified certificate was solely a value added proposition based on the value of verification. The change has been that certificates have shifted toward a mark of consumer status. There has been a trend toward attaching stigma to taking the courses for free. Removing the certificates from free tracks is an obvious part of it.
- rhizome 11y ago
  Private Universities and diploma mills have attractive business models for some organizations and operators.

Sven7 11y ago

How did learning new things change your life?

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
icebraining 11y ago
What's the point of asking, if learning the answer won't change yours? :)
jotm 11y ago
By acquiring knowledge and skills that can be used to get a job or at least an internship, start a business and expand your expertise beyond what is possible locally. Just a guess.
jzsprague 11y ago
is this a serious question?
- Sven7 11y ago
  Yes. He says it changed his life. I just wanted to know how.
kiloreux 11y ago
Although that it's not important how MOOCs changed my life , but i will tell you how , i was raised in a poor family (like really poor) , i got my first computer when i was 16 years old , and saw the internet for the first time when i was 18 years old , i always had hunger for knowledge and learning new things but never could go further than reading some old books from the high school library , when i first got the internet access it was just the beginning of the MOOCs and i was amazed by the opportunity it gives , given that i always loved computers and the "magic" behind it , i started my first MOOC at that time which was CS50 by David Malan in HarvardX (Edx) , and never stopped MOOCing from the the three platforms , now thanks to MOOCs and of course practicing on my free time i am a 20 years old full stack developer, i am still a junior developer ,but i gained enough money to change the situation of my family from worse to the better, while most of my peers still studying in our system (I am studying too and graduating this year from electrical engineering) , the real difference is between our education system and the MOOCs , i have to emphasize that there is no way to compare the quality , and of course the price (which is free) , i really encourage everyone to never stop learning from MOOCs because knowledge and new skills can create a completely change a life .

andyidsinga 11y ago

this! Once someone learns something -- they can put it into practice (or not if they were just learning for fun). It makes sense that in the future, rather than a certificate, examples of putting learning into practice would become more important. It is certainly easy to show proof of practice already with smartphones, cheaper computers and great publishing tools. portfolio trumps certificate :)

nraynaud 11y ago
In some fields you just can't experiment at home (often because the capital expenditure is too high), think some chemistry, some rocket design, some metallurgy etc. You need to get a job to build your portfolio, and you need a piece of paper to get the first job.
- wolfgke 11y ago
  In chemistry rather for legal reasons.
- andyidsinga 11y ago
  This is true, but only to the extent that we're looking at the current state of moocs - which don't offer access to those kinds of equipment. When we start seeing that happen, we're back to the focus on ability to show work, experiments behind them, and the ability to describe the work in great detail to a potential employer in order to get the job. also , for new college grad jobs in chemistry, rocket design, metalurgy -- these can most certainly be done at home, or civilian grade facilities. See also Amateur Rocket Society and the kinds of things they're up to http://www.space-rockets.com/arsa.html http://www.space-rockets.com/arsa.html
  - rpcope1 11y ago
    I have some very strong doubts that a MOOC will ever be able to offer the laboratory experience that you'd get at a traditional university (I'm not talking entry level). To do a lot of the EE work I've done in the past, you really need to know what you're doing, and a lot of the equipment, like a good vector network analyzer, is both incredibly cost prohibitive (new ones can reach a quarter of a million), and really take some expert knowledge to operate effectively (i.e. someone should be there with you to ensure the you don't break the machine). MOOCs may be good for CS, and they may be good for teaching entry level knowledge, because of the way the accumulation of very expensive equipment and experience/intelligence surrounding the field, at least for the immediate engineering fields I've been exposed to. I think it's still far better (if not the only decent way) to have a faculty mentor present and have a lot more close cooperation (as atleast I did when I was in university) when learning a lot of the specialist EE knowledge I got back when I was in school. I doubt you'll ever see MOOCs progress much in this regard, nor would I want to hire an engineer who did not have some level of hands on design and lab experience described above. Also to deflect a potential counterpoint: most of the very expensive equipment will probably never be any cheaper because it isn't built in enough quantities, and for things like good RF equipment, everything needs to be carefully spec'd and machined, and the manufacturing is very time and resource intensive (you're getting your money's worth on a good spectrum analyzer or network analyzer, typically).

carc 11y ago

Completely agree. I switched out of the finance/accounting industry to be a software developer because I fell in love with coding. I would not have been able to learn the skills to make that switch (while already working full time) without MOOCs and other awesome online resources to guide me along the way. MOOCs help us reach the goal that any motivated, bright individual can learn the skills necessary to reach their potential. Obviously we're still far away from that - but free online courses are certainly one step in the right direction.