A New Zealand analysis of MOOCs

Shrivastava, A. and Guiney, P. (2014) Technological Development and Tertiary Education Delivery Models: The Arrival of MOOCs  Wellington NZ: Tertiary Education Commission/Te Amorangi Mātauranga Matua

Why this paper?

Another report for the record on MOOCs, this time from the New Zealand Tertiary Education Commission. The reasoning behind this report:

The paper focuses on MOOCs [rather than doing a general overview of emerging technologies] because of their potential to disrupt tertiary education and the significant opportunities, challenges and risks that they present. MOOCs are also the sole focus of this paper because of their scale and the involvement of the elite United States universities.

What’s in the paper?

The paper provides a fairly standard, balanced analysis of developments in MOOCs, first by describing the different MOOC delivery models, their business models and the drivers behind MOOCs, then by following up with a broad discussion of the possible implications of MOOCs for New Zealand, such as unbundling of services, possible economies of scale, globalization of tertiary (higher) education, adaptability to learners’ and employers’ needs, and the possible impact on New Zealand’s tertiary education workforce.

There is also a good summary of MOOCs being offered by New Zealand institutions.

At the end of the paper some interesting questions for further discussion are raised:

• What will tertiary education delivery look like in 2030?

• What kinds of opportunities and challenges do technological developments, including MOOCs, present to the current policy, regulatory and operational arrangements for tertiary teaching and learning in New Zealand?

• How can New Zealand make the most of the opportunities and manage any associated risks and challenges?

• Do MOOCs undermine the central value of higher education, or are they just a helpful ‘updating’ that reflects its new mass nature?

• Where do MOOCs fit within the New Zealand education and qualifications systems?

• Who values the knowledge and skills gained from a MOOC programme and why?

• Can economies of scale be achieved through MOOCs without loss of quality?

• Can MOOCs lead to better learning outcomes at the same or less cost than traditional classroom-based teaching? If so, how might the Government go about funding institutions that want to deliver MOOCs to a mix of domestic and international learners?

• What kinds of MOOC accreditation models might make sense in the context of New Zealand’s quality-assurance system?

Answers on a postcard, please, to the NZ Tertiary Education Commission.

Comment

Am I alone in wondering what has happened to for-credit online education in government thinking about the future? It is as if 20 years of development of undergraduate and graduate online courses and programs never existed. Surely a critical question for institutions and government planners is:

• what are the relative advantages and disadvantages of MOOCs over other forms of online learning? What can MOOCs learn from our prior experience with credit-based online learning?

There are several reasons for considering this, but one of the most important is the huge investment many institutions, and, indirectly, governments. have already made in credit-based online learning.

By and large, online learning in publicly funded universities, both in New Zealand and in Canada, has been very successful in terms of both increasing access and in student learning. It is also important to be clear about the differences and some of the similarities between credit-based online learning and MOOCs.

Some of the implications laid out in this paper, such as possibilities of consortia and institutional collaboration, apply just as much to credit-based online learning as to MOOCs, and many of the negative criticisms of MOOCs, such as difficulties of assessment and lack of learner support, disappear when applied to credit-based online learning.

Please, policy-makers, realise that MOOCs are not your only option for innovation through online learning. There are more established and well tested solutions already available.