Thursday, July 3, 2014

Are MOOC Primarily a Source of Cheap Post-graduate Professional Development Education?

A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education reported research information on students in MOOC. Among other things ... it was revealed that the majority of students are males; the majority already have college degrees; and the majority live outside of North America. Apparently, for many of the students MOOC serve as an inexpensive way to get post-graduate professional development education. If so, then the MOOC are doing a great service to these students. The professional development-based demand for MOOC could help assure that MOOC stay available to regular undergraduates ... those who do not have an existing degree.

Link to Georgetown University Online Master of Science in Finance

I recently added a link to the online Master of Science in Finance from Georgetown University. Click here to see the link as it is precented on my website

Can Consortiums Help Universities Avoid Price Gouging and Excessive Costs as Educational Technology Advances?

As the evolution of educational technology proceeds, universities will have to anticipate the implications on costs and competition. For example, consider this story in the Chronicle of Higher Education on alleged price gouging on electronic textbooks.

In my opinion there is a tendency in modern technology marketplaces for users to seek "the standard", thereby facilitating greater standardization but also enabling the owner of the new standard to collect monopolistic revenue. I think that kind of phenomenon accounts in part for how the price gouging can take place.

The Chronicle has also recently reported that three leading universities are forming an online course technology consortium, and that could help them avoid being caught up in monopolistic technology binds. That story is at http://chronicle.com/article/Universities-in-Consortium/139919/ . Perhaps by banding together the universities can avoid being hammered by price-gouging and other nonproductive cost increases.

(If you need info about specific online graduate degree programs I hope you will consider using my website at> http://OnlineGraduateSchool.tripod.com/All.htm . )