The Rising Power of MOOCs: Now, Everyone Can Learn at Harvard

http://www.top10onlinecolleges.org/mooc/

Source: Top10OnlineColleges.org

The Rising Power of MOOCs: Now, everyone can learn at Harvard (or Yale, or…)

3 years ago, MOOCs were an idea. Now….
5 million: number of students signed on to MOOCs, around the world
33,000: the average number of students that sign up for a MOOC

The Dream: MOOCs Can:
• Offer Ivy League Courses at non-Ivy League prices (free), thus….
• Lifting people out of poverty
• Unlock billions of brains to solve the world’s biggest problems

And yet
1 in 4: Americans don’t even know what a MOOC is.
They are: Massive Open Online Courses.

Who Takes MOOCs:

• 37% have a B.S. degree
• 28% have a Master’s degree or profession
• 27% high school

Majority of those taking MOOCs tend to be young, male and employed, from highly developed countries.
• Over 40% of students are under 30 years old
• Less than 10% over 60
• 88 % of MOOC students are male
• 62 % are employed
• 13% are unemployed…or retired

Comparison of geographic location of students, by self identification and IP address
• U.S. 34% of MOOC students
• India: 7.28 %
• Brazil: 4.37 %
• Great Britain: 3.89%
• Canada: 3.4%
• Spain: 2.7 %
• Russia: 2.5%
• China: 2%
• Australia: 2%
• Germany: 1.7%

Employment:
• Student: 17.4%
• Part time employed: 6.9%
• Full time employed: 50%
• Self employed: 12.4%
• Unemployed: 6.6%
• Retired: 6.8%

Why do students Participate in MOOCs?
• Gain knowledge to get degree: 13.2%
• Gain specific skills to do job better: 43.9%
• Gain specific skills to get a new job: 17%
• Curiosity: 50%
[Those surveyed could pick more than one answer]

Requirements for successful online learning:
• Quality of material covered in the course
• Engagement of the teacher
• Interaction among students

Accredited Online (only) Schools offer MOOCs

edX: Courses from:
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Harvard
• University of California Berkeley

Coursera: Courses from:
• California Institute of Technology,
• University of Washington,
• Stanford University,
• Princeton University,
• Duke University
• John Hopkins University, and many others.

Udacity: Partner companies include:
• Google
• Facebook
• Bank of America

Udemy Free courses from:
• Dartmouth,
• the University of Virginia
• Northwestern and others….

iTunes Free Courses
• Apple’s free app. Right in the app, they can play video or audio lectures. Read books and view presentations.

Top Universities offer MOOCs:

• Stanford Free Courses - from Quantum Mechanics to The Future of the Internet.
• Stanford’s Introduction to Artificial Intelligence: 160,000 students from 190 countries signed up to Stanford’s Introduction to AI” course, with 23,000 reportedly completing.
• UC Berkeley Free Courses. Check out Berkeley Webcasts and Berkeley RSS feeds.
• MIT Free Courses: MIT’s RSS MOOC feed, and MIT’s Open Courseware.
• Duke Free Courses – Duke offers a variety of courses on ITunesU.
• Harvard Free Courses: Get a free Harvard education. No application required.
• UCLA Free Courses
• Yale Free Courses – Check out Open Yale
• Carnegie Mellon Free Courses – “No instructors, no credits, no charge”

Pros and Cons of MOOCs:

Pros: By design, MOOCs are….
Incredibly flexible
Diverse in their range of subjects
Open to anyone
Free.

And Downs:
No credit for completion
Lack of hands on learning
100,000 or more to 1, student to teacher ratio
High dropout rates of up to 90%

Sources:
http://poetsandquants.com/2013/12/17/the-mooc-revolution-the-best-mba-electives-for-free/
http://classroom-aid.com/2013/08/16/10159/
http://www.bdpa-detroit.org/portal/index.php/comittees/high-school-computer-competition-hscc/29-education/57-moocs-top-10-sites-for-free-education-with-elite-universities.html
Paper: The MOOC Phenomenon: Who Takes Massive Open Online Courses, and Why? By G. Christensen, A. Steinmetz, B. Alcorn, D. Woods, A Bennett, and E.J. Emanel. (U. of Pennsylvania)
http://distancelearn.about.com/od/isitforyou/tp/Top-Massively-Open-Online-Courses-Moocs.htm
http://www.technapex.com/2012/11/weighing-the-pros-and-cons-of-massive-open-online-courses-moocs/

Stephen

The Future of Libraries: Do We Have Five Years to Live?

http://www.thefutureoflibraries.org/

Thursday and Friday, May 1-2, 2014, Toronto

A two-day institute for Library CEOs and  University/College chiefs and their senior staff, to get beyond the nostalgia, platitudes and cliches and explore the significant challenges facing library leaders. A unique program planned by and for public library CEOs/Directors and University Librarians and their senior staff.

In a world filled with turbulent change, are libraries keeping pace?  Are they innovating and engaging their communities with all the opportunities available?  Are they choosing the right focus and priorities?  Join us for spirited discussions and interactive problem-solving!

Confirmed speakers include:

• Greg Buss, Chief Librarian, Richmond Public Library
• Steven Coffman, Vice-President, LSSI
• Jane Dysart, Partner, Dysart and Jones
  
• Ken Haycock, Senior Partner, Ken Haycock & Associates, Inc.
  
• Meg Backus, Chief Maker, Chattanooga Public Library
• Rebecca Jones, Partner, Dysart and Jones
• Mary-Ann Mavrinac, Vice-Provost, University of Rochester
• Joe Matthews, President, JRM Consulting, and Author: Reflecting on the Future of Academic and Public Libraries 2013
• Gary Price, Co-editor, INFODocket and FullTextReports.com
• Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project
  
• Ken Roberts, former CEO, Hamilton Public Library, and  member of the Royal Society of Canada expert panel on the future of libraries
• Andrew Wells, University Librarian, University of New South Wales
  
• Daphne Wood, Director, Planning and Development, Vancouver Public Library

Location
The Fairmont Royal York
100 Front Street West
Toronto, Ontario
Canada  M5J 1E3
Tel: +1-416-860-5015
Fax: +1-416-368-8148
www.fairmont.com

OLA and FOPL Members are eligible for a preferred rate for this symposium in Toronto.  This event was very successful in Vancouver and is being done again in our region.

Stephen

Top Resources for Essay Writers

https://plus.google.com/u/1/103650930190663702488/posts

All stages of essay writing can be tricky, from the choice of a proper topic to the organization of the paper to the actual writing. Moreover, you also have to edit and proofread the paper in order to make sure it’s clean of all spelling errors and logical gaps. The content has to be free of plagiarism, and all sources you have used need to be properly referenced. When you have all those rules in mind, essay writing can become really confusing.

However, there are online resources that can help you through every stage of the process, and we will list some of the most useful ones in the continuation.

Help with your topic and thesis

The first stage of the process can often be the most troublesome one. However, there are online tools that offer great topic ideas, which you can later turn into thesis statements with the help of thesis generators.

1. Topic Generator by Custom Writing will allow you to search for a catchy topic for your paper by selecting the type of assignment and its subject. The generator will come up with three topic suggestions for your essay.

2. Thesis Generator 1.0 is a great tool for drafting clear thesis statements for argumentative and persuasive essays. In order to get a suggestion for your thesis statement, you will need to enter the topic and main argument of your paper, along with two reasons that support the main argument.

3. Thesis Statement Creator is also requires you to enter all components of the thesis statement, after which you will get a suggestion for a thesis statement that you can directly use into your essay.

4. How to write a college application essay – 10 practical ninja tips by Ninja Essays. This simple guide offers practical tips for writing impressive application essays. Paying attention to this advice will relieve you from the stress of college applications.

Understand the types of essays

All types of essays have different requirements, so you need guides that will help you understand their principles.

1. Roane State Online Writing Lab provides clear information about various types of essays, as well as samples that will help you get an impression of how great academic writing is done.

3. Writing Detective provides a useful online lesson that will teach you how compare/contrast essays are written, after which you can take a quiz to test your abilities.

The organization of your paper

Proper essay organization isn’t difficult to achieve, but many students struggle with it. These are the tools that will improve the structure of your papers:

1. Writinghouse is citation generator that will create the needed bibliography entries and in-text citations in your paper.

2. Essay Map by ReadWriteThink will help you organize your paper through an interactive guide.

2. From outline… to essay by iCivics is a lesson with side-by-side examples of appropriate organization.

3. Essay Organizer is an app for smartphones, which you can use to go through the detailed steps of essay writing and take notes at any time.

Great essays don’t come without proper grammar and syntax!

These tools will help you make sure your paper is error-free:

1. PaperRater will not only provide you with suggestions on how you can improve your paper in terms of style and vocabulary, but will also check it for plagiarism.

2. Purdue OWL offers any information about essays you could possibly need. It will teach you about proper grammar and syntax, as well as the general requirements for different types of essays.

3. UNLV Writing Center provides practical tips on essay writing that will teach you how to avoid the most common mistakes.

Check the uniqueness of your paper!

Professors don’t forgive plagiarism issues, so you better use these tools to make sure your paper is unique before you submit it:

1. PlagTracker is a simple, but very effective tool that provides links to articles and webpages of duplicate content.

2. Viper is another effective plagiarism checker, but this one requires a download.

Conclusion

Education is an aspect of life that has been particularly transformed due to the remarkable digital changes. Now that you have practical tools within reach, essay writing doesn’t have to be a struggle. Online tools will make this activity less stressful and less time-consuming!

Stephen