What is the future of our education system?

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All of us, at some point have heard of MOOC, pronounced mook, or better yet, participated in MOOCs. For the less fortunate, here is what it is. MOOC – Massive open online course. Free/cheap/affordable courses offered online by prestigious Universities, that also often provide a platform to facilitate collaboration between peers and teachers. In short, it is an emulation of an actual classroom experience.

Robert Zemsky, an education person ( If you must know,  is a Professor of Education, the Chair of the Learning Alliance for Higher Education, and the founding director of the Institute for Research on Higher Education at the University of Pennsylvania) said “They came; they conquered very little; and now they face substantially diminished prospects.” but I beg to differ. They are here to stay and arguably, they are the future of the present education system. They are becoming more and more popular by the day. In my opinion, here is why.

  • Ease of access. Just one click away.
  •  Opportunity to meet and collaborate with people from different walks of life, from all around the globe. Not an exaggeration, I did have a study group meeting with people from more than one continent, of various professions, belonging to different age group, discussing about logical fallacies and math problems at 4 AM in the morning, I’m not kidding. So much fun!
  • Ability to choose subjects of various disciplines at the same time. In the real world, I can’t choose art history and investment banking in the same school can I?
  • Free or affordable and totally useful and relevant courses that can potentially get you a job.
  • Association with prestigious institutions. Even Ivy league schools like Harvard and Stanford offer free online courses
  • Valid certifications that enhance your resume.
  • Flexible schedules which helps you attend the class or rather watch the lecture videos online anytime anywhere, even in the bathroom stall!
  • Chance to network with the best

As the world gets smaller, people get closer, cultures merge and economic chasm disappears (still a long way to go), physical boundaries disappear too. When there is so much more in the virtual world, why would anyone restrict themselves to physical limitations.  Location independent jobs, virtual communities, social media, online collaboration is on the rise. When the whole physical world is going virtual so will the existing education system. Hope at least in the future, we won’t be dictated by the authorities about what we learn, succumb to the conventional education system aimed to breed conformity and kill creativity and originality.

To make this post a tad bit useful to you here is an amazing link to look at the top 50 online course websites which offers plethora of courses at your disposal. http://www.onlinecoursereport.com/the-50-best-online-course-providers-of-2015/

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4 thoughts on “What is the future of our education system?

  1. e.karastoyanov says:

    MOOC has a lot of benefits, however unless this education will be recognised by the government of at least by the major players/headhunters on the market, the monetisation of this industry will be quite hard.

  2. bergman.wendy says:

    I think this could be a good addition to University studies, for example elective courses. It would really help people that are interested in “less popular subjects”. However, I don’t see it substituting overall “at school” education, at least I hope it won’t. Humans are highly social creatures and going to school, meeting people are experiences that are valuable in life.It would be a great value people would miss out on.

  3. p.bedynska says:

    I believe it is great opportunity to benefit from knowledge passed by the best universities, so it is not retained only in one place, but it spreads. I agree with Wendy it should not substitute our whole education system, as social experience is really important. However, I feel online education will in some part replace today’s education system. To what extend? A lot of scenarios in my head 😉 Thanks Ankitha for last link – it’s really useful.

  4. m_zakrzewski says:

    I would like to stress that the idea of professionally conducted, competently delivered – massive open – online courses has a great potential. In my opinion, the most crucial factor here is the possibilty to obtain binding as well as credible certificates, even from the most repsected, recognizable universities (moreover, while not thinking about visiting the university’s edifice). It is also necessary to remember about the benefit that concerns meeting and collaborating with people from diversed cultures, as well as learning from people who have diversfied experineces. What can also have a significant impact on the development of the online courses is the advantage of flexible schedule, what may help the vast majority of participants in performing their professional duties.

    I would also like to emphasize that during one of our lectures, it was presented that the people who decided to become distance learning students of one of the famous universities feel greater bond with the institution than the “normal approach” graduates.

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