Analyzing MOOCs – A SWOT Analysis

By Andrew Spinner. One of my many roles at @Understoodit includes conducting onging analysis and research of education technology tools and trends.  One of the most interesting and heavily discussed areas relates to what is known as Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOC for short.  MOOCs are like your typical university style class – a professor, students, homework, and exams.  However, these courses are open to anyone, anywhere in the world, and the majority of them are completely FREE.
Your immediate reaction might be that these courses might not be reputable or have the same quality instruction compared to a school you attended, but this couldn’t be further from the case.  Organizations offering MOOCs have agreements with extremely reputable schools and professors.  For example, you can attend a course on Artificial Intelligence for Robotics at Stanford University.  Self-driving cars anyone?  As you can see, this isn’t your typical Intro to Geography (although I’m sure that’s offered somewhere too).  Courses can range from basics to the most advance courses around…free. There are a growing number of MOOC platforms where you can sign up and attend the courses.  Some of the most reputable platforms include:  Udacity, Coursera, and EdX. Read more...