What are you doing on July 1?
We invite you to join our webinar at 11am CEST on the theme of MOOC accreditation and its relevance to employers.
One of the primary concerns about MOOCs (according to our informal survey) is how to connect accreditation and certification with the needs of employers. This upcoming webinar, organised by the MOOCS for Web Talent Network, will give all interested stakeholders a chance to discuss the latest issues. More...

HarvardX and MITx offered 16 first-year MOOCs on the edX platform in 2012-2013. The learning data from the students enrolled in those courses, numbering over one million, has been de-identified and released for public re-use.
MIT press release. More...

• To which degree are certificates, as they are currently issued by various MOOC providers, such as openHPI, Coursera, edX, etc., accepted by HR managers or employers?
• What would HR managers or employers expect from such a certificate to consider it as a relevant document in a job application?

The Hasso Plattner Institute, an Information Technology university college in Germany, is conducting the survey. The institute has its own respectable offering of MOOCs.
The survey has 9 questions. Do you have a few minutes? Take survey now. More...

The release of the eLearning Africa Report 2014 was announced on May 28 by His Excellency Edward Ssekandi, Vice President of the Republic of Uganda. The report reaffirms the importance of improving ICT in the continent to benefit education. 
The report is a guide to the e-learning initiatives in 55 African countries, including a survey of funding sources and analyses of the agriculture, tourism, and health sectors. It includes contributions from renowned commentators such as Binyavanga Wainaina, Paul Boateng, Bitange Ndemo and Aida Opoku-Mensah. More...

The European Commission has published a new study on the supply and demand of MOOCs related to web skills. It shows that while MOOCs are widely recognized as a valuable learning opportunity, students struggle to find appropriate courses. 
The study is based on the analysis of over 200 MOOC providers and almost 3000 online survey respondents from around the world. The objective of the study was to investigate the supply and demand of MOOCs related to web skills and better understand the potential of MOOCs to develop the skills needed in the current market. The survey sample includes learners, MOOC providers, entrepreneurs, leaders of innovation support programmes, corporate managers, and IT professionals.
Download MOOCs-for-web-skills-survey-report.pdf and PressReleaseSurveyResultsMOOCsfor. More...

Massive Open Online Courses, shortly MOOCs, are a trending phenomenon in online education. Neither distance education nor online courses are new, but especially in the field of technology enhanced learning, MOOCs have been gathering  enormous attention by the public.
Thus, following the main idea of bringing education to a broad range of people, two universities in Graz developed an xMOOC platform for the German speaking area, mostly addressing people in Austria.
By Martin Ebner. Download How-to-MOOC-A-pedagogical-guideline-for-practitioners.pdf. More...

The TPACK (Technology, Pedagogy and Content Knowledge) model presents the three types of knowledge that are necessary to implement a successful technology-based educational activity.
It highlights how the intersections between TPK (Technological Pedagogical Knowledge), PCK (Pedagogical Content Knowledge) and TCK (Technological Content Knowledge) are not a sheer sum up of their components but new types of knowledge. This paper focuses on TPK, the intersection between technology knowledge and pedagogy knowledge – a crucial field of investigation.
Download portal_educational_resources.pdf. More...

The latest ePSI platform monthly topic report examines how open government and open data initiatives could contribute towards opening up education in European countries, especially those aspiring towards EU integration. 
The topic report draws connections between open government, open data, and open education initiatives, highlighting how concerted actions could bear fruit in terms of increased participation, transparency, accountability, and improved teaching practices
Download Open Education - How to Get There Through Open Government & Open Education Data.pdf. More...

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have drastically changed the way we learn as well as how we teach. The main aim of MOOCs is to provide new opportunities to a massive number of learners to attend free online courses from anywhere all over the world.
MOOCs have unique features that make it an effective technology-enhanced learning (TEL) model in higher education and beyond. The number of academic publications around MOOCs has grown rapidly in the last few years.
By Ahmed Mohamed Fahmy Yousef. Download MOOCs - A Review of the State-of-the-Art.pdf. More...

When Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence MOOC made headline news in 2011, one of the early predictions was that quality education at mass scale and at low cost was around the corner. Given our research center’s interest in the productivity of educational interventions, we have been watching for evidence that MOOCs are cost-effective in producing desirable educational outcomes compared to face-to-face experiences or other online interventions.
By Fiona M. Hollands, Ph.D. and Devayani Tirthali, Ed.D. Download MOOCs_Expectations_and_Reality.pdf. More...