LinkedIn moves to legitimize Web classes by Coursera, Udacity, others

By Lauren Hepler. If an online course doesn't get you college credit, why watch video lectures and complete Web assignments? 
Perhaps showing off to potential employers could create that incentive. A new partnership between LinkedIn and some of the most-hyped companies in education technology suggests that providers of Massive Open Online Courses, aka MOOCs, are seeking to establish online courses as valid professional credentials that people can tout on their LinkedIn profiles. LinkedIn announced the new "Direct-to-Profile Certifications" pilot program in a blog post today. Organizations participating in the program include: MOOC startups Coursera, Udacity and Udemy; Harvard and MIT-backed nonprofit MOOC provider edX; publishing giant Pearson; e-learning companies Lynda.com and Skillsoft. More...