Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education

Massive open online courses (“MOOCs”) provide free access to higher education for anyone with Internet access. MOOCs are considered a means for democratizing education. These courses will hopefully provide an opportunity for individuals to learn from the best educators in the world, as well as help...

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Autores principales:	Tawanna R Dillahunt, Brian Zengguang Wang, Stephanie Teasley
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Athabasca University Press 2014
Materias:	Massive Open Online Courses education online learning affordability income Special aspects of education LC8-6691
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/5a6cb8303ce74bc4819f5ac1fb35bbde
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:5a6cb8303ce74bc4819f5ac1fb35bbde2021-12-02T19:25:21ZDemocratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education10.19173/irrodl.v15i5.18411492-3831https://doaj.org/article/5a6cb8303ce74bc4819f5ac1fb35bbde2014-10-01T00:00:00Zhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/1841https://doaj.org/toc/1492-3831 Massive open online courses (“MOOCs”) provide free access to higher education for anyone with Internet access. MOOCs are considered a means for democratizing education. These courses will hopefully provide an opportunity for individuals to learn from the best educators in the world, as well as help expand their personal networks, and facilitate their career development. However, research thus far shows that the majority of people taking advantage of these courses are already employed, have post-secondary degrees, and have encountered few barriers related to the affordability of higher education. Little is known about MOOC learners with financial constraints and who do not fit the typical profile of MOOC learners. This paper presents the results of the analysis of data from six Coursera courses offered by the University of Michigan from fall 2012 through winter 2013. In this analysis learners who self-identified as being unable to afford to pursue a formal education (the target group) were contrasted to other learners (the comparison group) in terms of demographics, motivations, course enrollment, engagement and performance. Learners in the target group were primarily male and over 25 years old. A statistically significant portion of the target group held less than a 4-year college degree than the comparison group. Target learners were also significantly underrepresented in the enrollment of the courses examined here. Although the comparison group had a significantly higher completion rate overall than the target group, the target group had a statistically significant higher rate of completing courses with certificates of distinction. This article provides a discussion of these results and suggests how MOOCs could be adapted to better address the needs of learners who feel financially unable to pursue a more traditional path to a post-secondary education. Tawanna R DillahuntBrian Zengguang WangStephanie TeasleyAthabasca University PressarticleMassive Open Online Courseseducationonline learningaffordabilityincomeSpecial aspects of educationLC8-6691ENInternational Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, Vol 15, Iss 5 (2014)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Massive Open Online Courses education online learning affordability income Special aspects of education LC8-6691
spellingShingle	Massive Open Online Courses education online learning affordability income Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Tawanna R Dillahunt Brian Zengguang Wang Stephanie Teasley Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
description	Massive open online courses (“MOOCs”) provide free access to higher education for anyone with Internet access. MOOCs are considered a means for democratizing education. These courses will hopefully provide an opportunity for individuals to learn from the best educators in the world, as well as help expand their personal networks, and facilitate their career development. However, research thus far shows that the majority of people taking advantage of these courses are already employed, have post-secondary degrees, and have encountered few barriers related to the affordability of higher education. Little is known about MOOC learners with financial constraints and who do not fit the typical profile of MOOC learners. This paper presents the results of the analysis of data from six Coursera courses offered by the University of Michigan from fall 2012 through winter 2013. In this analysis learners who self-identified as being unable to afford to pursue a formal education (the target group) were contrasted to other learners (the comparison group) in terms of demographics, motivations, course enrollment, engagement and performance. Learners in the target group were primarily male and over 25 years old. A statistically significant portion of the target group held less than a 4-year college degree than the comparison group. Target learners were also significantly underrepresented in the enrollment of the courses examined here. Although the comparison group had a significantly higher completion rate overall than the target group, the target group had a statistically significant higher rate of completing courses with certificates of distinction. This article provides a discussion of these results and suggests how MOOCs could be adapted to better address the needs of learners who feel financially unable to pursue a more traditional path to a post-secondary education.
format	article
author	Tawanna R Dillahunt Brian Zengguang Wang Stephanie Teasley
author_facet	Tawanna R Dillahunt Brian Zengguang Wang Stephanie Teasley
author_sort	Tawanna R Dillahunt
title	Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
title_short	Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
title_full	Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
title_fullStr	Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
title_full_unstemmed	Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education
title_sort	democratizing higher education: exploring mooc use among those who cannot afford a formal education
publisher	Athabasca University Press
publishDate	2014
url	https://doaj.org/article/5a6cb8303ce74bc4819f5ac1fb35bbde
work_keys_str_mv	AT tawannardillahunt democratizinghighereducationexploringmoocuseamongthosewhocannotaffordaformaleducation AT brianzengguangwang democratizinghighereducationexploringmoocuseamongthosewhocannotaffordaformaleducation AT stephanieteasley democratizinghighereducationexploringmoocuseamongthosewhocannotaffordaformaleducation
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Democratizing higher education: Exploring MOOC use among those who cannot afford a formal education

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