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Ted O'Neill

California to Give Web Courses a Big Trial - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...e-web-courses-a-big-trial.html

mooc pseudomooc california remedial udacity university crisis

shared by Ted O'Neill on 14 Apr 13 - No Cached
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 14 Apr 13
       
      If they cannot pass elementary courses after their preparation in high school, what does that tell us about their preparation for university? Online courses require learners to already be autonomous and prepared to learn. That does not match well with students who need remedial work.
  • Ellen N. Junn, provost and vice president for academic affairs at the university in San Jose, said the California State University System faces a crisis because more than 50 percent of entering students cannot meet basic requirements. “They graduate from high school, but they cannot pass our elementary math and English placement tests,” she said.
  • Recently edX completed a pilot offering of its difficult circuits and electronics course at San Jose State to stunning results: while 40 percent of the students in the traditional version of the class got a grade of C or lower, only 9 percent in the blended edX class got such a low grade.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 14 Apr 13
       
      Would love to see the actual data on these claims and the study methodology if any.
Ted O'Neill

Citing disappointing student outcomes, San Jose State pauses work with Udacity | Inside... - 0 views

www.insidehighered.com/...jose-state-pauses-work-udacity

MOOC cMOOC Udacity SJSU fail

shared by Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13 - No Cached
  • After six months of high-profile experimentation, San Jose State University plans to “pause” its work with Udacity, a company that promises to deliver low-cost, high-quality online education to the masses.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      "Promises" but has now demonstrably failed to deliver.
  • San Jose State Provost Ellen Junn said disappointing student performance will prompt the university to stop offering online classes with Udacity this fall as part of a "short breather." Junn wants to spend the fall going over the results and talking with faculty members about the university’s online experimentation, which extends beyond the Udacity partnership and has proved somewhat controversial. She said the plan is to start working with Udacity again in spring 2014.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      Let's see how that reboot works. I doubt it comes back at the IIRC 150USD per pupil mark.
  • Preliminary findings from the spring semester suggest students in the online Udacity courses, which were developed jointly with San Jose State faculty, do not fare as well as students who attended normal classes -- though Junn cautioned against reading too much into the comparison, given the significant differences in the student populations.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      Right. Bad planning in selection of student groups for this program. MOOCs require autonomous, skilled learners.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • A copy of that internal presentation, which Junn repeatedly emphasized was preliminary, was obtained this week by Inside Higher Ed from the California Faculty Association. According to the preliminary presentation, 74 percent or more of the students in traditional classes passed, while no more than 51 percent of Udacity students passed any of the three courses.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      Pretty stark difference.
  • The courses were also put together in a rush. That’s apparently because of the timing of the deal with Udacity. The pilot project was announced a fortnight before classes started. (Like other similar deals, it was also the result of a no-bid contract.) The deal came together at the highest levels: On June 16, 2012, Brown e-mailed and called Thrun to talk about how Udacity could help California's higher education systems. “We need your help,” Brown said, according to Thrun. But, because of the haste, faculty were building the courses on the fly. Not only was this a “recipe for insanity,” Junn said, but faculty did not have a lot of time to watch how students were doing in the courses because the faculty were busy trying to finish them. It took about 400 hours to build a course, though the courses are designed to be reused.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      Incredibly bad pedagogy. That's what one gets when you allow the edtech bubble to drive educational decisions and take teaching out of the hands of faculty.
  • Another factor in the disappointing outcomes may have been the students themselves. The courses included at-risk students, high school students and San Jose State students who had already failed a remedial math course.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      Duh.
  • Student performance data from the San Jose State/Udacity courses are expected to be released in coming weeks.
    • Ted O'Neill
      Ted O'Neill on 22 Jul 13
       
      That original report leaked to IHED must be pretty damning if it will take weeks to edit it for release
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