I think there is a potential to inject a feedback mechanism in this course, and any MOOC for that matter, with regard to the helpfulness of reading material in the Syllabus. I think that would especially suit the Learning & Knowledge Analytics course.
This simple change made Google's ad marketplace much more efficient than
Overture's. Notice that the algorithm itself is quite simple; it is the addition
of the new data that made the difference.
Of course, you have to be judicious in your choice of the data to add to your
data set.
But the bigger point is, adding more, independent data usually beats out designing ever-better algorithms to analyze an existing data set. I'm often suprised that many people in the business, and even in academia, don't realize this.