MOOCs ahead
MOOCs (massive open online courses) have sparked explosive growth in both education and opportunity. Consider edX. Since this joint Harvard and MIT online platform launched in 2012, it has attracted more than 27 million course enrollments representing more than 8 million learners, uniting students all over the world with teachers and course material through lectures, interactive forums, problem sets, videos, and more. What many of those students may not realize is that the learning goes both ways. Each time a student clicks a link or logs into an online conversation, he or she leaves a digital trail. And that information is vital to expanding and improving the future of learning. “There’s a tremendous demand for learning from people around the world,” said Peter K. Bol, vice provost for advances in learning (VPAL) and the Charles H. Carswell Professor of East Asian Languages and Civilizations. He pointed out that 70 percent of edX...