IBL News

Author: IBL News

  • EdX Launches Eucalyptus, the Fifth Release of the Open edX Platform

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    The latest Open edX software called “Eucalyptus” was officially released this weekend. It replaces “Dogwood” and it comes with new course navigation, bookmarks, CourseTalk for reviews, teams, student notes and badges for completing course events.

    It also includes “Subsection prerequisites”, which require learners to achieve a certain score before they progress to the next subsection. Additionally, there are a number of new XBlocks, such as: Completion, Drag and Drop Problem and Peer Instruction.

    The Release Notes detail all of these functionalities.

    “Eucalyptus.1 is the first release on the Eucalyptus line”, explained Ned Batchelder, manager at edX . “We’re proud of all the work that went into producing Eucalyptus, we hope you get good use from it”.

    Several features have been deprecated or deleted:

    • REST APIs (deprecated):
      • Mobile, course structure, and profile images REST web services
    • Tools & Problem Types (deprecated):
      • Randomize component (replaced by randomized content blocks
      • Original drag and drop problem type (replaced by mobile-friendly drag and drop problem
    • Tools & XModules (deleted):
      • The graphical slider tool
      • The crowdsource hinter XModule
      • Support for the always_recalculate_grades XBlock field
      • The ENABLE_JWT_AUTH feature flag

     

    “FICUS” WILL BE NEXT

    The next Open edX release, scheduled for early 2017, will be called “Ficus“. It will include notifications, downloadable audio files and several improvements on mobile, commerce, grading, discussion, SSO integration, etc. This will be the sixth official release, after Aspen (September 2014), Birch (January 2015), Cypress (August 2015), Dogwood (January 2016) and Eucalyptus (August 2016).

     

    Key Resources:


    New Features:

     

  • Harvard Hopes to Find a Way of Sustainability with its New Open edX Platform

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    “The additional revenue from HarvardXPlus will contribute to the sustainability of HarvardX and defray some of the costs of producing the online materials    ,” Faculty director of HarvardX Robert A. Lue said for The Harvard Crimson about its new premium model on MOOCs.

    The HarvardXPlus platform will charge between $200 and $500 for enrollments in four eight-week courses, starting on September. This, according to The Harvard Crimson, will “signal a move towards more financially sustainable online learning models”, after the “fiscal sustainability of the HarvardX has come under question.”

    “Charging a fee will provide financial incentive to finish the course,” said Lue. According to a recent report, 5 percent of non-paying HarvardX participants completed the course, while those who paid for certification had around a 59 percent completion rate.

    Lue emphasized that HarvardXPlus is “experimental,” and more premium courses are currently in the works. According to Lue, HarvardX will evaluate the first iteration of the program after the courses are completed this fall.

    HarvardXPlus promises students expanded content and a more intimate contact with peers, teaching fellows, and faculty. In addition, the program will also provide those who complete the course with a “branded credential,” a two-page document that describes in detail the learning objectives, outcomes, and skills acquired throughout the course. Enrollment will be capped in the hundreds, as opposed to the tens of thousands who enroll in HarvardX courses.

    HarvardXPlus –with courses on biochemistry, business contracts, world and China literature– requires a fee for enrollment; HarvardX –the Harvard-specific branch of the edX platform– allows participants to purchase $50 to $150 verified certificates for otherwise free courses.

  • Coursera Hosts a Course Created by PwC on Big Data Analytics

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    Coursera, the world’s largest platform for MOOCs (edX is the second), has launched a Big Data Analytics course with PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP).

    PwC is one of the first professional services firms to offer courses to their workforce of 208,000 on Coursera.com.

    With this course, says PwC, “you will gain insights that PwC US and its clients use to address their toughest challenges every day. What you learn can help to enhance your personal brand, help your career, and assist you with achieving your potential. Through this PwC Coursera offering, you’ll get valuable knowledge from leading professionals shaping their industries.”

    On the other hand, Coursera has recently been on the news after its co-founder, Daphne Koller, decided to leave the company  to join Calico, a Google-funded research and development company that focuses on slowing aging and counteracting age‑related diseases. She explained this on her blog.

     

  • MITx Introduces an edX Course Where Students Will Have Their Work Graded By Professional Philosophers

    The Introduction to Philosophy: God, Knowledge and Consciousness MITx course on edX will allow students to obtain a verified ID certificate and have their work graded and commented on by professional philosophers.

    “This is a big deal — the first MITx humanities course to offer students the chance to write a paper and have it carefully reviewed by instructors,” says Caspar Hare, who will be running the popular MOOC for the third time. “Listening to lectures and reading books is great, but philosophy is all about taking complex ideas and organizing them in a simple way. You learn by writing, specifically writing to someone.”

    The course, which costs $300 with a verified certificate and starts on August 29th, will introduce students to theories around knowledge, beliefs, and consciousness, the existence of God and notion of proofs; the debate between free will and determinism. One of its goals is to move students from discussion to development of critical reasoning and argumentative skills.

    The new instructor grading and feedback feature will enable that process to take shape, according to MIT News.

    The course is also available for free without the certificate.

    According to The Wall Street Journal, philosophy majors tend to earn more than people with majors in accounting, business management or computer science.

  • Global Freshman Academy Presents Its Credit-Eligible Courses

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    Arizona State University’s and edX’s Global Freshman Academy (GFA) has presented its course offering for this fall, with nine online courses intended for college credit at the freshmen-level.

    There are two modalities: free courses and $49 ID Verified, credit-eligible courses. Students pay for credit only after a successful completion of the course with a C or better.

    These are the main ones:

    • College Algebra and Problem Solving – 3 Credit Hours: Course content will be self-paced, personalized with individualized coaching for each topic, and adaptive –with the Aleks technology intended to allow students to master a concept before moving on to the next.

    In this course, starting on October 15, 2016, students will learn by engaging in local problems and issues and completing a research project.

    Global Freshman Academy accounts this year for more than 4,400 students, 5 percent more on this fall than on the last, according to Arizona State University.

  • Teach for America Develops Innovative Ways to Teach High School Math

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=db-F_koMnek

    Teach for America (TFA), an organization that works with communities to expand educational opportunity for children facing the challenges of poverty, will offer, on October 10th, its first edX course, How to Teach High School Geometry, after joining the MIT’s and Harvard’s founded organization.

    In this course, high school math teachers will learn how to develop lesson plans, how to teach geometry concepts in innovative and exciting ways and how to enable students to explore math practices on their own.

  • The University System of Maryland Will Offer For-Credit Courses on edX

    The University System of Maryland (USM), which comprises 12 institutions, has joined edX as a Contributing Charter Member.

    As a result of this partnership, USM will offer for-credit courses. The first course, offered by UMUC and the University of Maryland, Baltimore,  will be Global Health – The Lessons of Ebola, starting on September 20. It will explore how multidisciplinary teams can work more effectively together to address global health needs and examine why local health issues affect us globally.

    USM’s investment on edX has been 2 million dollars.

  • The New Android App for edX Allows to Browse Courses without Logging In

    appedX has launched an advanced version of its app  for Android on the Google Play Store.

    Version 2.6.2 of the mobile app allows learners to browse edX courses without creating an edX account and without logging in. Learners can register for an edX account or sign in from the about page for any course.

    The new edX mobile app is a companion to the edx.org website. It also works on Open edX installations.

    [Disclosure: IBL offers iOS and Android apps]

  • Armando Fox, the Professor Who Coined the term "SPOC", Honored as an Outstanding Educator

    armando-foxArmando Fox, a professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Berkeley, author of successful MOOCs and leader at the Open edX community, was honored in June with the Association for Computing Machinery’s Karl V. Karlstrom Outstanding Educator Award.

    “Mr. Fox was instrumental in adapting a software-engineering course at Berkeley to be offered as a massive open online course, or MOOC, beginning in 2011. One of the course’s innovations was an automatic grading system to evaluate the correctness and style of student programming assignments,” Ruth Hammond reported at The Chronicle of Higher Education.

    Armando Fox is the author of the term “SPOCs” or Small Private Online Courses –that is, MOOCs intended for a small audience of learners on campus.

  • Imperial College Joins edX and Offers a Series of MOOCs to Attract Applicants into its MBA

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    Imperial College Business School launched this month through edx.org a first series of MOOCs as a free taster of its MBA degree.

    These free courses are offered as a part of a new agreement between Imperial College and the edX organization, that currently hosts over 100 top universities and educational organizations, with an overall audience of more than 8 million learners.

    The four-part Essentials for MBA Success series will cover math, finance, data analysis and accounting and start on October 17. This online program, now open for enrollment, has been designed to both help learners already enrolled in MBA programs to identify any additional knowledge and attract people who are considering doing an MBA degree at Imperial College.

    • Dr David Lefevre, Director of the Edtech Lab at Imperial College Business School said: “As an active participant in the use of edtech and online programs, Imperial College Business School keenly recognizes the growing need for flexible learning programs that cater for people’s busy lifestyles. MBA programs, and business education generally, can change lives and through the edX partnership we are enabling more people from all over the world to access our renowned world leading expertise in business education.”
    • “Each course features academic experts from the Business School and combines an active, social approach to learning with extensive multimedia. The courses also feature a personalized learning plan highlighting the areas that students need to focus on to acquire the base level of knowledge needed to undertake the core subjects on an MBA,” explained Imperial College on its website.
    • The courses are designed to provide a flexible learning experience. Students can study the courses in the order they choose, fitting them around their work and other life commitments. Each course will feature a mixture of academic theory and the ‘real world’ skills needed for business. The subjects are brought to life through interactive exercises and video content. Students also benefit from an expert online tutor to support them through the learning materials and associated activities. The courses also foster a learning community and encourage students to connect with other peers studying the same subjects online.

     

    These are the four courses: