[christudor]

"The old educational system is outmoded; that of learning from a person at the front and then regurgitating what they have told you in order to prove you know it."

I think most university tutors would find this an insulting caricature of what they and their students do. Is this what you actually think happens at university?

[randcraw]

I've attended seven colleges/universities over 40 years, big and small, public and private, in-person and online.

In all in-person large schools, lecture to passive students runs 90% of classes. The essential problem is, any class with more than about 30 students is too big to enable interaction from students. That means only maybe 10% of senior / grad classes even might break the mold of "shut up and sit there while I talk".

In-person small colleges have it better. Few courses there exceed 50 students. But more and more courses there are taught by journeyman profs, which causes instructional quality to vary from year to year.

However MOOCs aren't necessarily any better. Due to their remote delivery and being recorded, all human contact is lost aside from a few text messages to TAs (if you pay). In many, even grading is often automated.

In short, I agree with the sentiment that post-secondary education MUST change. But as they stand now, MOOCs are not the answer. (Other than significantly reducing tuition, which is no small achievement of course.)

[jimhefferon]

Yes, I teach at a small Liberal Arts school in the US and this is not a correct characterization of what happens here, either. (On the other hand, I went to a state university and there is some truth to it in that context, modified of course by the fact that individual instructors may take a different approach.)

[qmmmur]

I personally would love to do away with information based lectures and teach only tutorials in small low ratio settings. Online lecturing let's me do that and saves money (according to admin) and students are happier for it because they do the drier stuff at their own pace and have lots of quality one on one interactions.