[baron816]

You should keep in mind the key difference between your offering run of the mill MOOCs--you're students have to complete your course if they want to maintain their GPAs and graduate.

This should substantially change how you teach your class. A normal MOOC has to make learning "easy" so that students keep coming back. Unfortunately, when learning is "easy" it doesn't stick very well.

Effective learning needs to be challenging and force students to dig deep and think critically about what you're teaching them. If you give out hints or shortcuts, they'll probably like you more, but they're not going to build the deep understanding they need to succeed in further courses and in their career. If you're good at making them think critically, the whole learning process will feel hard for them, possibly as if they aren't learning anything, and they might resent you for that. So it's good that they're stuck with you. Do the right thing and make sure they're really understanding the material and not just memorizing formulas and patterns.