K-MOOC will Help You Learn Whatever You Want Wherever and Whenever
K-MOOC will Help You Learn Whatever You Want Wherever and Whenever
  • Reporter Kwon Na-eun
  • 승인 2015.05.06 17:32
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How interesting would it be if you could take class from world-famous universities like Standford, Harvard, or MIT? How interesting would it be if we could offer courses for others even though they are not Postechians?
This concept has actually been implemented since 2012, as a form of online courses called MOOC. Main providers include Udacity, COURSERA, Edx, and FutureLearn. MOOC is an abbreviated word for Massive Open Online Course. Above all, the main difference of MOOC from traditional courses is the number of students. Previously, each class has face-to-face method for learning, so the number of students is limited. However, courses in MOOC may have millions of students because courses from various universities are collected by MOOC providers and are opened to any web user. The point is that it is free of charge and does not require any prerequisite. This is why MOOC has the word “massive” and “open.” Furthermore, the educational contents are all digitalized and distributed through computer networks so it has the word “online.”
Although MOOC is expected to provide high quality education to everyone, especially to those under-privileged for any politic or economic reasons, it has some drawbacks. The main thing is about the implication and efficiency of education. Most researchers and educators agree that face-to-face education is better than online education since it provides the benefit of learning through human interaction. MOOC may provide interactions between learners, but it is hard to support interaction between professors and students. Also, it relies on automatic grading system and peer review for measuring learning achievements, which may not provide enough feedback for learners. Therefore, it is important to embrace the advantages and eliminate the disadvantages by strategically using various learning skills like flipped learning.
As MOOC is becoming an issue around the world, the Korean government is trying to catch up with the trend and is preparing to open K-MOOC, in which “K” stands for Korea. K-MOOC is planned to be test-operated in the second-half of 2015. Famous universities including SNU and KAIST are planning to participate to show they understand their sense of responsibility to the nation and society. In addition, they could secure and strengthen their international reputation. POSTECH will also open up two courses in the field of mechanical engineering and computer sciences to contribute to the nation and society. In addition, we may maintain and build national and global reputation by providing high quality courses.
In addition, according to an interview with Seung-Yoon Oh, vice chair of POSTECH Counseling Center, POSTECH was not only selected to participate in K-MOOC (by developing 10 subjects in 3 years) but also plans to participate in G-MOOC(G for global). Moreover, POSTECH is trying to prepare Collegian MOOC, which would require students’ participation. He also mentioned POSTECH opened up a studio for producing e-learning contents and information about this will be released soon.