When You Don’t Have Time to Learn, Try with MOOCs
Our education should be an ongoing process that never stops
I studied in four countries and completed my studies with a Master’s Degree from a top tier university. I can say my education has been top notch and has helped me master critical thinking and problem solving. However, after working for six years, I felt the need to improve my knowledge of computer and data science to carry out some important projects. I started evaluating several options such as taking live courses at the closest university, reading several books, getting a private tutor, and learning by myself through tutorials.
My main objective was to learn by doing with a mix of theory and practice as I had the need to fully understand and apply the subject. After carefully evaluating each option, I decided to self-learn with a mix of books and tutorials because the other options were either too expensive or too inflexible. Hence, I embarked on this very tedious journey and discovered later that I could not learn such an extensive and complex subject alone.
I was about to give up until, by pure chance, I discovered the existence of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). Now you are probably thinking “Wow, great discovery silly, MOOCs exist since 2008! (or probably something worse). Actually, I talked to several people, some of whom are in academia, and they did not know what a MOOC was. If you don’t have time to learn, I sincerely hope this article will give you a different perspective on how you can educate yourself for free and with great flexibility.
What are MOOCs
There is a big difference between a MOOC and a classic online course. The first is designed with a big audience in mind, while the second aims to provide a classroom experience with the flexibility of online learning. In addition, the biggest difference is that MOOCs are free, while online courses from top universities can cost up to $3.500 (or more). Yes, but the content is different, you may dispute. Actually, I found the content (and the teaching style) of some MOOCs to be better than many online courses and also better than some courses I have attended during my Master’s Degree.
Why I think MOOCs are awesome
Coming back to the reason why I discovered the existence of MOOCs, it is quite hard to learn new subjects when working full time and many people may not be willing to spend $5–6.000 for taking two advanced courses. Instead, MOOCs let you decide whether to audit the course for free or to pay a few hundred bucks to complete assignments and exams in order to get a verified certificate.
Moreover, you can audit several courses at the same time and decide if you like the teaching style of the professor or the course content before applying for a verified certificate. This gives you the option to carefully select the courses you really need for reaching your learning target. I find this flexibility of great value since many traditional courses allow you to audit just one lecture and you may discover later that your expectations have not been met. In addition, you can select the best courses on the subject (from different institutions) and gain knowledge with your own study program.
Why MOOCs changed my view on education
I have always been skeptical about online learning for two reasons: first, the lack of interaction with the professor, and second, the content of the course. Even though the content of many online courses is published, it is difficult to understand its depth. Indeed, a lecture that promises to cover a specific topic like the fundamentals of statistics may touch just a few theoretical concepts or instead combine theory with many helpful assignments.
Accessing for free the content of several courses that are taught at Harvard, MIT, Berkeley, or UC San Diego makes it easy to transform your education into an ongoing process that helps your career. As a matter of fact, while online courses or traditional degrees require students to complete a specific set of modules, with MOOCs you can decide which lectures to pick and learn only the topics you need.
Thanks to this initiative that many universities are exploring, education may become accessible to the less fortunate and to people who need a high level of flexibility. Most importantly, the quality of many MOOCs is very high and it would be difficult to find so many good courses at a local university.
How much I learned with MOOCs
As I mentioned before, my objective was to learn the fundamentals of computer and data science in order to follow the development of some important projects. Indeed, I looked for introductory courses on computer science and I enrolled myself first in the famous CS50’s Introduction to Computer Science and then to the more advanced course on Web Programming with Python and Javascript.
To be honest, I thought the courses were demanding, but I discovered they were even more demanding than expected. Indeed, I found myself studying and working on assignments around 20–25 hours a week. Did I learn enough to reach my target? I definitely did not become a computer scientist, but I learned many concepts of programming. In the end, I have been able to create from scratch a website that fetches news from 15 different sources and updates them every 10 minutes (thanks to Python and Django). This is way beyond what I expected to learn from just two MOOCs.
After this experience, I enrolled in more courses on data science and I must admit that the learning experience is excellent. Since all lectures are recorded, I usually go back to them several times to complete the assignments and this kind of repetition helps me learn concepts deeply.
The downside of taking MOOCs
The lack of interaction with the professors and the students is definitely a negative point of MOOCs. When covering difficult topics it is essential to have a source of knowledge that can further explain concepts in different ways. When attending traditional courses, I found it very helpful to participate in seminars and team projects because I learned from peers and received answers to my numerous questions.
When taking a MOOC, your only extra help is given by different learning sources like tutorials, videos, and books. There is no space for questions nor the opportunity to ask for further explanations. You are basically left on your own to figure out what you don’t understand, but, in some cases, it may result in a very rewarding learning process.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the education process should not stop after graduation. In fact, our education should be an ongoing process that helps us acquire more knowledge and advance our careers. There are many ways to access continuing education, however, MOOCs may be our best chance to reach our learning target without conspicuous investments and with more flexibility.
The quality of many MOOCs is outstanding and we may learn many concepts with just a few courses. However, if we are not self-learners and prefer to engage with peers and professors, MOOCs are not for us and we should look into more traditional learning paths.
I have no affiliation of any kind to creators and distributors of MOOCs. This article portrays my honest view based on experience.
