MOOC’s Could Hurt Smaller and For-Profit Colleges, Moody’s Report Says
Alisha Azevedo, Chronicle of Higher Education, September 12, 2012.

Under the heading of "No, Really?" a Moody's report traces a key implication of MOOCs offered by large big-name universities: Using MOOC’s produced by other universities could also lead to faculty and staff cuts, said Karen Kedem, vice president and senior analyst at Moody’s and the report’s author. The report also predicts that MOOC’s will most hurt the bottom line of low-cost local colleges, primarily commuter campuses, and for-profit colleges."

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Curriki launches free, project-based algebra course online
Helge Scherlund, E-Learning News, September 12, 2012.

With all the fuss about MOOCs we haven't heard much from Curriki recently. This post updates us with the release of a free, project-based Algebra I course released this week. "This course consists of five units aligned to the Common Core. Each unit culminates in a project that utilizes mastery of conceptual understanding taught in the individual lessons." Interestingly, the course is sponsored by AT&T. And, you have to sign up with Curriki in order to download content (which doesn't seem very open to me, and very much against the spirit of the wiki).The materials are a lot more traditionally aligned, with packages for students and a separate guide for teachers.

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Day two at ALT-C 2012
Rosanna Godfrey, UK Schools Blog, September 12, 2012.

More from Alt-C, 'a confrontation with reality'. It makes me think of the times I have dealt with 'reality' over the years - 2001 (From Virtual to Reality), 2007 (Reflections on Reality), 2008 (Reality), 2012 (The Reality and the Myth). Anyhow, continuing with Alt-C. This post is a summary of some of the presentations. Here are some summaries by Cath Ellis. Some e_learning development team presentations. There's only one presentation posted on the Alt-C site thus far.

[Link] [Comment][Tags: Schools, Project Based Learning, Seneca]

College may never be the same
Mary Beth Marklein, USA Today, September 12, 2012.

The MOOC phenomenon hits USA Today, which weighs in with a pretty good overview article (no mention of any work prior to the US-based courses, of course, but that's par for the coverage thus far). It's interesting from my perspective to watch because each bit of coverage - the NY Tim es a week a go, CBC Spark this week, today's USA today article - brings a flurry of new subscribers to the www.mooc.ca newsletter. I will have to start paying more attention to it as it is attracting a serious readership now.

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The MOOC Survivors
Steve Kolowich, Inside Higher Ed, September 12, 2012.

Interesting first look at a survey of 7,000 people who finished and passed an edX course that had 155,000 signups and 23,000 people starting. "The most interesting piece of data is that 80 percent of respondents said they had taken a “comparable” course at a traditional university." Also, the age distribution "favored what higher ed would call 'nontraditional' students: Half of them were 26 years old or older." The survey is of course limited (though at 6,000 responses dwarfs the sample typically found in journal articles).  But there is overlap with the much more extensive research conduced on MOOCs by Rita Kop (which of course Inside Higher Ed never mentions, because it's not MIT).

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