ATYPICAL: Analysis for a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) with a terminal efficiency of 22.35%

Authors

  • Lorena Yadira Alem├ín de la Garza Instituto Tecnol├│gico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) Avda. Eugenio Garza Sada, 2501 Sur Edificio CEDES, piso SS1 64849 Monterrey (Nuevo Le├│n) Mexico
  • Teresa Sancho-Vinuesa Sancho-Vinuesa Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) Rambla del Poblenou, 156 08018 Barcelona Spain
  • Marcela Georgina G├│mez Zerme├▒o Instituto Tecnol├│gico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) Avda. Eugenio Garza Sada, 2501 Sur Edificio CEDES, piso SS1 64849 Monterrey (Nuevo Le├│n) Mexico

Keywords:

terminal efficiency, desertion

Abstract

Nowadays, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have raised great expectations due to their potential for changing the relationship between students and professors, academy and the general community.  To conceptualize, the terms “course”, “online”, “massive” and “open” have been redefined and reinvented so many times that it is difficult to offer a wide broad definition to cover their whole activity, for example, the term “massive” most of the times it only refers to the number of learners joined, but it does not refers to the massive desertion levels.  This document presents a comparative analysis for 11 MOOCs that obtained a terminal efficiency equal to or less than 11% and a MOOC whose calculated terminal efficiency was of 22.35%.  This last course was created as part of a teacher training strategy, was developed at Coursera’s platform and 10,161 total learners from 81 different countries joined.  The obtained results describe the characteristics of the participants, the technological resources, the tools and the didactic strategies implemented by the instructors.  It is concluded that without a correct measurement of the final results, it is not possible to evaluate the success of a MOOC, so the institutions and consortia must establish indicators to focus the efforts in order to improve the quality of teaching.

Author Biographies

Lorena Yadira Alemán de la Garza, Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) Avda. Eugenio Garza Sada, 2501 Sur Edificio CEDES, piso SS1 64849 Monterrey (Nuevo León) Mexico

Doctoral candidate on the Education and ICT (e-learning) doctoral program at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), Spain. She holds a masterΓÇÖs degree, with honors, in Educational Institution Administration from ITESM, and a bachelorΓÇÖs degree, with honors, in Business Administration from TecMilenio University, Mexico. She has worked as a postgraduate lecturer in the Graduate School of Education at ITESM on masterΓÇÖs degree programs in Educational Institution Administration, in Education and in Educational Technology. She is a member of the Research Chair in The School as a Knowledge Organization. She is the technical manager on educational research projects of the Mexican National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT). She is the coordinator of university extension programs and special projects. Of note among these is the Higher Middle Education Teacher Training program (PROFORDEMS) and the New Teaching Profile diploma.

Teresa Sancho-Vinuesa Sancho-Vinuesa, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) Rambla del Poblenou, 156 08018 Barcelona Spain

Vice-rector for Research and Innovation at the UOC. She holds a doctorate in Electronic Engineering and a bachelorΓÇÖs degree in Mathematics. She is the principal researcher of the CIMANET (Online Science and Mathematics) RD&I group at the UOC. She has lectured in the field of numerical analysis, probability theory and stochastic processes at La Salle School of Engineering and Architecture, Spain. She has been a member of the TEXTO pedagogical and editorial team, and has coordinated Mathematics on Information Technology Studies at the UOC. She has been the academic coordinator and director of the doctoral program in Information and Knowledge Society at the UOC. She is currently responsible for the Mathematics subjects on the bachelorΓÇÖs degree program in Technical Engineering and Telecommunications. She has been a researcher on the interdisciplinary research program on the Information Society in Catalonia (Project Internet Catalonia), jointly led by Manuel Castells and Imma Tubella; within this framework, she headed a study on changes occurring in Catalan universities by analyzing Internet use. She has now resumed her activities in the field of Mathematics teaching for Network-based Engineering.

Marcela Georgina G├│mez Zerme├▒o, Instituto Tecnol├│gico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) Avda. Eugenio Garza Sada, 2501 Sur Edificio CEDES, piso SS1 64849 Monterrey (Nuevo Le├│n) Mexico

She holds a doctorate in Educational Innovation from the Graduate School of Education at ITESM, and a master’s degree in Information and Communication Technology Engineering Sciences. INT-CITCOM, France Télécoms Higher Education. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer and Administration Systems from ITESM. She is a tenured lecturer at the Graduate School of Education at ITESM on master’s degree programs in Education and in Educational Technology, and on the doctoral program in Educational Innovation. She is a member of the Research Chairs in The School as a Knowledge Organization and in Innovation in Technology and Education, and of the Mexican Education Research Council (COMIE). She is the technical manager on educational research projects of the Mexican National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT) and on the ALFA program of the European Commission. She forms part of the National System of Researchers (SNI) Level 1.

Instituto Tecnol├│gico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM)

Avda. Eugenio Garza Sada, 2501 Sur

Edificio CEDES, piso SS1

64849 Monterrey (Nuevo Le├│n)

Mexico

Downloads

Published

2015-08-26

Issue

Vol. 2 No. 3 (2015): Open Educational Resources and MOOCs: The Changing Face of Higher Education

Section

Theme Articles

License

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.

    1. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.

 

  1. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).