Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
I’m so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don’t have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). # Gary On Jan 23, 2014, at 12:53 PM, Owen Densmore o...@backspaces.net wrote: Ed mentioned a fascinating Georgia Tech experiment: A $6,000 master's degree in computer science! I believe the program to which he referred to is: http://www.omscs.gatech.edu/ This is amazing if it works. I know, I know, it sucks from any number of view points but just think of the theme: lets make education approachable for today's world, credits and all. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 11:02 AM, Gary Schiltz g...@naturesvisualarts.comwrote: I’m so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don’t have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). Eric Bonabeau (BiosGroup Paris and founder Icosystem) joined on as Dean of Computational Sciences at Minerva. Interesting to me is that while the courses are online, students are required to study together and live in residence facilities. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/minerva-schools-at-kgi-names-deans-of-computational-and-natural-sciences-231555771.html http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/minerva-start-up-college-hires-academic-leaders/48205 http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/photos/the-radically-experimental-university-minerva-schools-of-kgi-slideshow/bonabeau-minerva-project-smiles-during-meeting-san-francisco-photo-060227588.html FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
We mustn’t dismiss the good because we insist on the excellent. My (almost, in those days) free education at the University of California was a far cry from what I later learned Harvard students get. But it was awfully good, and I’m glad I got it. (Of course, Harvard wouldn’t even have let me in, as a woman, but they eventually got over that bigotry.) MOOCs will be debugged and improved over time, I think, but no, they will never take the place of everybody sitting together, learning together, f2f with a great teacher. Should we therefore not even aspire to teach people who can’t have the intimate experience? I say let’s at least try. On Jan 23, 2014, at 2:44 PM, Stephen Guerin stephen.gue...@redfish.com wrote: On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 11:02 AM, Gary Schiltz g...@naturesvisualarts.com wrote: I’m so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don’t have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). Eric Bonabeau (BiosGroup Paris and founder Icosystem) joined on as Dean of Computational Sciences at Minerva. Interesting to me is that while the courses are online, students are required to study together and live in residence facilities. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/minerva-schools-at-kgi-names-deans-of-computational-and-natural-sciences-231555771.html http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/minerva-start-up-college-hires-academic-leaders/48205 http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/photos/the-radically-experimental-university-minerva-schools-of-kgi-slideshow/bonabeau-minerva-project-smiles-during-meeting-san-francisco-photo-060227588.html FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
As a member of an e-learning team developing curriculum at the U. of Ottawa, I want to say thank you, Pamela, you are right. Also, considering growing inequality even here in the U.S., distance learning can help to level the playing field, and there are very few additional initiatives these days that lead to a more democratic and robust society. On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 1:25 PM, Pamela McCorduck pam...@well.com wrote: We mustn't dismiss the good because we insist on the excellent. My (almost, in those days) free education at the University of California was a far cry from what I later learned Harvard students get. But it was awfully good, and I'm glad I got it. (Of course, Harvard wouldn't even have let me in, as a woman, but they eventually got over that bigotry.) MOOCs will be debugged and improved over time, I think, but no, they will never take the place of everybody sitting together, learning together, f2f with a great teacher. Should we therefore not even aspire to teach people who can't have the intimate experience? I say let's at least try. On Jan 23, 2014, at 2:44 PM, Stephen Guerin stephen.gue...@redfish.com wrote: On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 11:02 AM, Gary Schiltz g...@naturesvisualarts.com wrote: I'm so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don't have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). Eric Bonabeau (BiosGroup Paris and founder Icosystem) joined on as Dean of Computational Sciences at Minerva. Interesting to me is that while the courses are online, students are required to study together and live in residence facilities. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/minerva-schools-at-kgi-names-deans-of-computational-and-natural-sciences-231555771.html http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/minerva-start-up-college-hires-academic-leaders/48205 http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/photos/the-radically-experimental-university-minerva-schools-of-kgi-slideshow/bonabeau-minerva-project-smiles-during-meeting-san-francisco-photo-060227588.html FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com -- Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D. President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA me...@emergentdiplomacy.org mobile: (303) 859-5609 skype: merlelefkoff FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
To a great extent MOOCs have been disappointing. Only a small number of people who initially show interest actually complete most courses. And a majority of those already have degrees. There are a few stories of people who have done well and had no other access to education, but for the most part it hasn't been the dream solution to universal education. Furthermore, the experiment at San Jose State was not particularly successful. Students didn't do any better than with a normal course. Many did worse. This was the case even though there was a great deal of support. It wasn't just watch the video and ask questions on the forum. It was disappointing enough that they suspended the experiment. Even so, I suspect that the Georgia Tech MS program will succeed. The students are more mature. They are more motivated--because they want the degree and because they are paying money for the courses. They will probably develop a reasonable forum system and find some way to arrange study groups. The first enrollees is limited to 400, which I think is a good idea. They are not trying for the tens of thousands--at least not immediately. One of my students was admitted. Considering that the admission process was quite selective (with only 400 slots), he was pretty happy about it. I can let you know what he thinks of it as the program progresses. Also, we are using one of the San Jose courses in our Intro to Computing course. We use what's called a flipped classroom model. Students watch the videos and do the homework on their own. Then we use class time to go over the homework, resolve questions, and do additional projects. It worked reasonably well that Fall. We are doing it again this quarter. (The course we're using is Cay Horstmann's Udacity Intro to Computing Course.) -- Russ *-- Russ Abbott* *_* * Professor, Computer Science* * California State University, Los Angeles* * Google voice: 747-*999-5105;CS Dept.: 323-343-6690 Google+: *http://GPlus.to/RussAbbott http://GPlus.to/RussAbbott,* * http://tinyurl.com/RussAbbott http://tinyurl.com/RussAbbott, or * * http://google.com/+RussAbbottCa http://google.com/+RussAbbottCa * * vita: *sites.google.com/site/russabbott/ *CS Wiki* http://cs.calstatela.edu/wiki/ and the courses I teach * A draft of Abstractions and Implementations http://philpapers.org/rec/ABBAAI * * How the Fed can fix the economy (**2 pages)**: ssrn.com/abstract=1977688 http://ssrn.com/abstract=1977688* *_* On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 12:25 PM, Pamela McCorduck pam...@well.com wrote: We mustn’t dismiss the good because we insist on the excellent. My (almost, in those days) free education at the University of California was a far cry from what I later learned Harvard students get. But it was awfully good, and I’m glad I got it. (Of course, Harvard wouldn’t even have let me in, as a woman, but they eventually got over that bigotry.) MOOCs will be debugged and improved over time, I think, but no, they will never take the place of everybody sitting together, learning together, f2f with a great teacher. Should we therefore not even aspire to teach people who can’t have the intimate experience? I say let’s at least try. On Jan 23, 2014, at 2:44 PM, Stephen Guerin stephen.gue...@redfish.com wrote: On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 11:02 AM, Gary Schiltz g...@naturesvisualarts.com wrote: I’m so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don’t have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). Eric Bonabeau (BiosGroup Paris and founder Icosystem) joined on as Dean of Computational Sciences at Minerva. Interesting to me is that while the courses are online, students are required to study together and live in residence facilities. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/minerva-schools-at-kgi-names-deans-of-computational-and-natural-sciences-231555771.html http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/minerva-start-up-college-hires-academic-leaders/48205 http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/photos/the-radically-experimental-university-minerva-schools-of-kgi-slideshow/bonabeau-minerva-project-smiles-during-meeting-san-francisco-photo-060227588.html FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe
Re: [FRIAM] Ga Tech Masters in CompSci
Gary - I’m so ambivalent about this and MOO in general. From the standpoint of learning, it offers many advantages, including training many more people who don’t have the resources to attend a college or university (notice I said training, not educating). From a social standpoint, there are so many intangibles to be gained by spending time face-to-face with other knowledge seekers (wow, does that sound idealistic). My college years made me who I am today (for better or worse) in many ways... I would wish something similar on more folks with a fairly plebian background such as mine. That doesn't mean college is for everyone, but as you point out education is ultimately different (and IMO more important) than training. I am much more self-trained than self-educated. I suspect *many* here have the same experience. - Steve FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
