Some interesting new tidbits emerge from the recently FOIAed agrrement between ASU and EdX.
It turns out that the "New American University" as ASU styles itself, has grand ambitions of "laundering" MOOC credit not just from courses offered by its own instructors, but others on the EdX platform as well. This is perhaps not so surprising, but what is absolutely astonishing is how brazen they are about this - they are openly proposing to charge students fees just to be allowed to transfer credit from a MOOC. They don't even bother to pretend to provide some actual service in exchange for that fee. This kind of reminds me of AIG's business model: launder mortgage back securities and other junk instruments using AIG's AAA credit rating. How does this end? https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/asu-edxs-cleaner -------------------------------------snip Previously <https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/problem-asu-solving-0>, I suggested that one of the motives for ASU’s partnership with edX was to draw students to the institution via the ersatz Gen Ed MOOC experience. Enticed by the Gen Ed Starter Pak,[1] <https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/asu-edxs-cleaner#_ftn1> students would take more ASU courses either online or face to face. ASU would then “launder” those MOOC credits from the transcripts, as they made it clear they do not intend to distinguish among the different course formats. My vision is extremely limited, however, which is perhaps why I’m ill-suited to running a neoliberal university. This particular clause makes it clear that ASU has the potential to expand their laundry service to the entire edX universe. In other words, they may do what the founding partner institutions of edX – MIT and Harvard – would likely never consider, give full institutional credit for a course taken as a MOOC outside their own institution.
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