College Reinvented in the Year of the 'MOOC'

Making News

Egyptian President Tries to Contain Backlash over Power Grab ()

Egypt's first elected President, Mohammed Morsi, met with the Supreme Council of the Judiciary today after his decree of virtually absolute power led to days of street protests all over the country. David Kirkpatrick is Cairo Bureau Chief for the New York Times.

Guests:

• David Kirkpatrick: New York Times, @kirkpatricknyt

Main Topic

Can Higher Education Be Democratized on the Internet? ()

Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOC's, began last year when Stanford Professor Sebastian Thrun put a class on line. He quickly enrolled 160,000 students — in more than 190 countries.  Now Harvard, Princeton and other prestigious schools are offering MOOC's that reach millions of students worldwide, leading to visions of broader access to higher education at vastly reduced cost. We hear what it's like to take a college course from a computer and what it's like to teach to a machine instead of a classroom. Will MOOC's count for college credit?  Will they still be free?  Will rich elites still dominate higher education?

Guests:

• Kayla Webley: Time Magazine, @kaylawebley
• Jeremy Adelman: Princeton University
• Andrew Ng: Stanford University
• Noliwe Rooks: Cornell University, @nrookie

Links:

• Webley on MOOC's as a tool to revolutionize higher education
• Coursera
• Rooks' 'White Money Black Power: African American Studies and the Crisis of Race in Higher Education'
• Adelman's Coursera class on the history of the world since 1300
• Princeton extends learning through online Coursera classes

Reporter's Notebook

Syrian Refugees Face a Winter of Misery ()

Since rebels declared war on the al-Assad regime, more than 400,000 Syrians have fled the country. Over a million more are displaced internally. Now winter is setting in on overcrowded, makeshift camps and abandoned buildings that house formerly urban families who left most of their possessions at home. One refugee camp inside Northern Syria was strafed today by Syrian fighter planes apparently trying to hit a nearby base for the rebel Free Syrian Army.  But more Syrians have fled to Jordan than anywhere else.  Andrew Chappelle, a news producer for al-Jazeera English, recently visited the Al Zaatari refugee camp.

Guests:

• Andrew Chappelle: al Jazeera English, @andrewchappelle