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    Back to To the Point

    To the Point

    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.

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    By Warren Olney • May 12, 2014 • 1 min read

    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?

    The full episode

    2 of 3
    College Reinvented in the Year of the 'MOOC'
    1. 0:00Greeks Face Harsh Winter at End of Year of European Austerity
    2. 7:53Can Higher Education Be Democratized on the Internet?You’re reading this
    3. 42:05What Next for North and South Korea?
    • https://images.ctfassets.net/2658fe8gbo8o/AvYox6VuEgcxpd20Xo9d3/769bca4fbf97bf022190f4813812c1e2/new-default.jpg?h=250

      Warren Olney

      former KCRW broadcaster

    • https://images.ctfassets.net/2658fe8gbo8o/AvYox6VuEgcxpd20Xo9d3/769bca4fbf97bf022190f4813812c1e2/new-default.jpg?h=250

      Anna Scott

      Former KCRW Housing and Homelessness Reporter

    • https://images.ctfassets.net/2658fe8gbo8o/AvYox6VuEgcxpd20Xo9d3/769bca4fbf97bf022190f4813812c1e2/new-default.jpg?h=250

      Frances Anderton

      architecture critic and author

    • KCRW placeholder

      Kayla Webley

      Time Magazine

    • KCRW placeholder

      Andrew Ng

      Stanford University

    • KCRW placeholder

      Noliwe Rooks

      Cornell University

      NewsNationalPolitics

    The full episode

    2 of 3
    College Reinvented in the Year of the 'MOOC'
    1. 0:00Greeks Face Harsh Winter at End of Year of European Austerity
    2. 7:53Can Higher Education Be Democratized on the Internet?You’re reading this
    3. 42:05What Next for North and South Korea?
    Back to To the Point