September 26, 2014
Two years ago, MIT and Harvard University founded EdX, a nonprofit learning platform designed to promote global education equality by offering free online courses to the public. Members can sign up for anything from “International Criminal Law” to “Relativity and Astrophysics.” Professors from more than forty higher education institutions around the world, including Osaka University, Madrid’s Universidad Autónoma, Berkeley University, Cornell and Dartmouth, teach the courses. Last March, Hamilton and Colgate University proudly announced their joint membership to this online education co-op.
A major benefit of joining edX was the chance to strengthen its representation of liberal arts schools. While Davidson and Wellesley are also members, the inclusion of Hamilton and Colgate will help diversify the kinds of courses offered by those at larger institutions.
As Dean of Faculty Pat Reynolds said, “Given the attention online educational technology has received in recent years, I think it is also important that residential liberal arts colleges are actively involved in shaping at least a part of that conversation... Membership in edX gives Hamilton, and our liberal arts college member peers, a seat at one table where that conversation is vigorous.”
EdX is based on the belief that online learning acts as a democratizer. Anyone with an Internet connection can register for free courses in under a minute and gain access to a variety of videos, automated feedback and interactive learning features, all of which they can use on their own time. As hundreds of people can sign up for the same course, the EdX platform includes discussion forums in which students may chat with one another about course material and assignments.
Next spring will mark the formal start to Hamilton’s edX course offerings, which will act as part of Hamilton’s three-year-long pilot program. Religious Studies Professor Brent Plate and English and Creative Writing Professor Doran Larson have both agreed to spearhead this initiative.
Professor Plate’s class, entitled “Spirituality and Sensuality: Sacred Objects in Religious Life,” will include a variety of interviews and visits to off-campus sites to enhance edX students’ understanding. Plate is excited to continue experimenting with technology and media, as he has done increasingly in recent years. He expressed his feelings, saying, “I’m excited! It allows me to think about how to teach in a different way to a different group of students. It will change the way I teach in traditional settings.” The course will run for seven weeks.
Larson’s “American Prison Witness” class will not be in a pure lecture style, either. He plans to center this course on texts written by incarcerated people and to use interviews with a variety of those involved in the study of the American penitentiary system, including social scientists. Other resources, such as animated graphics, will accompany his online course. While Larson agrees that democratizing education is a wonderful idea, he also commented on the restrictions created by online learning environments: “The limitation is that it selects out people who have easy access [to the Internet] and leisure time. It tends to be taken up by people who already have an education.”
Nevertheless, when asked about the possibility of criticism in response to making courses taught by Hamilton professors free of charge to the public, Larson emphasized that these offerings are not for credit. “It doesn’t lessen the value of a Hamilton degree,” he said. “It can heighten it... The higher profile faculty have, the more value people will set on the degree that faculty at Hamilton make possible.”
Dean Reynolds noted that he is even hesitant to call Hamilton’s edX offerings ‘courses’. “They do not come near what we consider ‘a Hamilton course,’ either in terms of the professor’s teaching, our expectations of a student’s learning or the academic support we provide for that process,” he said. However, to Reynolds, these edX offerings represent a much broader intention: educational outreach.
He added that our involvement in edX will provide the “opportunity to interested alumni and the public to learn about the innovative scholarship and glimpse the wonderful teaching of our faculty.”
After three years, Hamilton will assess the results of its involvement in edX relative to the amount of time, money and work put into it. In the meantime, Reynolds’ hopes for the immediate future include expanding alumni engagement with the College and providing an opportunity for public scholarship and increased educational outreach.
In terms of Hamilton’s partnership with Colgate, Reynolds sees great potential in “sharing resources and expertise on the production side, [while bringing] our participating faculty members together to share their experiences with each other.” With two fascinating edX courses already in the works for next spring, Hamilton is posed to enhance its influential role in the education community alongside other top schools throughout the world.
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