While what the OP mentioned is True , what i really think is that the real value of MOOCs is not in the certificate (it not that much important especially from MOOC providers) but the opportunity that it creates for people to gain knowledge , and personally speaking , MOOCs have changed my life , i live in 3rd world country where the quality of education is worse than you can imagine, but thanks to Coursera, Edx and Udacity , i managed to learn so many things , so what we should focus on , is that the opportunity it provides for people around the world to learn new things and change their lives in one way or another is the true factor that should be considered in the MOOC revolution .
In my experience over about a dozen completed courses and many more with less attentive participation, Certificate policies vary from course to course. Some of it is due to policies of the sponsoring institution, some is due to the business transaction between the institution or the instructor and Coursera. There's a whole host of branding issues that come with putting <i>Blub State University</i> on a course description. And good old BSU has a team of administrative staff that have nothing else to do than worry about BSU's brand.<p>That said, the Coursera Android App has become consistently worse. It wants to run at startup and once entered, never release the camera even after the app is stopped. To get rid of the camera-in-use toast, the app has to be uninstalled or the device rebooted. I came to the conclusion that unfortunately Coursera is headed down the road to finding the optimum between suck and income as a business model. Basically, it's given up on platform growth via innovation and is optimizing for Venture Capital fund liquidation timelines.<p>MOOC's are a model that can live off of exhaust fumes (in the words of Spolsky) but turning them into part of the people tracking infrastructure is simply more consistent with conventional wisdom and ten year investment fund timelines.<p>[edit:] On the 50% for a certificate comment, that's what Jeff Ullman does for his <i>Finite Automata</i> course and for me, it was non-trivial and required a lot of learning. There have been other courses where 90% and distinction was far easier.
Honestly, if someone's resume tells me they took (say) the Coursera Natural Language Processing course, never in a million years would it occur to me to ask to see the certificate, any more than I'd ask to see their transcript to verify that they took specific classes in college.<p>And vice versa, I have lots of Coursera courses on my resume, no one has ever asked to see my certificates either.
People in other comments are saying the certificates are pointless, or useless, or never needed. In contrast to their claims, recently when applying for a job I was asked for proof that I really do have a PhD. I have no idea where the certificate is, and pointed out in an email that certificates can, these days, easily be faked. To provide a certificate merely gives them grounds later, if they find I don't have a PhD after all, to claim that I actively misled them.<p>Instead I referred them to the British Library thesis lookup service[0] and pointed out that there's no way I could fake that. It was accepted (much to my relief!) but others may not have that option.<p>So sometimes some sort of documentary evidence of a qualification is going to be necessary.<p>[0] <a href="http://ethos.bl.uk" rel="nofollow">http://ethos.bl.uk</a>
"Free MOOC certificates for most platforms? Forget about it" would be a more accurate title.<p>Nevertheless, the post content is quite accurate. I was immensely disappointed with Coursera's decision to remove free statement of accomplishment certificates.<p>On the bright side, It seems that edX won't be implementing a policy change. The reason is quite simple: coursera is a for-profit and edx is a non-profit.<p>The largest and most popular MOOC platforms are nearly universally for-profit orgs: Udacity, Iversity, Coursera, Futurelearn. Same with programming education platforms: Codecademy, Codeschool, Treehouse, Lynda, Pluralsight.<p>Putting it in UN terms: This is a reason for grave concern.<p>Platforms like Treehouse and Codeschool have superior learning UX and require monthly payment of $25-50. While this is certainly not much, the majority users of worldwide internet users won't be able to afford this price tag.<p>Dangers to public benefit will become more pronounced as soon as M&A commence and online education will become an oligopoly. Pluralsight has already acquired Codeschool for $x0 MM.<p>As Gibson's quote goes: "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed."<p>If this massive disparity in access to knowledge persists we will find ourselves in the world predicted by cyberpunk authors.<p>Are we able to change this?
I honestly don't understand this. The article talks about revolutionizing the world of education and yet expects the online courses to give out certifications, like classical schools do. The free online courses exist so that you have free access to education, not that you have a piece of something that you can show to people. That might be an added benefit, and I see nothing wrong with strict requirements and charging money for it, but the primary purpose is the education, not the certificate.
The shame for me is that I occasionally used the "with distinction" grading to push myself where I might otherwise think I've done a "good enough" job understanding the content. It really helped push me over the line when taking the "Mathematical Biostats Boot Camp" series, which I enjoyed. <a href="https://www.coursera.org/course/biostats" rel="nofollow">https://www.coursera.org/course/biostats</a><p>It's silly, I know, but free certificates were the gamification of learning, and I'll miss that particular aspect of the game.
Certificates lose their meaning if they are doled out willy-nilly. Hence, Coursera has to implement (or at least try to) some sophisticated verification technology. This stuff doesn't come cheap; who's going to pay for it?<p>Me, personally, I don't care about certificates. I want the knowledge; and that is still free. Methinks the OP is making a big deal about a piece of paper.
Does this really demonstrate Coursera "giving up on the dream [of eliminating barriers to education]?"<p>IMO, the important thing about MOOCs has never been accreditation (show me an employer who actually cares about potential candidates' MOOC certifications, anyway), but simply making university-level courses available without the overhead of actually attending school. And in that regard, nothing's changed.
Y'know, back when I actually read the legalese, I feared some day Coursera would take their ball home and nobody would be allowed to play anymore:<p><a href="http://octave.1599824.n4.nabble.com/Stanford-University-Probabilistic-Graphical-Models-tp4470602p4470781.html" rel="nofollow">http://octave.1599824.n4.nabble.com/Stanford-University-Prob...</a><p>Granted, my fears at the time were about the materials vanishing, not the diplomas, but I still fear that the entire thing will some day become completely closed up.
Well that's what happens when you are trying to do charity AND make money - it doesn't make sense. Either it is free, or it is for profit. You have to choose which.<p>Khan Academy is free. MIT Courses on youtube are free.<p>These websites that want you to sign up, only be able to view courses at certain times, etc etc. Please, just give me youtube links and pdf/slides and have a forum for discussion.<p>This is not hard, youtube is free, pdf/slides are very cheap to host, as is a forum.<p>Why does Coursera even exist, what's the differentiating factor?
One thing I'd add is another comparison to edX. edX is a non-profit, while Coursera is for-profit.<p>Considering that point, I view the "bait-and-switch" slightly differently, but I agree more transparency is necessary.
I seem to remember that my certificate for Functional Programming with Scala had a shareable link code, whereas now it is only available to me. It's not anything I ever wanted to show someone, but it's slightly alarming from a company trust perspective that they would retroactively change the value of the free certificate.
I don't see the problem with charging for providing a valuable service. If Coursera is valuable then of course the people who contribute their time to making it so deserve to profit from their efforts. If it isn't valuable, then why does it matter what they charge?
I work for one of the large MOOC providers. We "sell" "certificates" as a means to enable us to keep on providing education for free for those who would otherwise not have access to it. Certificate sales enable us to function (e.g. pay for staff and infrastructure) and work with our university partners in putting on courses for free.<p>Every day we get email from learners complaining that we charge for certification. Everyday we also get email from learners thanking us for providing free education. It's a tough balance.
I accept that Coursera wants to earn money. But if paid, verified certificates can't fulfill this wish to Coursera (others on this discussion page already have argued, why it is not that easy to offer additional value for verified certificates), why doesn't Coursera try a completely different way to earn money:<p>It is often discussed on HN that there is a lack of qualified, say, programmers, data science experts etc. The "typical graduate" of Coursera courses is an ideal candidate to fulfill this role: Why doesn't Coursera instead let employers pay for access to their user database so that they can find high-potential candidates for their open jobs (a little bit similar to Stack Overflow Careers, but with a different focus). Why don't startups that look for underestimated, say, Python programmers search the Coursera database for good graduates of some Python programming course on Coursera. I can imagine that there could be money to be made if the often argued shortage of qualified programmers etc. is true.
MOOCs ultimately face the same problem that the old Chinese Imperial Exam had that (albeit circuitously) led to the holocaust of the Taiping Rebellion of 1850. You cannot create a true meritocracy for a number of reasons, gatekeeping being one of the biggest ones.<p><a href="http://www.sacu.org/examinations.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.sacu.org/examinations.html</a>
I am very happy to pay to get a certificate for a course that I actually get an opportunity (i.e. time) to finish. With a full-time job, a family, and side projects, it is generally hard for me to predict during sign-up if I'll be able to give enough time for course completion. It is also clear that if I do spent enough time on a course, the monetary value of my time spent and knowledge gained is much more than the cost of the certificate (I am based in the US). Additionally, while I care for the knowledge as the main thing, I do feel "why not" for the certificate too.<p>However, I do mind getting a certificate showing say a score of 51% when my score is 51% (instead of say 97%) just because I was unable to find time to finish. Does anyone else feel this way? Is my concern real? Assuming so, I would like to pay to get the certificate after I finish the course, not when I start it.
All of these MOOCs lack true verification of knowledge. Ultimately I think that the certification test should be done in person, at a cost to the person taking the test, since they are the ones who benefit most from the legitimacy of the certificate.<p>Also the signed certificate should include a clear photo of the person who took the test.
Who cares?<p>I don't think it matters in the slightest whether you got a certificate or not. These online courses provide a tremendous value by letting people <i>learn</i>. They are especially valuable for expanding your knowledge later on in life, when you already work.<p>As an employer, I don't care about certificates of any kind. I care about the person I'm hiring — and it isn't difficult for me to get a feel for his/her knowledge in a particular area.
I have take a lot of Coursera courses, and I guess this news is a bit of a downer, but not too much. For me, SOA is more of a memorabilia peace than any value, though I admit it is convenient to have an externally visible list of courses. But if any employer ever cared, I could just print out the profile page listing them anyway :)<p>OTOH, they have to make money somehow, and the fact that I still can learn so much without paying anything is plain awesome.
Thank you all for the discussion. I am on the support team at Coursera and wanted to share the official response we posted on the Coursera Junkie blog below.<p>+++<p>Hi Kathryn and readers,<p>My name is Hannah, and I’m on the support team here at Coursera. We’re glad that you raised this concern, and we sincerely apologize for any confusion around our policies.<p>We are fully committed to our mission of providing universal access to the world's best education. As such, we continue to offer free and open access to all courses. We also offer learners the option to earn Verified Certificates, which provide official recognition from Coursera and the partner institution offering the course and formally showcases their achievements. Our robust financial aid program offers full support to learners who can demonstrate that the registration fee for a Verified Certificate is beyond their financial means.<p>Coursera's free certificates, also called Statements of Accomplishment, were designed before we made Verified Certificates available. Over time, we noticed confusion regarding the relative significance of the free certificate and the Verified Certificate. The latter is an official document, while the former is an unofficial, unverified memento of the course. We chose to phase out Statements of Accomplishment in order to better distinguish the official status of the Verified Certificate.<p>Last November, we published a blog post (<a href="http://blog.coursera.org/post/102036391812/verified-certificates-ensure-academic-integrity" rel="nofollow">http://blog.coursera.org/post/102036391812/verified-certific...</a>) explaining the value of Verified Certificates and describing how most courses would no longer provide Statements of Accomplishment. Still, some older courses continue to offer Statements of Accomplishment, including the Child Psychology course you’ve referenced above. Understandably, that inconsistency has proven somewhat confusing.<p>We do our best to communicate changes clearly and will strive to be more transparent in our communication around such changes moving forward. If you have any further questions about Coursera’s certificates, I encourage you to visit this page in our learner help center: <a href="https://learner.coursera.help/hc/en-us/articles/201212139-Certificates-and-Course-Credit" rel="nofollow">https://learner.coursera.help/hc/en-us/articles/201212139-Ce...</a>.
Interesting article (and responses) on Coursera's actions, but am I the only one who objects to the clickbait title? This has nothing at all to do with the loss of free MOOCs, even with respect to Coursera itself.
I'm quite surprised there isn't a general "sigh of relief"
that this is happening...<p>HN is a tech news community, where many if not most of you who are working have tech salaries that can easily pay for the new Coursera pricing...<p>everyone knows the tech industry is volatile in the way that every few months, a new technology comes out that sends IT professionals scrambling to learn it in order to, not stay ahead of the pack, but just to keep up with the pack.<p>the enormous amount of free tech/programming/CS theory/knowledge from Coursera and others have created more competition in terms of tech jobs.<p>By principle, all members of our society deserves access to quality education, especially in the STEM areas. But let's face it -- this is good news for existing professionals in IT...for the most part ;-)
<p><pre><code> “The Statements of Accomplishment (free) and Verified
Certificates (signature track) will be provided to all
those who achieve 50% or higher grade, and will be released
within 1-2 weeks after the final submission deadline closes.
Everyone will be notified by email when they are ready. You
will be able to download the certificate from your course
records after they are released.”
</code></pre>
50% as a passing grade?