Online Courses Look for a Business Model

As we think about how we can make our own Distance Learning courses sustainable and revenue generating in the future, I'd like to share this Wall Street Journal article titled "Online Courses Look for a Business Model." Just as we find challenges with a sustainable, revenue generating and profitable online course model, so does the business sector. The article focuses on unlocking the potential profitability of the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) by finding a successful business model(s). MOOC providers such as Udacity, Coursera and edX are still figuring out how to keep basic course access free while generating revenue.

Some business models that are being tested include:

matching students to employers
licensing content to schools
charging for proctored exams

At this point, it is still unclear if any of these models will be successful in the long term to generate sustainable revenue and profits. However, investors and increasingly higher education recognize MOOCs potential and want to jump on the band wagon before it's too late.

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Scratch - OWAU discussion 10/28

Aloha kākou, I while back, I learned about this product from a presentation at the eSchool conference. The speaker was so excited about Scratch and was having so much fun demonstrating it that my mind began racing immediately. "I could use it in `Ike Hawai`i courses and I bet I could use it to develop tons of activities for the A`o Makua `ōlelo Hawai`i courses". Then, reality set in as I returned to work intending to try it out after I finished my "next" task. Well, you know how that goes. 7 months later, I finally took a stab at it out of necessity of course. I really wanted some type of activity to teach my students about different Kapu in old Hawai`i without having them just read a list of them. So, what it Sratch? Simply put, it's a developer's tool (a very inexpereinced developer like myself). It allows you to create activities and games using "coding" that is in a drag and drop format. The codes are pre-written & range from phrases like ...

Geotagging

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Kamehameha Schools Distance Learning (KSDL) Owau

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