This document discusses developments and challenges of MOOCs in India and China. It notes that while early hype suggested MOOCs could benefit underprivileged learners, completion rates are generally poor and participants tend to be highly educated males from Western countries. Both India and China have established national MOOC platforms, with China's XuetangX platform partnering with universities to offer credit recognition. While MOOCs aim to improve quality, there are concerns they could reinforce neo-colonial notions of knowledge and that populations may lack readiness for self-regulated online learning. Overall, MOOCs are seen as having potential but more needs to be done to reach lower socioeconomic groups.

1. Massive Open Online Courses in
India and China – Developments
and Challenges
Janesh Sanzgiri
PhD Student
Institute of Educational Technology
The Open University (UK)

2. Outline
• MOOCs in the Developing World – The hype and the reality
• MOOC Developments in China
• MOOC Developments in India
• Reflections on MOOCs in India and China

3. MOOCs in the Developing World – The
hype and the reality
 “Nothing has more potential to unlock a billion more brains to solve the world’s
biggest problems… than the MOOC” (Friedman 2013)
Coursera MOOCs can benefit learners in the developing world who currently lack
access to higher education (Koller 2012)
MOOCs can give underprivileged learners in the developing world access to ‘top
courses from top professors’ (Agarwal 2013)
Anecdotal accounts of learners in the developing world taking MOOCs and finding
employment, or gaining admission into universities.

4. MOOCs in the Developing World – The
hype and the reality
• Completion rates are poor (Jordan 2014), however international learners more likely
to complete (Nesterko et al. 2013)
• Most MOOC participants, highly educated, male, Western (Deboer et al. 2013;
Zhenghao et al. 2015)
• Gender disparity further skewed in BRICs nations(Christensen et al. 2013)
• Steady shift away from Openness
• Less than 10% of MOOC Research from Asia, 5.4% from China, less than 1% from
India (Veletsianos and Shepherdson 2016)

5. MOOC Developments in China
• Chinese universities offering over 140 English courses from 12 universities (Shen et
al. 2016)
• Investment to improve reputation of university, increase knowledge about Chinese
Culture, History and Art
• Significant investment in leads to the creation of a number of platforms: CNMOOC
(Shanghai Jiaotong University), China University MOOC (NetEase) and Chinese MOOC
(Peking University and Alibaba) (Xiang 2015).

6. MOOC Developments in China -
XuetangX
• First and Largest MOOC platform in
China, formed by Tsinghua
University
• Has over 5 million unique learners
and over 400 courses (Shah 2016)
• Partner universities can use MOOC
content to deliver their own
courses in a blended format
• ‘Licensed’ MOOC content from
Western platforms - translated into
Chinese with local instructors.
Image taken from Shah (2016)

7. MOOC Developments in India
•Significant enrolments from Indians on the three major US MOOC platforms
(Coursera, edX, Udacity)
•Between 10-15% of all total enrolments (Nair 2013)
• Indian learners on Western platforms tend to be more educated, over 80% of
learners have postsecondary degrees and younger (average age 26) than Western
learners (Alcorn et al. 2015)

8. MOOC Developments in India - NPTEL
 National Programme on
Technology Enhanced Learning –
Started as an OER repository along
the lines of MIT-OCW
 922 Courses, mostly in Engineering
and Technology – All under Open
License
 NPTEL MOOCs - 225 Courses

9. MOOC Developments in India - SWAYAM
•Envisioned in 2014, launched in
2016
•All Public universities across India
can deliver courses
•Uses indigenous LMS
•High School – Post Grad Level
Courses
•Test-Prep

10. Reflections on MOOCs in India and
China
• Improving Quality within existing University system
• MOOCs positioned as outside disruption to formal higher education – particularly
as a response to the rising cost of education.
• In India and China, MOOCs are positioned as an internal development in order to
improve the quality of education for the large number of students who are not in
the few elite institutions.
• The use of Blended MOOCs in both India and China, as well as supplementing
learning at second and third tier colleges.

11. Reflections on MOOCs in India and
China
Credentialing
• While Coursera, edX, Udacity have attempted creating formal credentials with their
‘nano-degrees’ – recognized credentialing is still a major issue concerning MOOCs
in the West
• XuetangX partner universities can recognize MOOCs for formal credit. So far over
24,000 students have taken formal credit courses from XuetangX (Shah 2016)
• Indian Government has passed a resolution that up to 20% of all credit towards a
degree can come from its MOOC platform SWAYAM (University Grants Commission
2016)

12. Reflections on MOOCs in India and
China
MOOCs as neo-colonialism
• Within the broader OER movement, there have been arguments that the notion of
delivering content from “high quality” Western universities to the passive Global
South suggests a form of neo-colonialism (Glennie, Harley, Butcher & Wyk 2012)
• Early notions of MOOCs bringing about a democratization of learning assumes that
knowledge is neutral (Altbach 2014)
• MOOCs reinforce the academic traditions, methodological orientations and teaching
philosophies of specific academic systems (Wahyudi and Malik 2014) This may be
more pronounced in some disciplines than others.

13. Reflections on MOOCs in India and
China
‘MOOC-Readiness’ of the learner population
• Research has shown that MOOC learners that can self-regulate their learning are
most successful (Kizilcic et al. 2016; Littlejohn et al. 2016).
• Further, a set of digital literacies, capabilities and behaviours are required to be
successful in MOOCs (Liyanagunawardena et al. 2013)

14. Conclusions
•Despite stagnating interest in MOOCs in the West, particularly in the US, both Indian
and Chinese Governments are optimistic about the potential of MOOCs to improve
the quality of their higher education
•The use of SPOCs and Blended MOOCs are gaining in popularity, particularly in China,
along with the provision of formal credit for taking MOOCs
•However, MOOCs and other technology enhanced learning initiatives are yet to reach
the lower stratum of society
•There is a need for innovative, frugal and contextually beneficial courses for low
socio-economic groups in both countries

15. References
Agarwal, A. (2013). Why massive open online courses (still) matter. TED. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/anant_agarwal_why_massively_open_online_courses_still_matter?language=en
Alcorn, B., Christensen, G., & Kapur, D. (2015). Higher Education and MOOCs in India and the Global South. Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, 47(3), 42–49.
Altbach, P. G. (2014). MOOCs as Neocolonialism : Who Controls Knowledge ? International Higher Education, (75), 5–7.
Christensen, G., Steinmetz, A., Alcorn, B., Bennett, A., Woods, D., & Emanuel, E. J. (2013). The MOOC Phenomenon : Who Takes Massive Open Online Courses and Why ?
Deboer, J., Seaton, D. T., & Breslow, L. (2013). Diversity in MOOC Students ’ Backgrounds and Behaviors in Relationship to Performance in 6 . 002x. Proceedings of the Sixth Learning International Networks Consortium Conference,
1–10.
Glennie, J., Harley, K., Butcher, N., & Wyk, T. Van. (2012). Open Educational Resources and Change in Higher Education : Reflections from Practice. PERSPECTIVES ON OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNING Open Educational Resources
and Change in Higher Education Reflections from Practice.
Jordan, K. (2014, February 24). Initial trends in enrolment and completion of massive open online courses. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning. Retrieved from http://oro.open.ac.uk/39592/1/1651-
13695-1-IRRODL.pdf
Kizilcec, R. F., Pérez-Sanagustín, M., & Maldonado, J. J. (2016). Self-regulated learning strategies predict learner behavior and goal attainment in Massive Open Online Courses. Computers & Education, 104.
http://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2016.10.001
Koller, D. (2012). What we are learning from online education. TED.
Littlejohn, A., Hood, N., Milligan, C., & Mustain, P. (2016). Learning in MOOCs: Motivations and self-regulated learning in MOOCs. Internet and Higher Education, 29, 40–48. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2015.12.003
Liyanagunawardena, T., Williams, S., & Adams, A. (2013). The impact and reach of MOOCs: a developing countries’ perspective. eLearning Papers, 33. Retrieved from http://centaur.reading.ac.uk/32452/
Nair, M. (2013). MOOCs click with Indians. Retrieved from http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-times/deep-focus/MOOCs-click-with-Indians/articleshow/21890105.cms
Nesterko, S. O., Dotsenko, S., Hu, Q., Seaton, D., Reich, J., Chuang, I., & Ho, A. (2013). Evaluating Geographic Data in MOOCs, 1–7.
Shah, D. (2016). XuetangX: A Look at China’s First and Biggest MOOC Platform. Retrieved from https://www.class-central.com/report/xuetangx/
Shen, J., Ye, M., Wang, Y., & Zhao, Y. (2016). Massive open online course (MOOC) in China: Status quo, opportunities, and challenges. 2016 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), (April), 1106–1108.
http://doi.org/10.1109/EDUCON.2016.7474692

16. Thank you
Janesh Sanzgiri
Twitter: @janeshsanzgiri
PhD Student
Institute of Educational Technology
The Open University, UK
PhD Thesis: “A Comparative Study of Indian Learners in Local and Global Massive Open Online Courses”
Supervisors: Martin Weller, Leigh-Anne Perryman, Robert Farrow