MOOCs (like those offered by edX) are free for students to participate in. If they weren’t, their business model would be largely indistinguishable from distance learning institutions like the Open University.
Sir Michael Barber, once of the Prime Ministers Delivery Unit under the last Labour Government and now chief education adviser at publishing and education company Pearson is reported in the Times Higher Education today as saying:
“If a student wants to do some courses from a MOOC at Stanford or Harvard, some other courses from Oxford, another from Melbourne and another one from the National University of Singapore, what’s the argument for not funding that if they are going to get a great education?”
What next? Is he going to suggest that people who read free books from libraries should get funding too?
(And yes, I know that edX has signed a deal with Pearson to pilot a way of introducing invigilated examinations for these courses. Maybe that’s the bit of MOOCs that Sir Michael really wants the funding for, but is too shy to say so …)