EMOOCs 2019

International and cross-institutional collaboration for solving real world problems
MOOCs are not only offering better access to (continuous) education, but also provide new opportunities to build education networks and learning communities on a truly global scale. Some universities and their partners have recently undertaken initiatives to explore these possibilities for international and cross-institutional collaboration. Examples of these are the global and European virtual exchange alliances, where over 10 universities offer MOOCs and online courses as electives to each other’s enrolled students and issue academic credit to them when they successfully finish the courses. Other examples are collaborations of universities that provide joint summer courses using MOOCs and using them as preparation for hybrid projects where students collaborate with professionals from ngo’s and businesses to solve challenges. These early explorations could point to a future with globally connected networks of universities and other partners that share their online courses and local facilities for real world projects, e.g. to solve some of the global grand challenges such as the United Nations Global Sustainability Goals (SDG’s).

Policy questions:

• 1. How can we leverage the abundant availability of open and online courses for international collaboration between academics, students and others, such as professionals working in businesses and non-profits around the world, to solve real world challenges?
• 2. What other international and interinstitutional collaborations could MOOCs and their platforms support? How could we us the collaborative strengths of the European Higher Education Area, such as the European Qualification Framework (EQF) or Erasmus+, to stimulate these kinds of collaborations?
• 3. What kind of financial and regulatory hurdles should be taken down and what stimuli should be introduced for universities to develop these types of international collaborations to enhance access to each others courses or collaborate on real world challenges?