Abstract:

Although universities and other educational institutions offered free classes, public lectures, summer schools and alike for free in the past, it was the combination of the technical possibilities of the internet and social initiatives towards openness (among others open access open government). In 2001 the Creative Commons were founded and MIT started the OpenCourseWare initiative , in collaboration with the Hewlett foundation.

The 2012-Paris declaration on Open Education claims “that the term Open Educational Resources (OER) was coined at UNESCO’s 2002 Forum on Open Courseware and designates “teaching, learning and research materials in any medium, digital or otherwise, that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions”. A new occurrence was the MOOC , a course of George Siemens and Stephen Downes, Connectivism and Connective Knowledge (CCK08). It attracted 25 25 tuition-paying on-campus students at the University of Manitoba, and over 2000 online students following the course for free. The New York Times labelled 2012 “the year of the MOOCS” .

Yet, four years later, the sustainability of MOOCs and Open Education is doubted. Even accepting that the number of courses is growing explosively, the website OCR lists several shortcomings. MOOCs are criticized because of their teaching methods, the way content is presented (edutainment), their Anglo-Saxon orientation (75% of the MOOCs is taught in English) and their bad completion rates. According to OCR: Economists analyzing creators’ claims to a near-zero marginal cost have pointed out that losing learners will inevitably cost money. Many of these critics assume that if MOOCs are going to succeed, their completion rates should reflect completion rates at the colleges they are sponsored by. Or worse, that MOOCs operate on a business model very similar to (and that threatens) that of a traditional university. Pointing out that their business model targets a different audience than traditional colleges, creators prefer to look at more contextual metrics like low product cost, international reach, and comparisons of retention rates and intent as more accurate indicators of MOOC success.

In this paper we evaluate several different systems as suggested in the literature, using the two-layer business model canvas as developed by Sanderse and de Langen in analyzing the business models of NGOs. Furthermore, one actual system will be analyzed through a case study, using the questionnaire developed alongside the two-layer business model. Proposition is that collaboration is essential for the long term survival of open educational systems.

The combined analyzes of the models featuring in the literature and the case study suggest that more research in forms of collaboration are needed, to move towards an European system of Open Education.

Keywords:

Open eduction, MOOCs.