Step up with SPOCs

Gauri Chhabra

In the “web-driven” world a lot of excitement has been witnessed about virtual instruction ever since massive open online courses (MOOCs) came into picture. Whether MOOCs can be as successful without providing the same level of learner support is still an open question and the euphoria seems to have given way to its more methodical cousin — Small Private Online Courses (SPOCs) so much so that SPOCs are fast emerging as the preferred model for specialised learning, taking the online approach to smaller, targeted-and revenue generating-classes.

Understanding SPOCs

SPOC is a version of MOOC used locally with on-campus students. The term “MOOC” (Massive Open Online Course) owes its genesis to 2008 when it was used to describe a 12-week online course — Connectivism and Connected Knowledge — designed by George Siemens and Stephen Downes and offered at the University of Manitoba, Canada. It refers to a means of instruction where students typically access interactive content at their own pace. Instructors set their own grading scale.

SPOCs are an amalgam of online resources and technology with personal engagement between faculty and students. Its implementation requires the faculty to determine which features and course content to utilise. This can include video lectures, assessments interactive labs, project-based work instead of lectures.

Gravitating towards SPOCs

Of late, the education fraternity has started gravitating towards SPOCs because of it being small and private. These courses might be free or paid, and delivered through the internet, but access is restricted to much smaller numbers, tens or hundreds, rather than tens of thousands. It means a selection process for applicants and the capacity for a more customised experience. Looking further down the track, it wouldn’t be difficult to imagine fees and course credits. This makes them selective. Anyone can apply, but acceptance is selective to limit enrollment.

Selectivity solves the critical problems that have plagued MOOCs — low levels of active participation, low retention rates, and variable student backgrounds. By limiting enrolment to selected students, SPOCs have the potential to become serious and effective online learning platforms that retain the MOOC’s magic of massive, open, and online. They open up a whole new dimension of possibilities for MOOCs. For example, a variation on selecting students up front may be to allow students to self-select via performance in the first few weeks of a course. In other words, all students are accepted in the beginning, but only those who participate actively and at a given level — determined by staff or peers using rubrics — are retained. This amounts to a two-phased enrolment process that’s initially open but becomes progressively selective in the latter phases of the course.

The smaller class size allows much more rigorous assessment and greater validation of identity and that is more closely tied to what kind of certification might be possible. It’s safe to say that in the quite near term there will be announcements of experiments in this area.

Implementation in Institutes

We’ve already entered the SPOC era. With the growing need for graduates and working professionals to constantly hone their skills in this time-crunched corporate order, SPOCs have come to stay. Colleges and universities can create SPOCs, or licence them. In the latter instance, a SPOC might give the instructor an opportunity to deliver the material directly to students using video delivered by another expert, instead of assigning an article to read.

ITM Group of Institutions offers SPOCs in various streams including Engineering, Management, Health Sciences, Hotel Management & Culinary Arts, Fashion & Interior Design. Its business schools in Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, and Navi Mumbai & Noida offer AICTE approved PGDM programmes.

The final word

Learning has come full circle and SPOCs are here to stay. Because of their increased access and availability, these offer more opportunities to students besides giving them the empowerment of remaining current all the time. These have brought distance learning to a new platform, empowering a type of learning that is possible while remaining in your own context.

Expert speak

“Institutions are engaging with SPOCs for extending their reach and access to education, improving educational outcomes for both participants and on-campus students, improving economics by lowering costs or increasing revenues, bringing about innovation in teaching and learning".

K P Gopal Krishnan, Director, Noida Campus, ITM Group of Institutions

Will SPOCs replace classroom learning?

This is the moot question that needs to be answered. SPOCs have been something of a hurricane in education arena, making a lot of noise. What is it that a student gets out of being on campus and being in the classroom? If students on campus prefer learning online, what does it mean for the universities? What happens if a recorded online lecture is preferable to a mediocre live talk? How do universities show their added value?

To answer these questions, we need to understand that SPOCs do not aim to replicate or replace classroom teaching rather they add something that is more flexible in this time crunched world andis more self- paced and effective.

Today, both the students and universities can’t ignore the significance of SPOCs. If you feel that they are just show reels for conventional courses, you are creating an island existence of your own. The really big questions are about what you get from the classroom, what works, what could be done better to make education more meaningful and making yourself more employable. Institutions that sit back and watch, may be in trouble. Imagine a large institution where there isn’t much difference between online and classroom — there is a big problem in such cases.