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The future of massive open online courses ¨C whether as a new academic horizon or a chance to ¡°get rid of the duff scholars¡± ¨C was debated at this year¡¯s Battle of Ideas Festival, held on 19 and 20?October.

Chairing ¡°Laptop University? The Future of HE¡±, an event at London¡¯s Barbican Centre in association with Times Higher Education, Toby Marshall, curriculum manager at Havering College of Further and Higher Education, asked whether Moocs were ¡°a threat, an opportunity, a tool¡±, or even ¡°a mirror into the soul of frustrated academics¡±.

Matt Walton, head of product at FutureLearn ¨C the first UK Mooc platform, owned by The Open University ¨C suggested its courses were ¡°good for learning new skills alongside a full-time job¡±. Despite predictions, podcasts had actually led to people listening to more radio, he said: in the same way, Moocs might ¡°rekindle the love for learning¡±.

But Diana Laurillard, professor of learning with digital technologies at the Institute of Education, noted that although Moocs marked a welcome return of the ¡°talking head¡±, ¡°students need nurturing and guidance as well as lectures¡±. Moocs might be the ¡°21st-century answer to the public libraries of the 20th?century¡±, but neither in themselves amounted to an education.

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She also commented that the small proportion of people who had completed Moocs tended to be ¡°professionals who already had several degrees¡±. Was there something odd about a situation where ¡°campus students are paying ?9,000 a year to subsidise the education of highly paid professionals¡±?

Dennis Hayes, professor of education at the University of Derby, was unimpressed by claims that ¡°iPhones are making universities redundant¡±. He even cited a pro vice-chancellor who believed we could ¡°now get rid of the duff scholars and listen to¡­Harvard¡±.

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Yet this rested on a fallacy, he said: ¡°Access to information is not only confused with knowledge and understanding but also seen as a substitute for them.¡±

Real education, by contrast, always required ¡°an intense engagement with intellectual authorities¡±.

matthew.reisz@tsleducation.com