哈佛大學藝術與科學學院院長史密斯一日在電子郵件中指出，該校的學術誠信委員會已結束對作弊案的調查，其中逾半數個案的學生必須休學一段時間；休學時間不定，通常是二到四個學期；剩餘學生中有約半數被處以留校查看，其他人則不會受到懲處。
哈佛校方去年八月證實，春季學期的一門叫做「國會導論」、被視為營養學分課程的在家期末考中，有多達一百廿五名大學部學生作弊，助教發現這些學生可能互相抄襲。
哈佛校園報曾報導，涉案學生包括該校的美式足球、籃球與曲棍球等運動健將。哈佛籃球隊兩名副隊長在校方展開調查後，隨即被從代表隊名單中剔除。哈佛校方一日以學生隱私為由，不願討論任何個案。
部分哈佛校友與在校生並不贊同校方的處置，因為根據了解，該課程的任課教授突然更改在家考試的規定，從原本鼓勵學生可以公開討論合作作答，改成必須自行作答；批評者認為，此一新規定是否清楚傳達給所有人，令人質疑，因為有些助教曾違反新規定公開幫學生溫習試題。
專欄作者
在線課程掀起高等教育革命
托馬斯·弗里德曼 2013年02月01日
Till Hafenbrak
上帝知道，在今日的世界，有多少壞消息讓人沮喪，不過，有一件正在發生的大事讓我對未來
滿懷希望，那就是在全球範圍內正蓬勃興起的網絡高等教育革命。沒有哪樣事物有這麼大的潛力，能去消滅貧困，方法就是通過給窮人提供負擔得起的教育來讓他們
獲得一份工作、或改善他們現有的工作。沒有哪樣事物有這麼大的潛力，能解放十多億的頭腦來解決世界上最艱巨的問題。沒有哪樣事物有這麼大的潛力，能讓我們
重新構想高等教育，而我說的就是大型公開在線課程（massive open online
course，簡稱MOOC），這類高等教育平台正在由斯坦福大學(Stanford)、麻省理工學院(Massachusetts Institute
of Technology)等大學和Coursera以及Udacity等公司進行開發。
去年5月，我在Coursera剛剛上線時寫了一篇關於它的文章。Coursera是由斯坦福計算機學家達夫妮·科勒(Daphne Koller)和吳恩達(Andrew Ng)共同創建的。兩周之前，我返回帕洛阿爾托去再次拜訪這些網站。當我去年5月造訪該網站時，約有30萬人正在攻讀由斯坦福大學的教授和其他幾個高等學 府開設的38門課程。今天，這個網站擁有240萬學生，他們在學習包括八所國際性大學在內的33所大學開辦的214門課程，
阿南特·阿加瓦爾(Anant
Agarwal)曾任麻省理工學院人工智能實驗室主任，他現在是麻省理工學院和哈佛大學(Harvard)聯手打造的非營利MOOC項目——edX的總
裁。阿加瓦爾對我說，自去年5月以來，全球已有15.5萬名學生參加了edX的第一門課程：由麻省理工學院開設的電路學初級課程。他說，“參加這門課的學
生人數比麻省理工學院150年歷史中所有校友的人數還要高。”
的確，只有一小部分的學生完成了所有的功課，即便是他們，往往也來自其所在社會的中上層階級，不過我確信，在五年之內，這些平台將能觸及更廣大範圍 內的民眾。想像一下它可能如何改變美國的對外援助。美國可以用相對微不足道的資金，在埃及的村子裡租賃個空間，安裝20幾台電腦和高速衛星上網設施，僱傭 一名當地的老師來進行服務，再邀請任何想要學習在線課程的埃及人聆聽全球最棒的教授們的課程，這些課程還可提供阿拉伯文字幕。
你一定要聽聽這個行業的先行者們所說的故事，才能真正理解MOOC的那種革命性潛能。科勒最喜歡的一個故事是關於“丹尼爾”(Daniel)的。丹 尼爾是一名17歲的自閉症患者，他主要依靠計算機和別人交流。他參加了賓夕法尼亞大學(University of Pennsylvania)開辦的一門網絡現代詩課程。他和父母寫道，嚴格的學術課程迫使丹尼爾專註於手裡的任務，而在線學習系統不會受限於他在社交能力 方面的不足和他的注意力缺失症，或逼迫他與人對視，這些因素組合在一起，讓他能夠更好地控制自己的自閉症。科勒分享了來自丹尼爾的一封信，後者在信中寫 道：“請把我的故事告訴Coursera和賓夕法尼亞大學。我是一名正在走出自閉症的17歲男孩。目前我還無法坐在一間教室里，所以（你們的課）是我所上 過的第一個真正的課程。上課過程中，我必須要跟上班裡的進度，這在特殊教育當中前所未聞。現在，我知道自己必須努力學習，之後我就能從中獲益，我喜歡這種 與世界同步的感覺。”
Coursera團隊的一名成員最近參加了一門可持續發展課程，他對我說，這門課程比他上大學時所學的類似課程有趣很多。這門網絡課程包括來自世界 各地的學生，他們來自氣候不同的地域、收入水平和所在地的地理情況也不同，結果就是，與在美國一所典型大學裡“和來自類似地理環境及收入水平的群體進行的 討論相比，這門課程里的討論更有價值、也有趣得多。”
去年秋天，普林斯頓大學(Princeton University)社會學教授米切爾·鄧奈爾(Mitch Duneier)為《高等教育紀事報》(Chronicle of Higher Education)撰寫了一篇文章，文中講述了他通過Coursera平台教授一門課的經歷：“幾個月前，就在畢業典禮之後，普林斯頓大學校園變得幾乎 沉寂的時候，來自全球113個國家的4萬名學生通過互聯網來到這裡，參加了一門免費的社會學初級課程......作為開課後的首次公開討論的一部分，我對 C·懷特·米爾斯(C. Wright Mills)1959年的經典之作《社會學的想像》(The Sociological Imagination)進行了一次精讀，對其中的一篇核心章節進行了逐字逐句的研讀。我讓學生們對照自己手中的書，跟着我閱讀，就像我在校園課堂上所做 的那樣。當我在普林斯頓大學校園做講座時，我通常只能收到幾條鞭辟入裡的問題。然而這一次，類似的討論被貼上線才幾個小時，在線課堂論壇就湧現了數百條評 論和問題。數日之後，評論和問題的數量達到了數千條......三周之內，我收到的與自己的社會學見解有關的反饋比我整個教學生涯中收到的還要多，它們極 大地影響了我之後的每次大課和討論課。
edX的阿加瓦爾講述了一名開羅學生的故事，他參加了電路學課程的學習，並遇到了困難。在該課程的在線論壇里，學生們彼此互助，來完成作業。他在論 壇里發帖說，他正準備退課。其他參加了同一項課程的開羅學生做出回應，邀請他在一家茶館見面。他們在那裡提出幫他跟上課程進度。阿加瓦爾補充道，作為所修 的混合式課程的一部分，一名15歲的蒙古學生也參加了這個課程，他在期末考試時獲得了優異的成績，現在正在申請到麻省理工學院和加州大學伯克利分校 (University of California, Berkeley)就學。
麻省理工學院校長L·拉斐爾·賴夫(L. Rafael Reif)說，當我們把目光投向高等教育的未來時，現在被我們稱作“學位”的東西將成為一個與傳統的校內學習經歷相關聯的概念，而這種學習經歷也將越來越 多地利用科技和網絡，來強化在教室和實驗室進行的教學活動。與此同時，許多大學會給世界各地的學生提供在線課程，他們可以通過這些課程獲得“資格證書”， 這些證書可以證明他們已經完成了學業、通過了所有考試，賴夫表示。所有MOOC項目依然在完善一套流程，即開發可靠的資格證書評審系統，以確認一名學生已 經充分地掌握了課程內容、沒有作弊、而且能夠達到僱主的要求。一旦成功，MOOC將出現巨大增長。
很快，我就能見到這一天的來臨，屆時你能夠通過參加全球最棒的教授傳授的最佳在線課程，來獲得自己的大學學位。這些教授里，有一些是斯坦福大學的計 算機教授、有一些是沃頓商學院(The Wharton School)的企業經營學教授、有一些是布蘭迪斯大學(Brandeis University)的倫理學教授，有一些是愛丁堡大學(Edinburgh University)的文學教授，而你只需要支付少許結業證書費用即可。這種模式將改變教學、學習和就業的渠道。賴夫說，“一個嶄新的世界正在破殼而 出，每個人都必須做出改變，從而去適應它。”
去年5月，我在Coursera剛剛上線時寫了一篇關於它的文章。Coursera是由斯坦福計算機學家達夫妮·科勒(Daphne Koller)和吳恩達(Andrew Ng)共同創建的。兩周之前，我返回帕洛阿爾托去再次拜訪這些網站。當我去年5月造訪該網站時，約有30萬人正在攻讀由斯坦福大學的教授和其他幾個高等學 府開設的38門課程。今天，這個網站擁有240萬學生，他們在學習包括八所國際性大學在內的33所大學開辦的214門課程，
Josh Haner/The New York Times
托馬斯·L·弗里德曼
的確，只有一小部分的學生完成了所有的功課，即便是他們，往往也來自其所在社會的中上層階級，不過我確信，在五年之內，這些平台將能觸及更廣大範圍 內的民眾。想像一下它可能如何改變美國的對外援助。美國可以用相對微不足道的資金，在埃及的村子裡租賃個空間，安裝20幾台電腦和高速衛星上網設施，僱傭 一名當地的老師來進行服務，再邀請任何想要學習在線課程的埃及人聆聽全球最棒的教授們的課程，這些課程還可提供阿拉伯文字幕。
你一定要聽聽這個行業的先行者們所說的故事，才能真正理解MOOC的那種革命性潛能。科勒最喜歡的一個故事是關於“丹尼爾”(Daniel)的。丹 尼爾是一名17歲的自閉症患者，他主要依靠計算機和別人交流。他參加了賓夕法尼亞大學(University of Pennsylvania)開辦的一門網絡現代詩課程。他和父母寫道，嚴格的學術課程迫使丹尼爾專註於手裡的任務，而在線學習系統不會受限於他在社交能力 方面的不足和他的注意力缺失症，或逼迫他與人對視，這些因素組合在一起，讓他能夠更好地控制自己的自閉症。科勒分享了來自丹尼爾的一封信，後者在信中寫 道：“請把我的故事告訴Coursera和賓夕法尼亞大學。我是一名正在走出自閉症的17歲男孩。目前我還無法坐在一間教室里，所以（你們的課）是我所上 過的第一個真正的課程。上課過程中，我必須要跟上班裡的進度，這在特殊教育當中前所未聞。現在，我知道自己必須努力學習，之後我就能從中獲益，我喜歡這種 與世界同步的感覺。”
Coursera團隊的一名成員最近參加了一門可持續發展課程，他對我說，這門課程比他上大學時所學的類似課程有趣很多。這門網絡課程包括來自世界 各地的學生，他們來自氣候不同的地域、收入水平和所在地的地理情況也不同，結果就是，與在美國一所典型大學裡“和來自類似地理環境及收入水平的群體進行的 討論相比，這門課程里的討論更有價值、也有趣得多。”
去年秋天，普林斯頓大學(Princeton University)社會學教授米切爾·鄧奈爾(Mitch Duneier)為《高等教育紀事報》(Chronicle of Higher Education)撰寫了一篇文章，文中講述了他通過Coursera平台教授一門課的經歷：“幾個月前，就在畢業典禮之後，普林斯頓大學校園變得幾乎 沉寂的時候，來自全球113個國家的4萬名學生通過互聯網來到這裡，參加了一門免費的社會學初級課程......作為開課後的首次公開討論的一部分，我對 C·懷特·米爾斯(C. Wright Mills)1959年的經典之作《社會學的想像》(The Sociological Imagination)進行了一次精讀，對其中的一篇核心章節進行了逐字逐句的研讀。我讓學生們對照自己手中的書，跟着我閱讀，就像我在校園課堂上所做 的那樣。當我在普林斯頓大學校園做講座時，我通常只能收到幾條鞭辟入裡的問題。然而這一次，類似的討論被貼上線才幾個小時，在線課堂論壇就湧現了數百條評 論和問題。數日之後，評論和問題的數量達到了數千條......三周之內，我收到的與自己的社會學見解有關的反饋比我整個教學生涯中收到的還要多，它們極 大地影響了我之後的每次大課和討論課。
edX的阿加瓦爾講述了一名開羅學生的故事，他參加了電路學課程的學習，並遇到了困難。在該課程的在線論壇里，學生們彼此互助，來完成作業。他在論 壇里發帖說，他正準備退課。其他參加了同一項課程的開羅學生做出回應，邀請他在一家茶館見面。他們在那裡提出幫他跟上課程進度。阿加瓦爾補充道，作為所修 的混合式課程的一部分，一名15歲的蒙古學生也參加了這個課程，他在期末考試時獲得了優異的成績，現在正在申請到麻省理工學院和加州大學伯克利分校 (University of California, Berkeley)就學。
麻省理工學院校長L·拉斐爾·賴夫(L. Rafael Reif)說，當我們把目光投向高等教育的未來時，現在被我們稱作“學位”的東西將成為一個與傳統的校內學習經歷相關聯的概念，而這種學習經歷也將越來越 多地利用科技和網絡，來強化在教室和實驗室進行的教學活動。與此同時，許多大學會給世界各地的學生提供在線課程，他們可以通過這些課程獲得“資格證書”， 這些證書可以證明他們已經完成了學業、通過了所有考試，賴夫表示。所有MOOC項目依然在完善一套流程，即開發可靠的資格證書評審系統，以確認一名學生已 經充分地掌握了課程內容、沒有作弊、而且能夠達到僱主的要求。一旦成功，MOOC將出現巨大增長。
很快，我就能見到這一天的來臨，屆時你能夠通過參加全球最棒的教授傳授的最佳在線課程，來獲得自己的大學學位。這些教授里，有一些是斯坦福大學的計 算機教授、有一些是沃頓商學院(The Wharton School)的企業經營學教授、有一些是布蘭迪斯大學(Brandeis University)的倫理學教授，有一些是愛丁堡大學(Edinburgh University)的文學教授，而你只需要支付少許結業證書費用即可。這種模式將改變教學、學習和就業的渠道。賴夫說，“一個嶄新的世界正在破殼而 出，每個人都必須做出改變，從而去適應它。”
LORD knows there’s a lot of bad news in
the world today to get you down, but there is one big thing happening
that leaves me incredibly hopeful about the future, and that is the
budding revolution in global online higher education. Nothing has more
potential to lift more people out of poverty — by providing them an
affordable education to get a job or improve in the job they have.
Nothing has more potential to unlock a billion more brains to solve the
world’s biggest problems. And nothing has more potential to enable us to
reimagine higher education than the massive open online course, or
MOOC, platforms that are being developed by the likes of Stanford and
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and companies like Coursera
and Udacity.
Last May I wrote about Coursera — co-founded by the Stanford computer scientists Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng — just after it opened. Two weeks ago, I went back out to Palo Alto to check in on them. When I visited last May, about 300,000 people were taking 38 courses taught by Stanford professors and a few other elite universities. Today, they have 2.4 million students, taking 214 courses from 33 universities, including eight international ones.
Anant Agarwal, the former director of M.I.T.’s artificial
intelligence lab, is now president of edX, a nonprofit MOOC that M.I.T.
and Harvard are jointly building. Agarwal told me that since May, some
155,000 students from around the world have taken edX’s first course: an
M.I.T. intro class on circuits. “That is greater than the total number
of M.I.T. alumni in its 150-year history,” he said.
Yes, only a small percentage complete all the work, and even they still tend to be from the middle and upper classes of their societies, but I am convinced that within five years these platforms will reach a much broader demographic. Imagine how this might change U.S. foreign aid. For relatively little money, the U.S. could rent space in an Egyptian village, install two dozen computers and high-speed satellite Internet access, hire a local teacher as a facilitator, and invite in any Egyptian who wanted to take online courses with the best professors in the world, subtitled in Arabic.
YOU just have to hear the stories told by the pioneers in this industry to appreciate its revolutionary potential. One of Koller’s favorites is about “Daniel,” a 17-year-old with autism who communicates mainly by computer. He took an online modern poetry class from Penn. He and his parents wrote that the combination of rigorous academic curriculum, which requires Daniel to stay on task, and the online learning system that does not strain his social skills, attention deficits or force him to look anyone in the eye, enable him to better manage his autism. Koller shared a letter from Daniel, in which he wrote: “Please tell Coursera and Penn my story. I am a 17-year-old boy emerging from autism. I can’t yet sit still in a classroom so [your course] was my first real course ever. During the course, I had to keep pace with the class, which is unheard-of in special ed. Now I know I can benefit from having to work hard and enjoy being in sync with the world.”
One member of the Coursera team who recently took a Coursera course on sustainability told me that it was so much more interesting than a similar course he had taken as an undergrad. The online course included students from all over the world, from different climates, incomes levels and geographies, and, as a result, “the discussions that happened in that course were so much more valuable and interesting than with people of similar geography and income level” in a typical American college.
Mitch Duneier, a Princeton sociology professor, wrote an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education in the fall about his experience teaching a class through Coursera: “A few months ago, just as the campus of Princeton University had grown nearly silent after commencement, 40,000 students from 113 countries arrived here via the Internet to take a free course in introductory sociology. ... My opening discussion of C. Wright Mills’s classic 1959 book, ‘The Sociological Imagination,’ was a close reading of the text, in which I reviewed a key chapter line by line. I asked students to follow along in their own copies, as I do in the lecture hall. When I give this lecture on the Princeton campus, I usually receive a few penetrating questions. In this case, however, within a few hours of posting the online version, the course forums came alive with hundreds of comments and questions. Several days later there were thousands. ... Within three weeks I had received more feedback on my sociological ideas than I had in a career of teaching, which significantly influenced each of my subsequent lectures and seminars.”
Agarwal of edX tells of a student in Cairo who was taking the circuits course and was having difficulty. In the class’s online forum, where students help each other with homework, he posted that he was dropping out. In response, other students in Cairo in the same class invited him to meet at a teahouse, where they offered to help him stay in the course. A 15-year-old student in Mongolia, who took the same class as part of a blended course and received a perfect score on the final exam, added Agarwal, is now applying to M.I.T. and the University of California, Berkeley.
As we look to the future of higher education, said the M.I.T. president, L. Rafael Reif, something that we now call a “degree” will be a concept “connected with bricks and mortar” — and traditional on-campus experiences that will increasingly leverage technology and the Internet to enhance classroom and laboratory work. Alongside that, though, said Reif, many universities will offer online courses to students anywhere in the world, in which they will earn “credentials” — certificates that testify that they have done the work and passed all the exams. The process of developing credible credentials that verify that the student has adequately mastered the subject — and did not cheat — and can be counted on by employers is still being perfected by all the MOOCs. But once it is, this phenomenon will really scale.
I can see a day soon where you’ll create your own college degree by taking the best online courses from the best professors from around the world — some computing from Stanford, some entrepreneurship from Wharton, some ethics from Brandeis, some literature from Edinburgh — paying only the nominal fee for the certificates of completion. It will change teaching, learning and the pathway to employment. “There is a new world unfolding,” said Reif, “and everyone will have to adapt.”
Last May I wrote about Coursera — co-founded by the Stanford computer scientists Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng — just after it opened. Two weeks ago, I went back out to Palo Alto to check in on them. When I visited last May, about 300,000 people were taking 38 courses taught by Stanford professors and a few other elite universities. Today, they have 2.4 million students, taking 214 courses from 33 universities, including eight international ones.
Josh Haner/The New York Times
Thomas L. Friedman
Yes, only a small percentage complete all the work, and even they still tend to be from the middle and upper classes of their societies, but I am convinced that within five years these platforms will reach a much broader demographic. Imagine how this might change U.S. foreign aid. For relatively little money, the U.S. could rent space in an Egyptian village, install two dozen computers and high-speed satellite Internet access, hire a local teacher as a facilitator, and invite in any Egyptian who wanted to take online courses with the best professors in the world, subtitled in Arabic.
YOU just have to hear the stories told by the pioneers in this industry to appreciate its revolutionary potential. One of Koller’s favorites is about “Daniel,” a 17-year-old with autism who communicates mainly by computer. He took an online modern poetry class from Penn. He and his parents wrote that the combination of rigorous academic curriculum, which requires Daniel to stay on task, and the online learning system that does not strain his social skills, attention deficits or force him to look anyone in the eye, enable him to better manage his autism. Koller shared a letter from Daniel, in which he wrote: “Please tell Coursera and Penn my story. I am a 17-year-old boy emerging from autism. I can’t yet sit still in a classroom so [your course] was my first real course ever. During the course, I had to keep pace with the class, which is unheard-of in special ed. Now I know I can benefit from having to work hard and enjoy being in sync with the world.”
One member of the Coursera team who recently took a Coursera course on sustainability told me that it was so much more interesting than a similar course he had taken as an undergrad. The online course included students from all over the world, from different climates, incomes levels and geographies, and, as a result, “the discussions that happened in that course were so much more valuable and interesting than with people of similar geography and income level” in a typical American college.
Mitch Duneier, a Princeton sociology professor, wrote an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education in the fall about his experience teaching a class through Coursera: “A few months ago, just as the campus of Princeton University had grown nearly silent after commencement, 40,000 students from 113 countries arrived here via the Internet to take a free course in introductory sociology. ... My opening discussion of C. Wright Mills’s classic 1959 book, ‘The Sociological Imagination,’ was a close reading of the text, in which I reviewed a key chapter line by line. I asked students to follow along in their own copies, as I do in the lecture hall. When I give this lecture on the Princeton campus, I usually receive a few penetrating questions. In this case, however, within a few hours of posting the online version, the course forums came alive with hundreds of comments and questions. Several days later there were thousands. ... Within three weeks I had received more feedback on my sociological ideas than I had in a career of teaching, which significantly influenced each of my subsequent lectures and seminars.”
Agarwal of edX tells of a student in Cairo who was taking the circuits course and was having difficulty. In the class’s online forum, where students help each other with homework, he posted that he was dropping out. In response, other students in Cairo in the same class invited him to meet at a teahouse, where they offered to help him stay in the course. A 15-year-old student in Mongolia, who took the same class as part of a blended course and received a perfect score on the final exam, added Agarwal, is now applying to M.I.T. and the University of California, Berkeley.
As we look to the future of higher education, said the M.I.T. president, L. Rafael Reif, something that we now call a “degree” will be a concept “connected with bricks and mortar” — and traditional on-campus experiences that will increasingly leverage technology and the Internet to enhance classroom and laboratory work. Alongside that, though, said Reif, many universities will offer online courses to students anywhere in the world, in which they will earn “credentials” — certificates that testify that they have done the work and passed all the exams. The process of developing credible credentials that verify that the student has adequately mastered the subject — and did not cheat — and can be counted on by employers is still being perfected by all the MOOCs. But once it is, this phenomenon will really scale.
I can see a day soon where you’ll create your own college degree by taking the best online courses from the best professors from around the world — some computing from Stanford, some entrepreneurship from Wharton, some ethics from Brandeis, some literature from Edinburgh — paying only the nominal fee for the certificates of completion. It will change teaching, learning and the pathway to employment. “There is a new world unfolding,” said Reif, “and everyone will have to adapt.”
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