Greetings, I've searched the forums and haven't found much mention of Udacity. I'm interested to know if anyone here has taken their online courses that started at the beginning of the year. I've just enrolled in the CS101 course that starts in a couple weeks and am looking forward to learning some basic computer science. I also like the idea of providing this online learning resource to all free of charge. Any thoughts on whether or not this is the future of education--as some have claimed? Peace, db
I'd assume the reason why Udacity hasn't garnered much interest is because it doesn't offer degrees. It's been mentioned a few times, but overall, it's slightly better than khan academy at this point due to actually giving a grade at completion. The experience I have with CS101 is that (like MITX) they're offering content that's valuable but they've not come to terms with the schedules of distance learning. If I was a college student who would be committing a large chunk of my schedule to a classroom anyway, the content presented is appropriate. If I was a programmer already, the content presented is simple. However, as I was a full time employee working 50-60 hours during the term, I found myself aiming for a C immediately after week 3. What I will give them a great deal of credit for is making the class topic relevant and valuable in context to the material. (create your search engine). Having occasional appearances from Sergei Brin also was appreciated. They've obviously got connections and knowledge to share.
Last thoughts - 1. I do believe that the future of education is online modality. I also think we've got a long way to go. 2. I believe the next steps we'll see taken are online equivalents to Ivy courses. These courses won't cater to the mid-life professional who is also a student, but will give the conventional college student significant options.
I feel my experience with Udacity had the power to give a new direction to my life. I always liked science and technology, but in my country, the opportunities for a scientific career are few and poor pay. This, coupled with suggestions from my family led me to became a lawyer. However, I paid a high price for it: I have always been dissatisfied with the study of law, which, besides being very boring, is an area (in my opinion) where you work all the time with problems, but with little chance to do something to act on the root these problems, despite some are very, very repetitive. A place where the rate of innovation is measured by centuries (or, at best, decades), not years or months. I had even forgotten my geek vocation until I got in touch with TED Conference 2 or 3 years ago. What those people do are the things that I always dreamed of doing (using creativity to solve big problems). If, in advocacy, you can solve the problem of one or a few people, with science and technology you can solve 7,000,000,000 problems at once (or nearly so) with much more fun. Udacity meant for me an opportunity to put one foot in science and technology field, being taught directly by some of the brightest minds in the world. It was along time since I left school and took lessons in mathematics. But I was able to take CS101 course entirely! It was not easy. In unit 6, I had to miss a day of work to solve one starred homework (and I got it!). I was able, by myself, to solve all programming homeworks (they were about 6 or 7 a week) except one (7.2 starred). I found the the course level was excellent, challenging, maybe a little fast. Better than any classroom course that I remember. Professor David Evans is "a beautiful mind." And I really enjoyed his geek humor. I'm getting ready to enroll in one or more courses starting next week. I greatly admire the work of Peter Norvig, Sebastian Thrun, and now David Evans. I want to get the maximum amount of skills that Udacity can teach me. And from that, I want to work in the spirit of TED, trying to solve some problems. In some CS volunteer project, for example. It’s still early to conclude that, but the feeling I have is that Udacity is allowing me to make a "return" on the road of life, so I can do what I ever loved (science/technology), but, for financial reasons and accidents of fate, I eventually lost. Law, besides being a tedious subject, exposes you all the time to death, pain and a constant struggle (often dishonest) for small interests. This reality, as Stanley Kubrick pointed (Stanley Kubrick on Life Playboy: If life is so... - Lapidarium), leads us to "lose faith in the ultimate goodness of man" and "subtly erode our 'joie de vivre' (a keen enjoyment of living)." With Udacity, I learned the basics of computer programming. But more important, I experienced "the rebirth of life's élan (enthusiastic and assured vigor and liveliness)."
It seems that the program is now self-paced. When I signed in to my Udacity account today (the first day of CS101), I was greeted with the following message: "Dear students, We have listened to the feedback from the first round of courses about how awesome, engaging, exciting and educational, but also time consuming, our classes are. We are aware that most of you have many commitments in your life - job, family, studies at offline brick-and-mortar universities, house, garden, pets, vacations, travel plans, and many other things that are incompatible with our deadline based course model. Therefore we have decided to see if making our courses self-paced will enable more people to enjoy our content and learn new and exciting things. The two courses that are offered for the second time - CS101 (Building a Search Engine) and CS373 (Programming a Robotic Car) will have no deadlines, and you will be able to work through them at your own pace. You can start at any time, and take as much time as needed to finish the course. This self-paced version of the courses will stay open and accessible for everyone, even if at later time a revised version of these courses will be released." This actually works quite well for me since my spring is busier than I thought it would be. We'll see what happens. Peace, db
