Summary:
· US MOOC website Coursera has reported that China has become its second largest market after the US, with more than one million Chinese users signing up to the site. Coursera initially operated in China through online translation partnerships with local companies before officially launching in late 2013. Rick Levin, CEO of Coursera, said in an interview that China has a strong demand for high-quality education and many Chinese users are attracted to famous universities that offer courses with Coursera. The site is currently working with 10 Chinese universities to create localised courses targeting Chinese users, as well as offering translated versions of many courses from overseas universities.
· From September 2015, the leading UK independent school Eton College will deliver online leadership courses to students in China through EtonX, established in partnership with a technology firm. The EtonX project will see pupils in China learning from a mixture of interactive content produced at Eton and one-to-one online teaching from tutors in the UK, and will be taught in English. The courses will be targeted at China's aspirational middle-class families, although the initial launch will be limited to “less than a dozen" schools in China. According to Percy Harrison, director of information technology at Eton College, this will allow the school to reach a wider number of pupils, without setting up an overseas campus, and the online venture would allow Eton to provide lessons for students in China without losing control of the quality.
· EIC, an education agent in China, launched its new learning system for IELTS and TOEFL test preparation. The new system will integrate offline classroom teaching and online learning platform called Prepsmith. The group has invested 15 million USD on research and development of the new system, which is based on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). EIC claims to be the first education agent to standardise its test preparation services in this way.
Analysis by Liu Xiaoxiao, Education Services Manager and Kevin Prest, Senior Analyst:
Despite the high regard for traditional higher education institutions in China, online education is becoming increasingly popular, with 6.15 million students enrolled in online higher education courses as of 2013. However, data from HESA shows that only 1,970 students in China were enrolled in formal distance learning courses operated by UK universities in 2013-14.
In the MOOC field, there are currently two main ways of operating open online courses in China. One of these is through a MOOC platform operated by traditional institutions supported by the Ministry of Education, such as XuetangX managed by Tsinghua University, while the other Is cooperation between MOOC operators and private internet companies such as Coursera’s cooperation with Chinese internet giant NetEase.
Sources:
1. http://www.bbc.com/news/education-33190029
2. http://www.scmp.com/tech/innovation/article/1823395/china-courseras-sec…
3. http://www.duozhi.com/company/201506143407.shtml