MOOC motivations

I’m a little overwhelmed by the number of participants on the course – there are hundreds of participant introduction posts, and though there’s very little conversation, I thought I’d do a micro-micro-ethnography on their motivations for taking the MOOC. I haven’t read all of the posts because it’d take hours, but there’s definitely a convergence in terms of the reasons why students admit to signing up for the MOOC.

Here they are. Not in any particular order.

1. I’m a lifelong learner: the phrase comes up fairly frequently, but it’s pretty clear that there are some people on the course who just like learning, and identify as a learner. They haven’t expressed the reason why they chose this particular MOOC, but their principal motivation is learning.

2. I wanted to try out an online course: “Warren Buffet [sic] likes online courses”, writes one person. These are people who are not necessarily confirmed learners, but they’re just testing the waters. It’ll be interesting to see if any of them assess their experiences later on.

3. I work in another industry, but I’m interested in investigative journalism: some people are just interested in the subject, though they’re in other professions or are happily employed in other areas; from what I can tell, they’re not nursing any ambition to switch professions, but journalism is a hobby or something that they find particularly fascinating.

4. I work in another industry, but something is happening in my country and I want to know how to report it: some participants are enrolled in the course in response to a particular problem in their communities, and they want to understand it, to learn how to write about it, and to disseminate what they’ve written.

5. I work in another industry, but I’m interested in becoming an investigative journalist: for some people, this is the first step in their career change to investigative journalism; some are ‘testing the water’, as it were; others are committed to this change, and would like the experience and knowledge.

6. I’m a journalist, and I want to enrich my understanding of my career: wanting to get better at investigative journalism is probably the most commonly cited reason on the introduction boards, and it’s probably the most simple to understand.

7. I’m a journalist, and I want to promote my work and writing: there are a few people openly promoting themselves, their blogs, their businesses; it’ll be interesting to see how (or if) they contribute to discussion where it is less appropriate to mention their twitter handle or link to their LinkedIn page.

8. I’m a journalist, and I’m looking for new collaborative projects: again, these people are openly there for the community, rather than for the content of the learning that they might do.