1
00:00:00,390 --> 00:00:04,140
So, how fast will these studies trickle to
improvements on

2
00:00:04,140 --> 00:00:08,331
the MOOC format, or even improvements in
education in general?

3
00:00:08,331 --> 00:00:10,856
Well, pretty fast, I would say.

4
00:00:10,856 --> 00:00:13,490
To explain this, I'll need to describe how
startups work.

5
00:00:14,770 --> 00:00:17,495
Here's the startup iteration cycle.

6
00:00:17,495 --> 00:00:22,396
We see that we have a product, such as the
Coursera portal for Coursera.

7
00:00:22,396 --> 00:00:25,272
It can be used to measure all kinds of
data.

8
00:00:25,272 --> 00:00:28,032
That could be via A/B testing, for
instance,

9
00:00:28,032 --> 00:00:30,447
as I just explained, or maybe using other

10
00:00:30,447 --> 00:00:33,690
metrics, enrollment in a course or the
click-through

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00:00:33,690 --> 00:00:36,442
on emails that have been sent to the
students.

12
00:00:36,442 --> 00:00:38,458
Armed with all this data, the startup

13
00:00:38,458 --> 00:00:40,978
engineers can learn about areas that would
need

14
00:00:40,978 --> 00:00:46,230
improvement, and they can generate new
ideas and things to do and build that in.

15
00:00:46,230 --> 00:00:48,830
The whole cycle is not groundbreaking,
sure.

16
00:00:48,830 --> 00:00:50,230
I'm not claiming it is.

17
00:00:50,230 --> 00:00:53,280
The difference is that this cycle is not
bothered

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00:00:53,280 --> 00:00:56,320
by the usual very slow methodology of
education research.

19
00:00:57,720 --> 00:01:01,685
Sure, this data can be spun off into
papers, and that's what education

20
00:01:01,685 --> 00:01:06,312
researchers have to do, are currently
doing, because that's what their job is.

21
00:01:06,312 --> 00:01:08,284
But, by the time those studies are

22
00:01:08,284 --> 00:01:11,140
published, the engineers will have already
gone

23
00:01:11,140 --> 00:01:13,860
through several iterations of this cycle,
and

24
00:01:13,860 --> 00:01:17,124
the newly published results will already
be obsolete.

25
00:01:17,124 --> 00:01:21,188
They'll, they will already have improved
the platform.

26
00:01:21,188 --> 00:01:25,878
The big, big, difference with five years
ago is that now education is the next area

27
00:01:25,878 --> 00:01:28,692
where software engineers can make an
impact, and

28
00:01:28,692 --> 00:01:31,704
hundreds are working on making it more
efficient.

29
00:01:31,704 --> 00:01:36,480
This is completely new, and you can expect
it to show effects very, very fast.

30
00:01:37,530 --> 00:01:40,282
Just as for many other industries that you
know of,

31
00:01:40,282 --> 00:01:43,690
such as the book industry, the travel
industry, et cetera.