MIT digital learning dean quits as edX sale backlash grows | Times Higher Education (THE)

"The dean of digital learning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has resigned as a faculty revolt against the sale of non-profit online course platform edX to for-profit competitor 2U grows, Times Higher Education can reveal.

Krishna Rajagopal, who has announced his departure, told colleagues that he had “serious continuing reservations about the path forward for edX that MIT has announced”. Meanwhile, many of his colleagues have vowed to create a new non-profit alternative platform to distribute their courses online.

MIT created edX with Harvard University and developed it to have 160 partner institutions serving nearly 40 million students, many of them overseas – only to acknowledge that the idea of providing elite-level courses at no charge would struggle for financial sustainability.

But selling the platform to 2U for $800 million (£580 million) was blasted by several MIT faculty as a betrayal by the institution’s president, L. Rafael Reif....

Others who declared their distress over the sale – and promised to leave edX for the planned faculty-organised alternative – includedEsther Duflo, MIT’s Nobel prizewinning professor of poverty alleviation and development economics.

Professor Duflo said that the free distribution of MIT courses over edX had helped many students abroad in recent years – including some who later took regular MIT classes – and said that such work did not now appear “compatible with” edX’s apparent mission under the control of 2U....

Others who declared their distress over the sale – and promised to leave edX for the planned faculty-organised alternative – includedEsther Duflo, MIT’s Nobel prizewinning professor of poverty alleviation and development economics.

Professor Duflo said that the free distribution of MIT courses over edX had helped many students abroad in recent years – including some who later took regular MIT classes – and said that such work did not now appear “compatible with” edX’s apparent mission under the control of 2U....

Stephanie Hall, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation, noted that the agreement requires edX to offer free courses for only another five years. “So 2U has essentially purchased a massive lead generator that will help them export a predatory model on a grander scale in low- and middle-income countries,” Dr Hall said."