Massive open online courses have evolved quickly, and it’s instructive to look back at the earliest experiments in this new form of open learning. George Siemens, a researcher and strategist at Athabasca University’s Technology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute, makes the case for why colleges should experiment with inviting tens of thousands of students to participate in their courses free online. Since the Tech Therapy team conducted the interview two years ago, talk of MOOCs is no…

The latest discussions of MOOCs and other online courses often leave out consideration of minority students and the obstacles they might face in gaining access to technology, argues Corey Davis, director of online learning at Our Lady of the Lake University, in Texas. He challenges the Tech Therapy team and others to tell more-diverse stories as they consider the recent online boom.

Links mentioned in this episode: MOOC 2.0 blog

Each month The Chronicle’s Tech Therapy podcast offers analysis o…

Academic journals don’t happen by magic, and even online editions are expensive to produce in ways that scholars may not realize. That’s the argument by two scholarly publishers, Fred Dylla (right), executive director at the American Institute of Physics, and Brian D. Scanlan (left), president of Thieme Publishers. The two give their response to comments by our guest from last month’s show, a scholar who argued that in an online world journals should publish scholarly articles free online.
 
Do…

David Parry, an assistant professor of emerging media and communications at the University of Texas at Dallas, argues that scholars have an obligation to publish their research in journals that make free copies available online. The Tech Therapy team talks with him about how the debate over open access to research has heated up in recent months, and invites journal publishers to give their views on next month’s podcast.

Links discussed in this episode: Memorials for Aaron Swartz Turn to Discuss…

Dale J. Stephens, who was home-schooled as a kid, argues that people can direct their own college-level learning without ever setting foot on a traditional campus. Now he is faced with spelling out what his alternative might look like—including running an admissions process and establishing a $12,000 “gap year” that teaches students how to teach themselves. Mr. Stephens explains his vision to the Tech Therapy team, who ask how he plans to avoid the trappings of institutions that he criticizes.

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With so many messages coming in, many people on campuses are feeling a sense of overload. The Tech Therapy team talks with Brett Foster, an associate professor of English at Wheaton College, in Illinois, about his experiment in keeping his inbox to zero each day.

Links discussed in this episode: Chronicle Review essay on “E-Mail Nirvana”
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Each month The Chronicle’s Tech Therapy podcast offers analysis of and advice …

Scott Carlson, a senior reporter at The Chronicle, talks about a new series on reinventing colleges, as the Tech Therapy team celebrates its 100th episode. Mr. Carlson was the original host of the show and now covers the business of higher education.

Links discussed in this episode: The Chronicle’s Reinvention Series | Rebooting the Academy e-book | Tech Therapy episode on coping with technology

Download this recording as an MP3 file, or subscribe to Tech Therapy on iTunes.

Each month The Chro…

Wearable computers may be coming to campus sooner than you think. Google recently announced “Project Glass,” a pair of glasses that contains a computer display and camera so that wearers can see text messages, directions, or other information right in their field of vision, and some say it is a sign of a coming age of “augmented reality” devices. The Tech Therapy team talked with Amber Case, a self-described cyborg anthropologist, about what the technology could mean for colleges.

Links discuss…