World moving towards modular model of education: Anant Agarwal, edX founder

A bachelor's degree in pure history or computer science or a master's degree in business management may not be enough to see you through your career, he adds

Circuits and Electronics is one of the most popular courses at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Until recently, the course was offered twice a year to around 100 students each time. In 2012, this course was offered through edX, an online course provider set up jointly by Harvard and MIT. More than 155,000 learners from 120 countries enrolled, and over 7,500 completed the course that year. It would have taken MIT professors over 35 years to teach so many students on campus! Since then, edX has grown by leaps and bounds, both in terms of reach and the courses on offer. The platform claims that over 82 million have enrolled for its courses. India is the platform’s second largest market and represents around 10 per cent of its total learner base. Of the total enrolments, India accounts for about 6.3 million. 

Professor Anant Agarwal, the founder of edX, is an IIT Chennai alumnus, professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT and director of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. He’s also on the international advisory board of IIM, Bengaluru. A Padma Shri awardee, and a recipient of the $4 million Yidan Prize for Education (founded by Charles Chen Yidan, co-founder of Tencent) Agarwal donated $2 million of his prize money to edX. In India last month, to meet university heads and industry leaders such as Ratan Tata and Anand Mahindra, Agarwal spoke to Anjuli Bhargava on how edX’s micro credential courses are benefiting Indian students and what the future may bring. Edited excerpts:

You introduced micro credentials at the master’s level in 2016. How has that fared so far?

We have 25 million students on our platform. The world is moving towards a future of education that is “modular” and “stacked” as opposed to a “one size fits all”. In other words, a bachelor’s degree in pure history or computer science or a master’s degree in business management may not be enough to see you through your career. At any stage, you may need to upgrade your skills and knowledge and add a “micro credential” to your portfolio.

Micro master’s constitute around 25 per cent of a full master’s degree and allow the student to celebrate a smaller piece of learning. This can be done online, and there are no formal admissions. We offer around 50 such currently, including some very popular ones like artificial intelligence (AI) from Columbia University and a data science degree from MIT.

These micro master’s courses typically cost around $1000, whereas the full master’s degree may cost anywhere between $40,000 and $70,000. Similarly, an MBA may cost $100,000 on campus while the online master’s courses can be acquired at a fraction of the cost. For example, in Boston University, which is a top-ranked school, the on-campus MBA costs $100,000. They have now launched the exact same degree at $24,000 on edX.

We also launched a $10,000 master’s degree in computer science from the University of Texas, Austin, that costs $40,000 on campus. On edX you can get a full online degree for Rs 7-10 lakh, comparable with the on-campus offering and with similar job opportunities. Eighty-seven per cent of our students who have completed a micro master’s course confirm that they have seen a career advancement in the form of a new job, promotion or a pay rise.

What is the thinking behind micro credentials at the bachelor’s level ?

We are now launching the micro bachelor’s, which will allow learners to earn a smaller piece of a full undergraduate degree. With the micro bachelor’s, credits will be earned and transferred onto the university script in the US. IN other words, a student can earn a micro bachelor’s in computer science from NYU, for instance, and put that on their resume even as they earn a full degree in, say, mechanical engineering.

So, a student can do a micro bachelor’s from our platform and transfer this as full credits with our university partners. Therefore, in the US, it is now possible for a student to earn a full bachelor’s degree by stacking up credits through many micro-bachelor’s — a bit like Lego. This is a transformative way to learn.

In India, we are exploring other approaches. Many universities, including the one in Bengaluru, will have its students signing up for micro bachelor’s and micro master’s programmes on our platform.

Are companies in India willing to hire on the basis of edX credentials? As I understand it, online learning is still an alien animal here.

Tech Mahindra is willing to guarantee interviews to students who have completed certain micro master’s through edX. The company has identified 10 areas, including cyber security, project management, AI and so on, and are giving interviews to those who have these credentials. They are also using edX to up-skill 117,000 of their employees. 

Look at it this way. I already have a bachelor’s or a master’s degree and am working. How can I take two years out to get another master’s in a specific area or subject? It’s expensive and impractical. So, the learner has the option of up-skilling through edX. 

Over a 100 Indian companies across industries are using edX to up-skill their workforce and are giving preference to applicants with edX credentials. ITC is one of them. We are working on other possible collaborations with major banks and companies in India. Today, companies need to build competence in areas like machine learning, data science, AI and big data analysis. Decisions are becoming more data driven. We offer some cutting-edge courses in these fields. In many universities they are still teaching Fortran and C programming whereas the language of data science today is Python and R. So, if companies want their employees to acquire these language skills, they can do it on edX online.

But in India awareness levels are so low…I don’t see even the top colleges and universities coming up to speed…

Yes, awareness levels are low, but some universities have visionary leaders. We will be soon announcing a partnership with a Bengaluru university.  They want their students to get micro-master’s along with their bachelor’s degrees, making them far more employable right from the start.

And awareness is growing. I’ll cite a recent instance. We have a learner from Hyderabad – a girl called Harleen - who earned a micro credential in data science. She applied to Microsoft in Redmond and landed herself her dream job. There are many such instances. My belief is that more and more students will acquire such credentials, making them job ready from Day One.