Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees

Duncan A. Thomas; Maria Nedeva

doi:10.1007/978-3-031-88173-2_3

Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees

Duncan A. Thomas
, Maria Nedeva

Danish Centre for Studies in Research and Research Policy
Aarhus University
University of Manchester

Research output: Chapter or section in a book/report/conference proceeding › Book chapter

1 Citation (SciVal)

Abstract

Even before COVID-19 closed higher education (HE) classrooms in 2020 and spurred a mass shift to remote emergency teaching, universities had used online platforms and invested in relationships with private sector educational technology (EdTech) providers. From the 2010s in the USA, universities developed free massive open online courses (MOOCs) and fully online degrees with firms like Silicon Valley for-profit Coursera. Where these delivered commercial or reputational success, faculty instructors imagined them as templates for later teaching online HE courses at scale. Yet when large-scale online teaching arrived with the pandemic such approaches were largely side-lined and platforms like Zoom were used instead to simply broadcast live classes. We critically explore preconditions for this by reconsidering dependencies of pre-pandemic faculty within five US university/EdTech platform cases. This revisits late-2017 interviews at US universities highly active with free MOOCs, fully online degrees and one EdTech-enabled start-up university. We reveal faculty (in)dependence already largely pre-set by factors of: instructor roles; reputations; job security; platform delivery, interactivity, assessment and certification; career sector; how fast course materials refresh; and instruction language. Pre-pandemic platform independence was already difficult for these individual faculty instructors to achieve within their universities and the larger political economy of platforms.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Critical Perspectives on EdTech in Higher Education
Subtitle of host publication	Varieties of Platformisation
Editors	D. A. Thomas, V. Laterza
Place of Publication	Cham, Switzerland
Publisher	Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Chapter	3
Pages	43-65
Number of pages	23
Edition	1st
ISBN (Electronic)	9783031881732
ISBN (Print)	9783031881725
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-88173-2_3
Publication status	Published - 25 Oct 2025

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond grant FSK15-0881:1 (KNOWSCIENCE) and workshops funded by The Joint Committee for Nordic Research Councils in the Humanities and the Social Sciences.

Keywords

Coursera
EdTech platform features
EdTech provider firms
Faculty independence
Fully online degrees
Instructor roles
MOOC instructors
MOOCs
Online pedagogy
US universities

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General Economics,Econometrics and Finance
General Business,Management and Accounting
General Computer Science
General Social Sciences

Access to Document

10.1007/978-3-031-88173-2_3

Cite this

Thomas, D. A., & Nedeva, M. (2025). Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees. In D. A. Thomas, & V. Laterza (Eds.), Critical Perspectives on EdTech in Higher Education: Varieties of Platformisation (1st ed., pp. 43-65). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-88173-2_3

Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees. / Thomas, Duncan A.; Nedeva, Maria.
Critical Perspectives on EdTech in Higher Education: Varieties of Platformisation. ed. / D. A. Thomas; V. Laterza. 1st. ed. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2025. p. 43-65.

Research output: Chapter or section in a book/report/conference proceeding › Book chapter

Thomas, DA & Nedeva, M 2025, Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees. in DA Thomas & V Laterza (eds), Critical Perspectives on EdTech in Higher Education: Varieties of Platformisation. 1st edn, Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, Cham, Switzerland, pp. 43-65. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-88173-2_3

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Can Instructors Configure EdTech Platform (In)Dependence? Reconsidering Pre-Pandemic US University MOOCs and Online Degrees

Abstract

Acknowledgements

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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