1. Dr Lorraine Hudson, Professor Gerd Kortuem and Annika Wolff
Evaluating the design and delivery of a Smart Cities MOOC for an international audience
Dr Lorraine Hudson, Professor Gerd Kortuem and Annika Wolff

2. Contents Aims and learning objectives
Designing a course for a global audience
MOOC design and structure
Evaluating the success of the MOOC
Future work and acknowledgments

3. Smart Cities MOOC
Aim: to explore the role of data and technology in cities, and learn how you can participate in the creation of smart cities
Developed as part of MK:Smart, part funded by HEFCE
Significance is in implication for society rather than technology alone
Multidisciplinary course draws on many STEM topics
Global audience & cultural differences might impact on expectations, course participation and learning experience

4. Learning objectives https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/smart-cities/
By the end of the learners will be able to:
Describe different approaches to smart city design and delivery
Co-create a smart cities project in their community using a range of tools and techniques
Share and discuss their views on smart cities as part of a global learning community

5. Designing a course for global audience
Open course ideal format to attract international learners
Key considerations:
cultural differences
different time zones
language
use of communication tools.
Benefit to wider society i.e. tackling wicked problems
Challenges of MOOCs:
Maintaining student engagement
Navigating large number of discussions
Identifying problems when thousands of comments

6. Course design Learning Design: Time commitment: 6 weeks, 3 hours/week
OU approach & FutureLearn pedagogy based on social learning
Stakeholder workshop with MK:Smart Partners
Learning design workshop & sessions to develop weekly content
Time commitment: 6 weeks, 3 hours/week
Structure: article, video, discussion, quiz, activity… steps
City case studies: learn through doing, reflect on how they apply to their city, explore what is happening there and learn how to co-create a smart cities project

7. Course structure Week 1: Introduction to smart cities
Week 2: Smart citizens
Week 3: Infrastructure, technology and data
Week 4: Enterprise and innovation
Week 5: Leadership and strategy
Week 6: Measurement and learning

8. Co-creating smart cities projects
Stages of the Design Thinking Process
Adapted from

9. Data to evaluate the MOOC
6 presentations from autumn 2015 to spring 2017
Presentation 1: 28 Sept 2015 start, 8005 joined
Presentation 2: 18 Jan 2016 start, 6483 joined
Data available to evaluate course:
Statistics dashboard
OU pre/post course surveys
MOOC comments
FutureLearn course report
Initial evaluation using data from presentation 1

10. Statistics dashboard

11. Pre/Post course surveys
OU questionnaires compiled by Patrina Law, Leigh-Anne Perryman & Rebecca Ferguson
Pre-course survey – 1067
Post-course survey – 139
Now integrating survey including demographics into FutureLearn

12. Learner cohort profile
Gender ratio: 57% male, 43% female
> 80% aged between 18 and 55 years
More than ¾ already have a University degree
Learners from over 100 countries:
UK (36%), Spain (6%), India (5%), Brazil (3%), Ukraine (3%)
English 1st language for 45% learners
5% of learners have a disability

13. Knowledge of smart cities before the course
Learner motivation
Knowledge of smart cities before the course
41% little or nothing
44% some experience
14% work in area
Main motivations
Personal interest – 70%
Professional development – 60%
Relevant to work – 40%
Relevant to study – 21%

14. Learners use of the MOOC
46% of joiners became learners
17% reach week 6 & fully participating learners
7322 comments from 727 social learners – mean 63 words (s.d. 47words)

15. Rich Picture Padlet
187 rich pictures added by learners and some created their own padlet boards

16. Learner experiences
“This has been a very engaging course which has introduced me to a lot of new ideas. Various parts of the course have caused me to question my views and this has resulted in new perspectives. There are many issues I would like to take further and I need to find the means to do so” [Dave Hall]
“A very interesting course. I particularly enjoyed reading, thinking about and discussing the various different perspectives, views and ideas of the participants, especially those whose viewpoint is very different from my own. In my experience I learn much more from those with whom I disagree, because even if they don't change my views, at least they make me think about them” [Jackie Pullman]

17. Learner experiences
“Some of the videos were talking heads that did not add value compared to the transcript. I have limited data, ironically for this course!” [Anonymous]
“If there is an option to download all contents of each week as a single click in a word document, it will save a lot of time for learners for serious study” [Anonymous]

18. Was the MOOC a success?
Attracted a diverse cohort of international learners
Created relevant learning resource on smart cities
MOOC discussions good at scaffolding knowledge
City case studies (videos and articles) & discussions popular
Smart City Business Model Canvas – very few shared completed version
Completion rate of course – 17% of learners
Learning objective 2 (co-creating smart city projects) not fully met

19. Future work and acknowledgements
Minor changes for presentations 2 & 3
Considering further changes for future runs (4 July, 26 Sept, 16 Jan 17)
Further research
data analytics
demographic data collected through FutureLearn
course will run on OpenLearn
Contact details -
HEFCE, MK:Smart partners and OU: MCT, LTS, OMU & facilitators (Rianne ten Veen, Sinead O’Connor-Gotra & Glenn Vowles)