No MOOCs in Minnesota?

Posted by Kenneth Ronkowitz on

Here's an odd one via http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/

Minnesotas Office of Higher Education has informed the popular provider of massive open online courses (MOOCs) that a major provider, Coursera, is not welcome in Minnesota because it never got permission to operate there.

It's a rather strange ruling and I wonder if it was motivated by concerns from colleges that see these free providers as a threat to their tuition income. The Chronicle admits that it is "unclear how the law could be enforced when the content is freely available on the Web."

Coursera updated its Terms of Service to include this "Notice for Minnesota Users"


Coursera has been informed by the Minnesota Office of Higher Education that under Minnesota Statutes (136A.61 to 136A.71), a university cannot offer online courses to Minnesota residents unless the university has received authorization from the State of Minnesota to do so. If you are a resident of Minnesota, you agree that either (1) you will not take courses on Coursera, or (2) for each class that you take, the majority of work you do for the class will be done from outside the State of Minnesota.
If you live in Minneapolis, you might want to find some free wifi in Eau Claire, Wisconsin and drive over to take that Social Network Analysis course. Maybe some folks at the Office of Higher Ed might want to take Model Thinking or Sustainability. Just saying.

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