Korean universities implement OCW
Since 2009, Ewha has been providing lectures to KOCW – a Web site owned by a non-profit organization that provides lectures received from various universities free of charge – to share knowledge and educational resources with others.
“All the lectures are non-credit and are provided by universities who have voluntarily decided to give out their lectures with the goal of sharing knowledge and intellectual resources with society,” said Lee Soo-ji, an official of KOCW.
KOCW has been at the forefront of implementing the OCW service in Korea after it benchmarked Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)’s OCW in 2007, first in Korea. More than 100 universities are participating in KOCW to disseminate their lectures to the world. A total of 54 lectures from Ewha are currently uploaded to KOCW.
“I agreed to share contents of my class through KOCW on behalf of one of the leading schools’ professors that specialize in special education, also believed that releasing my contents could be a way of social participation,” professor Park Seung-hee (Special Education) said.
Among the 54 lectures, “Introductory Psychology” by professor Yang Yoon (Psychology) has been selected as one of the 20 most popular lectures in KOCW.
However, some students criticize that their classes are made accessible to all people without any restrictions.
“I was surprised to know that the class I had enrolled in would be provided to KOCW because there wasn’t any prior notice,” Park Bo-mi (Economics, 2) said. “Furthermore, it feels unfair that we pay a high tuition fee for the classes whereas people who take our class through KOCW can just attend it without any registration or payment.”
* Reporter: Ko Min-seok & Chung Che-yoon & Lee Sang-ha
* E-mail: minseok_ko@ewhain.net & thfl353@ewhain.net &banilab5748@ewhain.net