Companies are investing heavily too in upskilling. For example, Reliance has about 200,000 employees. To promote a culture of learning, Coursera access has been provided to all the employees and their family members. Such learning can help employees to stay at the cutting edge of employability.

We should not treat this as an either/or question. We should see it as an and question, i.e. how the two can be combined to deliver the best outcomes. Mr. Gupta’s own children are doing campus-based courses. About 80-90% of their instruction is offered on campus. But the remaining 10-20% is consumed through online learning. This kind of hybrid learning will be the way to go. Coursera on Campus has been designed to augment campus teaching.

But fully online degrees are also becoming popular. IIT Madras has an online course BSc (Data Science). Some 20,000 students are enrolled. https://study.iitm.ac.in/ds/

IIT Guwahati also offers a similar course: https://iitg.ac.in/acad/programmes/bsc.php

For students who make it to only Tier 3 engineering colleges, such online courses offered by world class instructors may make sense. About one third of the students in the US are pursuing a Masters courses in purely online mode. They have already gone through their undergrad courses and established their network. Now they might not want to disrupt their job or family life.

In short, we must try to combine the two forms of learning. There are enough circumstances where online is a powerful mechanism. However, in general, online learning need not be viewed as a substitute for face-to-face teaching.

As Dr Prasad mentioned, the low completion rates in online courses are possibly because of low levels of engagement. Swayam is a good example. Mr. Gupta joked that even in the classroom, only the students on the first bench may be fully engaged!

Mr. Gupta explained that for a course to succeed, there should be a purpose and motivation. Where students enroll on Coursera as part of their credit and must take an exam to earn the credit, the completion rate is as high as 95%. But in the case of those who go to the consumer platform to view videos or take audit courses, the completion rates may be very low, say 5%.

For course completion, the prerequisites are motivation and skin in the game. High quality content is essential. Great teachers in classroom mode must be enabled to teach equally well in an online environment. The credentials of the education provider also matter.

Note: We had the privilege of listening to Prof Andrew Thangaraj of IIT Madras about two years back. Here is a summary of some relevant remarks he made in that webinar conducted by TIMES Higher Education.

It is a myth that face-to-face education guarantees superior student engagement. In graduate programs, the people who get admitted are clear and motivated about what they want. Unfortunately, in undergraduate education in India, that's not true. People come into college because their dad and mom pushed them into that program. Some come because their parents think they can get better dowry that way! Even in his own class, Prof Thangaraj has seen that some students have no interest in electrical engineering. Many of them end up in management. As teachers, we think we are doing a great job. But are we tracking everything that is going on? Prof Thangaraj estimates that about 20% of his class keeps checking WhatsApp messages!

When Coursera began, it mostly offered longer courses. But today, considering the learner profiles and requirements, there are also 200,000 + video clips. Students can take a quick look. Suppose we have a doubt on the use of Pivot tables. These clips can be of great help.

Today, there are some 6500+ courses available on Coursera. But there are also more than 3400 projects where we can learn a tool (such as Power BI) in less than 2 hours. There are also 700+ specializations. In short, Coursera has various learning formats available. These are arranged in stackable formats and enable flexible learning and credit accumulation.

This cannot be attributed to LLMs. There is no decline in the number of jobs. Job growth will continue but the focus will be on productivity. The job situation is reflective of a wider global slowdown. The IT services industry, traditionally a massive employer, has gone slow in recruiting people. Elections in countries like USA and India also imply muted investments on the part of companies. This wait and watch attitude of companies probably explains the weak placement trends on the campuses.

Indians consider education to be every important. There is a thirst for high quality education: content and credentials. Indians are value conscious. High quality education must be provided at affordable prices.

Algorithmic biases are a major concern today. Mr. Gupta explained with an example how to deal with this problem. Coursera has developed Course Builder to create content. The LLMs only work on the content available on the platform and not on the wider platform to prevent hallucination. The platform has high quality content curated by experts. This significantly reduces the chances of hallucination, though there is always a slight possibility of the answer not being 100% correct. (That is why we must always critically examine the responses given by an LLM.)

One participant, a professor, wondered whether students really learn much in the online mode. She mentioned that once she asked students to do a course on Coursera. They came back within minutes claiming they had completed the course. Mr. Gupta responded that if students are just asked to audit a course on the consumer platform, they may take shortcuts, such as watching a video clip. Faculty members should use Coursera on Campus. This involves exams, assessments, and credits. So, the students will be forced to learn. The consumer platform is only for self-motivated students.

Due to LLMs, business models, staffing and the cost structure may change. This can have major implications. This should be factored into strategic planning exercises. LLMs will be applied in many fields. We should be able to visualize these applications. The Coursera CEO in his course has explained how to use LLMs to finetune strategy.

Dr Prasad emphasized that human involvement is critical even in online learning. Faculty have an important role to play. Personalization is critical. Every institution attracts a certain kind of students. The needs of this segment must be kept in mind. The cultural aspects are important. Faculty should be properly inducted and trained in how to leverage AI. The emphasis should be on outcomes. Content alone is not enough. The fact that Swayam is struggling is not surprising. Building an online course does not happen overnight. Faculty must work hard.