When Penn announced its partnership with massive open online course provider Coursera, in April 2012, administrators lauded the education startup as a way for the University to push its access agenda forward on a global scale. By making parts of a Penn education available to students worldwide, Coursera, administrators said, had the ability to revolutionize higher education.
2012年4月，宾夕法尼亚大学宣布与大规模开放在线课堂供应商Coursera合作。宾大的行政官员对这家教育行业创业公司赞不绝口，称与Coursera的合作将使宾大的生源面积扩大到世界范围。不仅如此，行政官员们还认为Coursera会将宾大的教育资源推广到全世界，促使高等教育领域产生变革。

More than a year and a half later, Coursera is still a long way from realizing that goal.
一年半之后，Coursera要达到这一目标还任重而道远。

A new study, published last week by Penn researchers in the journal Nature, shows that students who have taken MOOCs on Coursera are highly educated and career-oriented. The study’s findings, though not necessarily surprising, will do little to win over MOOC critics, who argue that the online education hype in higher education has been largely overblown.
《自然》期刊上周刊登了一篇宾大研究者发表的调查文章，该文章称，在大规模开放在线课堂平台上学习的学生大都具有高学历，他们学习目的大都是以求职为导向的。这一研究结果并不让人惊讶。但许多大规模开放在线课堂的批评者都宣称在线教育浪潮已经式微，这一研究成果似乎不足以反驳这些批评家的意见。

Researchers, led by Vice Provost for Global Initiatives Ezekiel Emanuel, conducted an online survey in July of nearly 35,000 students enrolled in at least one of the University’s 32 courses on Coursera.
一个由全球倡议机构副主任伊奇基尔·伊曼纽尔带领的研究团队，在今年7月对Coursera课程平台上的3万5千名学生作了调查研究。Coursera的教育平台上有32门宾大提供的课程，接收调查的3万5千名学生都至少报班学习了其中的一门课程。

Across all geographic regions, the study found that MOOC students have high levels of educational attainment: 83 percent of those who responded said they had earned either a two- or four-year post-secondary degree, far more than international averages. Educational attainment disparities were especially pronounced in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, where about 80 percent of MOOC students — compared to just 5 percent of the populations in those countries as a whole — had earned post-secondary degrees.
受调查的学生来自全球各地，研究结果显示，他们都接受过较高等水平的教育：其中83%的受调查学生都有两至四年的大专学历，远远高出国际平均教育水平。教育水平差距在巴西、俄罗斯、印度、中国和南非等国尤为明显。在这些国家，80%的大规模开放在线课堂平台学员具有大专学历，而这些国家人口总数中拥有大专学历的人数比例只有5%。

The Coursera student population, in addition to being well-educated, also tends to be young, male and employed, according to the survey. More than 40 percent of MOOC students surveyed were younger than 30, and less than 10 percent were older than 60. About half of all students surveyed said they had enrolled in a MOOC because of “curiosity” or “for fun,” while 44 percent said they had made the decision to sign up in order to “gain specific skills to do my job better.”
据调查显示，Coursera教育平台上的学生不仅学历高，而且大多为年轻职场男性。Coursera的学员中年龄不到30岁的人数比例超过40%，而超过60岁的学员人数不到10%。超过半数的受调查学员称，他们报班学习网络公开课是“出于好奇心”或“出于兴趣”。而44%的学生称他们报班学习是为了“获得相关技能以便更好的适应职场”。

The study, though limited in its scope and generalizability, provides some of the first publicly available data on who is taking MOOCs, and why they are taking them.
尽管存在调查范围较窄、普遍性较低等不足，这项调查研究还是为我们了解大规模开放在线课堂的学员身份以及学习目的提供了一手的公开资料。

Jonathan Moreno, a professor of ethics who has taught a Coursera course on neuroethics said that he would ideally like to have more data on who signs up for his MOOC. Moreno believes there is still a clear gap between an online course and a bricks-and-mortar classroom.
在Coursera平台上教授神经伦理学课程的伦理学教授乔纳森·莫雷诺称，他非常希望能够对那些报名学习他的课程的学员有更多的了解，能够掌握更多的关于他们的资料。莫雷诺教授相信，在线课程和现实中的面对面课堂之间仍然存在着明显的差异。

“The best thing is still to have somebody in front of you,” he said. “No amount of demographic information I have on who’s taking my MOOC can replace the look that a student has on their face when they’re sitting in front of you.”
“有学生坐在你面前听课还是最好的，”他说。“我能拥有很多关于在线网络课程学员的个人资料，但再多的个人资料也比不上让学生坐在我面前，我能看到他们脸上的表情。”