Mixed Bag for MOOCs on Business School Applications

Massive open online courses -- known as MOOCs -- have been touted for many reasons. They can provide a taste of American education to the developing world, expose high school students to subjects they might want to study in college and even help sharpen someone's job skills, proponents say.

But when it comes to helping prospective students get into business school, admissions officials are divided on whether they can make any difference.

Students interested in taking the online courses on subjects such as financial markets, smart growth for private business and entrepreneurship can take the classes for free, often at high-quality universities, through MOOC providers like Coursera and edX.

As more students are mentioning their experience with MOOCs in business school applications, admissions committees are being forced to decide just how much weight to give the courses. While some say MOOCs can add to the overall quality of an application, others recommend passing on the classes in favor of other alternatives.

[Learn about universities offering MOOCs.]

Taking a MOOC with a business-related theme or quantitative emphasis can't hurt your chances of being accepted into business school, says Rebekah Lewin, assistant dean of admissions and student engagement for the Simon Graduate School of Business Administration at University of Rochester.

She says officials would consider a MOOC much like other noncredit learning opportunities such as participating in Six Sigma, a training program on business processes, or taking math courses through the website MBAmath.com. In other words, MOOCs can serve as a recent snapshot of the applicant's interest and ability in business-related classes, she says.

"It's a signal of a student's seriousness," she says. "It shows an interest in pursuing higher learning."

Taking and completing a MOOC can also prove that students are ready for the business school workload, says Sharon Borowicz, chairwoman of graduate business administration at Benedictine University.

"It shows self-motivation, which in an MBA program is really key," she says. "It can definitely add to an application."

That said, many admissions officials say there are better ways to impress an admissions committee than mentioning a MOOC in an application essay.

"We encourage them to take a course in which they would receive a transcript," says Shari Hubert, associate dean for MBA admissions at Georgetown University's McDonough School of Business. "It could be at a community college -- some place where they are getting a grade and a transcript so we can then determine and measure how well they did. That is much more valuable to us in admissions."

[Test your readiness for b-school with a MOOC.]

But if that's not an option, Hubert says taking a MOOC and mentioning it is better than nothing.

Borowicz, of Benedictine University, says part of the reason her admissions committee doesn't give much weight to MOOCs is because they aren't accredited or sufficiently standardized.

"There is no way to guarantee that this is the person who took the class," she says. "The individual may have gotten a certificate but we have no idea how they were assessed or how their learning went."

Chris Reed, director of recruitment and admissions at Mays Business School at Texas A&M University, has similar concerns.

"Although we typically believe that additional relevant coursework is an added value in relation to a student's profile, we would be unlikely to put much weight into a course taken through the MOOC format," he said in an email. "As there are so few controls on content, delivery, or class profile the argument that a MOOC is good preparation for a rigorous MBA program is a stretch at best."

[Explore the controversy around MOOCs.]

Many business school officials argue that the real strengths of MOOCs aren't that they help a student get into an MBA program, but rather about helping students prepare for the content they encounter once accepted.

"An applicant who lacks exposure to business school courses faces no disadvantage: that is precisely the reason most candidates are applying," Derrick Bolton, assistant dean and MBA admissions director at Stanford University wrote via email. "We frequently admit candidates and then suggest courses for them to take online and in-person before matriculating at Stanford."

Students who follow their heart tend to be the most successful applicants, Bolton says.

"I hope that anyone who takes a course -- whether online or in-person -- does so based on interest in the subject matter, not with the sole aim of becoming a stronger applicant," he says.

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