Generating Lifelong-Learning Communities and Branding with Massive Open Online Courses

The arrival of Massive Open Online Courses MOOCs has stimulated teachers and universities to change in some ways the teaching methodologies. The success of these massive courses is based on involving students to acquire knowledge and skills in a wider community by learning from others and using active learning practices. MOOC providers also help universities to support the mission of transferring knowledge to society in any kind of area, supporting lifelong learning and adopting some kind of internationalization strategy. This is an ongoing trend where 17 of top 30 universities in the world's adopted MOOC courses. Open learning is a strategic and valuable trend in knowledge society. Opportunities appear in the Anglo and Latin American market, while problems associated with the high drop-out rate, the sustainability, and the feasibility of skill certification should be addressed. In this paper we analyze the properties of a MOOC as a learning community by taking data from a pilot of three MOOC courses performed at AbiertaUGR, the MOOC platform of the University of Granada.