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Duke University Philosophy Professor Walter Sinnott-Armstrong Has 180,000 Students In MOOC

The Astonishing Number Of Students In One Online Class
In this photo taken Nov. 15, 2012, Peter Struck, Associate Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania prepares to record a lecture on Greek Mythology in Philadelphia. In 15 years of teaching, Struck has guided perhaps a few hundred students annually in his classes on Greek and Roman mythology through the works of Homer, Sophocles, Aeschylus and others "the oldest strands of our cultural DNA." But if you gathered all of those tuition-paying, in-person students together, the group would pale in size compared with the 54,000 from around the world who, this fall alone, are taking his class online for free a "Massive Open Online Course," or MOOC, offered through a company called Coursera. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
In this photo taken Nov. 15, 2012, Peter Struck, Associate Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania prepares to record a lecture on Greek Mythology in Philadelphia. In 15 years of teaching, Struck has guided perhaps a few hundred students annually in his classes on Greek and Roman mythology through the works of Homer, Sophocles, Aeschylus and others "the oldest strands of our cultural DNA." But if you gathered all of those tuition-paying, in-person students together, the group would pale in size compared with the 54,000 from around the world who, this fall alone, are taking his class online for free a "Massive Open Online Course," or MOOC, offered through a company called Coursera. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

If college professors think a lecture hall full of 300 students is a big class, that would seem like private tutoring compared to the enrollment of a single philosophy Coursera class taught by a Duke University professor.

"Think Again: How to Reason and Argue,” a massive open online course co-taught by Duke professor Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and University of North Carolina professor Ram Neta, has 180,000 students registered to take it, the Charlotte News & Observer reports.

The large enrollment in the class makes it one of the biggest MOOCs to be offered, but many students dropped didn't stick around.

The News & Observer reports 70,000 never watched the first video posted online, and eight weeks in, 26,000 people were classified as active in the class. However, that's still far more than Sinnott-Armstrong said he could ever teach in a traditional setting. He estimated he's probably able to teach 8,000 students over a 40-year span, averaging around 100 to 200 each year.

"I've got almost a million downloads of my videos already," Sinnott-Armstrong said. "I mean, c'mon. That's just amazing! This is over 20 times as many students as I would reach in my career."

Meager completion rates are one of the reservations many college presidents hold regarding MOOCs.

Currently, completing a MOOC usually just rewards a student with a certificate, rather than any transferable academic credits. The American Council on Education is evaluating a few Coursera classes for possible credit.

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