ABSTRACT
The history of higher education can be defined by a fascinating tension between the traditional and the innovative. Distance learning for a broader, more diverse, less elite student body was a democratization of higher education that was opposed by the entrenched elitism of traditional higher education at the time. Historical perspective search for effective and sustainable models of delivering higher education to students as possible via independent learning and teaching, distance learning ideas and opportunities have culminated in the modality of the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC). The MOOC phenomenon emerged coincidentally with the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, at a time when many governments were undergoing a period of austerity and in many cases enacting cuts to their higher education systems. MOOCs clearly have some successes worth noting. They fulfill a market niche for cheap continuing education and accessing education opportunities from formerly inaccessible elite institutions.
