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Please include:

  • Overview: 1-2 sentences that describe the project

  • Problem: 1-2 sentences that describe the primary user problem, challenge or barrier

  • Use cases: As a [course author author/instructor/learner], I need to be able to [do something] because/in order to [achieve a specific outcome].

  • Discovery approach: What questions would you ask to explore solutions to this problem?

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Status

Status
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titleDRAFT v1.1READY FOR REVIEW

Contributing Team

Marco Morales

Coordinator

TBD

Github

Earlier Discovery

edX / 2U - Aamir Ayub Spec for Improving Course Announcements from Jan 2024

Linked Initiatives

N/A

Type

Proposal

Overview

This effort is looking to update the Course Updates feature in Studio that educators use to post updates in their courses. The proposed changes include the ability to schedule or trigger course updates, automatically cross-post them as an email and discussions post, and more. These changes are meant to help our course instructor experience echo that of similar course management platforms which streamline these kinds of course communications.

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  • The Course Updates feature was recently converted to use new front end technology, but previous to this change Updates had remained relatively unchanged since their initial implementation in Studio circa 2013.

    • Some course authors have manually modified course XML to add back in the course updates tab into the main navigation because of the reduced visibility of updates, or the ability to only highlight the latest update via Course Home. (via edX discovery surveys)

  • Course Updates were intended as a primary in-platform mechanism for educators to reach out to students for instructor paced courses. Updates were never reimagined to work for self paced courses, and are thus less used today than they were from 2012-2015. Incorporating self-paced learning triggers for new updates is one way to reimagine how updates could be used in courses.

    • edX discovery data shows a drop in usage for the Course Updates feature around the time of self-paced courses being introduced (~2017), with continued declines year over year since then.

  • When the Course Home was updated to be powered by the learning MFE in ~2019, we decided to only show the most recent update, a short term compromise as we focused on releasing the MFE to production. How updates are rendered in course home, including whether or not students have actually read previous updates, is an improvement we can address now.

  • Generating in-platform updates is not enough to reach learners, but we never automatically sent out course updates via email and instead expect educators to duplicate these updates via the bulk email tool and discussion forums.

    • >88% of course authors surveyed by edX (n=27) felt learners were missing out on course updates always, weekly, or monthly.

    • ~18% of authors felt their updates were never viewed. Would you be excited to author valuable student communications if you felt like they were never read? We must do better as a platform for students and educator connection and engagement.

  • Today, the most commonly used announcement tool is through the bulk email, used by most courses. Some courses use course announcements within Studio, and few echo these into the Discussion forums currently as posts.

    • Many concerns from course authors (via edX discovery) include the lack of visibility of emails and how often these are ignored or going to spam filters. About 43% of course update emails are never opened (edX discovery research). This aligns with industry research (via GetResponse) showing educational emails at 44% open rates which is well above the 33-39% typical range.

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