Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in The United States, China, and India

MOOCs is considered a disruptive concept in world's education industry today. "Borderless access," "free of cost," and "unlimited enrollment" are the core attributes of MOOCs. Ideally, these characteristics allow students with various backgrounds to access quality higher education from any place in the world. In reality, there are barriers exist to limit MOOC access to particular groups of people in different geopolitical or socioeconomic society. This paper looks into the detail characteristics of MOOCs in three distinct countries: The United States, China, and India. From the comparison, we found that different cultural background, social needs, and economic development status will shape the MOOC industry, participants' characteristics, and industry development differently across countries.