HKU Dentistry is ranked No. 1 in the World in 2016. Known for its world-class quality undergraduate and postgraduate and research programmes and clinical dental specialties, HKU Dentistry moves to the forefront in using creative technology in teaching and learning. On 25 October this year, it launched the World’s 1st MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) in Implant Dentistry on the Coursera platform.

Up-scaling learning and teaching, from solo to global endeavor

The Implant Dentistry MOOC successfully captured 7000+ enrollees who are practicing dental practitioners and dentistry graduates and students from more than 50 countries around the world. The MOOC gives students more than an option and convenience to a self-paced curriculum on an individual device; students are engaged in lively forum discussions with instructors, TAs and fellow online peers anytime, anywhere.

Engaging students in an interactive MOOC learning experience is not the work of one but many instructors – the course is taught by a dream-team close to 20 renowned international experts in dental implants and reconstructions led by HKU’s Dr. Nikos Mattheos, Clinical Associate Professor in Implant Dentistry. Each teacher on the team contributed specialized knowledge and evidence-based best practices on the same platform to multiple-levels of dental professionals and multi-national learners.

The vision and mission
Why an Implant Dentistry MOOC? According to the chief course instructor, Dr Niko Mattheos,
“Implant Dentistry is one of the most dynamic and rapidly developing areas within oral health care, but is still a rather new discipline in dental education and is not quite often taught in undergraduate dentistry curricula.”

Earlier this year, researchers from the Department of Oral Rehabilitation conducted a small-scale survey on postgraduate dental education to practicing dental practitioners in Europe, Asia, North America, Oceania and South America. The study showed that the most frequent period that dental practitioners placed the first dental implant was 3-5 years after dental school graduation and 82% of the respondents reported the need for further education, however, among the group, only 29% actually pursued further education in an academic setting, i.e. post-graduate 2-3 year full-time programs in accredited universities.

HKU Dentistry, with the vision to provide a top-notch dental education programme to the training of future dental professionals, endeavored to bridge the gap of knowledge in Implant Dentistry and diligently worked with HKU’s TELI team to produce a world-class MOOC in Implant Dentistry to offer an opportunity for dental practitioners and dental students to learn about this specialized subject.

Creating impacts to international communities
The MOOC has reached beyond national borders, language and professional boundaries. We are excited to see that the MOOC has gained endorsement not only from universities and dental schools, but also from other professional communities. Among them are Ukrainian Academy of Periodontology and Canadian Dental Association. There are also strong incentives among learners in building learning communities in Implant Dentistry. Enthusiastic Arabic learners started a Facebook group, where they translated the course materials to Arabic and shared notes with their peers. There are currently 900+ learners and counting. We are also delighted to have established strong connections with professional organizations in mainland China that bring us 1500+ Chinese learners.

Learners’ stories
Here are some testimonies and learners’ sharing from the MOOC:

The course will be completed by 4 December 2016, but the second round will start soon from 27 February 2017. Join us now, to experience the world-class MOOC brought by the world-class dental school!

Further reading:

1. HKU Faculty of Dentistry Bulletin: November 2016

The Faculty of Dentistry recently launched a MOOC which targets pre-professionals and dentists in the world – particularly those in China where formal programmes in this area are rare. The question for the course team is: how to reach this group of audience? The answer: one powerful friend, and your smartphone.

In order to reach out to the dental community and create bigger impact for the MOOC, the course team established a partnership with an online dental training platform, Myake. Founded by a few experienced dentists, the platform’s vision is to provide free quality education and knowledge sharing. With more than 10,000 registered users, it has established an active and mature learning community among practising dentists.

The featuring promotional event was for the MOOC instructor, Dr. Nikos Mattheos, to give a live webinar through the platform. Dr. Mattheos addressed a key topic under implant dentistry, and took the chance to invite learners to join our MOOC.

What came as a surprise to the course team, was that the tool being used to deliver the webinar, was a simple chatting app, which is so popular that almost everyone in Mainland China is using. Without a webcam, a laptop, or any other sophisticated gadgets, the only device needed for delivering and participating in the webinar, was a smartphone. The instructor simply presented screenshots of lecture slides, and supplemented them with voice messages. Throughout the 90-minute webinar, the number of live learners kept growing, eventually reached over 8000.

How do we make high education more accessible? Clearly one efficient way is to adopt tools that is available and familiar to our target audience. Making use of this day-to-day communication app, the implant dentistry course team was able to bring the knowledge straight to the front-line practising dentists.

Today we are told that more than 50% of the global population live in urban areas. If we keep on with this growth rate, by 2050, 70% of the world’s population will be urbanized. Sure enough, urban development presents numerous challenges to society. Yet at the same time, this gives rise to opportunities for people to reflect on effective natural resource management (land, water and air resources) that can sustain the growth of future cities.

An Urban World, UNICEF

As one of the top 10 densely populated cities on the globe, Hong Kong comes under the spotlight when we discuss key challenges of urbanization. Mr. Matthew Pryor (Head of the Division of Landscape Architecture) from HKU was invited to contribute a set of online learning resources to Universitas 21 (U21)’s Shared Online Course titled “Planetary Urbanization: Global Challenges in a Changing World.” Primarily led by University College Dublin, this 5-week course focuses on identifying challenges that planetary urbanisation presents for the growing number of cities around the world.

List of Countries by Population Density, Statistics Times

In collaboration with TELI, Mr. Pryor delivered insightful topics that cover the past and present form of Hong Kong’s built environment and its relation to public health issues for Module 4. With his deep reservoir of knowledge on the history and society of Hong Kong, Mr. Pryor articulates how this highly dense city still achieved a healthy city status. Combining his narration with images and footages that show the community’s ‘real side,’ the videos are eloquent of the impact that urban living has on our well-being.

*Registration for this course is open to U21 students only. As HKU is a partner institution of the U21 Network, HKU students may register at http://bit.ly/U21PlanetaryUrbanisation for the next run of the course (early 2017).

Technology is bringing about a gradual but significant transformation in education. With the growing popularity of online learning, phenomena termed as nanodegree and MicroMaster have emerged over the years to provide a more focused and flexible alternative to regular institutional degrees. It may sound like these new form of credentials are posting a threat to the regular degree providers, yet in fact, prestigious universities around the world are leading this parade.

For universities:
MicroMaster programs serve as a convenient sneak peek to regular master’s degrees provided by universities. With essentially no registration fee and pre-requisite, MicroMaster programs can attract a pool of applicants who are potentially interested in universities’ regular master’s programs. The universities can also identify high-flyers from the MicroMaster programs for admission to their regular program to ensure intake quality.

For learners:
MicroMasters programs offer a focused and affordable “teaser” before they make full commitment to the regular master’s degree. They also have a choice of applying for a Verified Certificate costing US$150 per course, either to enhance their competitiveness in the job market or gain a better chance of getting admitted into the regular master’s program. MicroMaster programs are also credit-eligible – it can substitute part of the on-campus coursework.

For employers:
MicroMaster credentials are still new to the employers but Ryan Craig, author of “College Disrupted: The Great Unbundling of Higher Education,” predicted that human resource platforms such as LinkedIn will develop new functions catered to this new form of qualification in terms of certificates/skills listing and credentials verifications. MicroMaster programs are focused, efficient and mostly concentrated in skills that are in high demand in the current job market. It is a great way to address the discrepancy between traditional institutional degrees and expectation from students and their future employers.

MicroMaster is indeed a leap forward in achieving internationalization. By extending our high quality teaching and learning contents to a greater audience, we can create a greater ripple of impact in the Asian region and the world. Want to give it a go? Contact us at enquiry@teli.hku.hk and let’s make it happen!

Fast facts:
– 20 MicroMasters programs offered by 14 universities are currently available on edX edX as of February 2017.
– Most of the programs focus in the field of business, management, computer science and education.
– The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) is offering a MicroMaster on International Hospitality Management.

Reference
Craig, R. (2015). College disrupted: The great unbundling of higher education.

Knowledge exchange with fellow academics through collaboration and outreach is always an important part of TELI. On 12 October 2016, we were honored to welcome a Macao education delegation to HKU.

Initiated by the Macao Tertiary Education office, the purpose of the half-day visit was to share and exchange HKU’s experience in e-learning, MOOCs and language teaching with the delegation.

A 360 degree group photo with the delegation

We welcomed a total of 23 delegates from 8 Macao higher education institutions, which included Vice Presidents, Faculty Deans, Language professors and Admin personnel. It was led by Prof. SUN Jian Rong (Macau University of Science and Technology) and Prof. JIN Hong Gan (University of Macau).

The day opened with an introduction of HKU’s e-learning landscape and visions for online learning by TELI.

After introducing the wider picture, Prof. Gina Marchetti from the Department of Comparative Literature then introduced and shared her hands-on experiences on creating an upcoming MOOC called Hong Kong Cinema through a Global Lens. To produce a rewarding MOOC, Prof. Marchetti stressed the importance of identifying your academic strengths, using existing content alongside supporting research, and working with a team throughout development progress.

Prof. Marchetti introducing the MOOC

As HKU has been pioneering language teaching through technology, Dr. Ka-Yee Loh’s team from the Faculty of Education next introduced mLang, a mobile language app (IOS, Android) developed for non-native students to learn Chinese. Dr. Ki Wing Wah provided background to the app which revolves around DIY flashcard production by students. Ms. Florence Chu and Principal Tracy Cheung from HKMA Lee Kwok Po Secondary School (one of the partner schools) shared first-hand experiences and showcased videos demonstrating usage of mLang in class. Dr. Vincent Lau concluded with technology’s important role in mLang.

Ms. Florence Chu showcasing how mLang is applied in the classroom

Subsequent tours to the Centre for the Promotion of Language Learning, Digital Literacies Lab and TELI’s multimedia office enriched the visit, allowing delegates to learn more about the infrastructure supporting online learning in HKU.

A visit to the Centre for the Promotion of Language Learning, guided by Mr. Kevin Chan

Mr. Patrick Desloge guiding delegates through the Digital Literacies Lab inside the Chi Wah Learning Commons

TELI Multimedia team showcases TELI’s daily works

We look forward to future collaborations with Macao’s tertiary institutions. Contact us to learn more.