Athabasca University MDDE 601: Critical Review of a Scholarly Article

This assignment presents a critical review of the article "Do MOOCs contribute to student equity and social inclusion? A systematic review 2014–18" by Lambert. The review begins with a summary of the student's search history, outlining the process of finding the article through the Athabasca University Library database, using keywords like 'online education,' 'equity among students,' and 'social inclusion.' The critical review then summarizes Lambert's article, which investigates how massive open online courses (MOOCs) and other educational programs provide equitable online education. The author analyzed 46 studies, including 24 empirical evaluations, to assess the impact of MOOCs on student equity and social inclusion, particularly for disadvantaged learners. The review highlights the strengths of the article, such as its methodology, the large sample size of learners considered, and the inclusion of multilingual and regional language materials. Weaknesses include limitations in the database used and the lack of representation from certain regions and indigenous groups. The assignment emphasizes the importance of MOOCs in providing access to education, flexibility, and communication. The review concludes with a discussion of the article's relevance to distance education and provides a reference to the original article.

Running Head : ENGLISH
ENGLISH
Name of the Student
Name of the University

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Article - Lambert, S. R. (2020). Do MOOCs contribute to student equity and social
inclusion? A systematic review 2014–18. Computers & Education, 145, 103693.
Link -https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360131519302465
Search History Summary
This section of the assignment will explain the process of searching the articles for further
critical analysis. First I confirmed the area of interest in accordance to the topics that are covered
in unit 1 and unit 2. Finally I confirmed the topic, equity and social inclusion of students in the
era of online courses. In connection to the topics that has been covered in the class materials of
Unit 1 and Unit 2 as well as within the lecture notes, I decided to run a thorough search within
the online database of Library. I narrowed down to the topic of education within the system of
library and also sorted the timeline of the published articles together with the status of peer
reviews. I narrowed down the articles in the context of their credibility. I searched a couple of
articles and read down their abstracts within the relevant field of research which interested me.
The chronological order of the search history story are as follows.
1. Opening the library online database
2. Searching for the topic with relevant key words and search terms
3. Adjusting the year of publication to the most recent ones
4. Sorting down the articles as per their peer reviewed status
5. Going through the abstract of 2-3 articles to find relevancy regarding the topic that I have
decided on my mind
6. Finalizing the research article that I will be using for critical analysis

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The selection of the topic as well as the procedure of the exploration that I used for deciding the
article that I will critically analyze includes the selection of the search terms, like, ‘online
education’, ‘equity among student’, ‘social inclusion’, ‘impact of online resource on student’.
The strategies that I have applied for narrowing it down includes searching the correct words, the
peer reviewed journals and current papers for critical analysis.
Critical Review
Summarization of the article
The article “Do MOOCs contribute to student equity and social inclusion? A systematic
review 2014–18” by Lambert focused over the investigation on how massive open online courses
and some of the other educational programs provide equitable online education forms for
addressing the wide participating agendas of the globe (Lambert, 2020).
The author of the literature divided his research study in empirical reports outcomes for
students and those of practitioner guidance. the author utilized 46 globally diverse reports and
studies which included 24 empirical evaluation of programs that reach over 440,000 learners
what disadvantage in blended and distance settings of learning. In contrast to the other existing
set of literature, this specific research study explain the flourishing rate of multilingual as well as
other languages apart from English addressing the social economic disadvantage of the region.
The author introduced the concept of massive open online courses within the research study and
defined as the open and distance learning program which rose towards a promise of increasing
accessibility of education for people and learners hailing from several background. In contrary to
the existing range of depend regarding open literature, this research study found out that it the

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learning materials legal status has been free to the end users. The review of the research study
concluded that open online courses targeted to Idea the learning participation for the entire world
as the alternative practice that exist apart from the commercial online course offerings. The
research study by Lambert (2020) concluded that addressing the gaps in offerings as well as
improving the approach and the research design forms the major part for the propagation of open
online courses throughout the globe so that learns from all the background can access education .
The strength of this research study addresses the question regarding the impact of online
education towards the attainment of student equity and social inclusion. As stated by the
researcher, the research methodology utilized for scale measurement system for the
determination of the extent of 24 evaluated online programs regarding their attainment to the
stated goals. The frequency that has been gathered from four typical types of outcome in the
methodology section of the assignment. While 20% of the research study and mixed outcome
which majorly made the objectives, according to the study 87.5% of massive open online course
programs made that targeted aims for enabling social inclusion and student equity. The major
strength of business research article is that the good result that has been deducted from the
methodology considered that these online programs has reached more than 440,000 learners.
Furthermore, the open online course programs included several elements that differs from the
traditional approach of learning and has been beneficial towards considering the existing gaps of
education by providing sufficient scaffold training at the online platform both email and phone
supports from tutors (Lambert, 2020). Delivered in English and other regional language, this
online educational program has furthermore been designed for offline and mobile options with
the facilitation of weekend and weekly groups of study across remote locations in developing
countries. The design of this online courses included high degree of contextualization and

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localization with the feature of flexibility towards the situation of an individual like lack of
computer, lack of proper electricity and internet.
Some of the weakness of this article as stated by the author includes the fact that this
specific review can only be examined in the context of public and published literature.
Furthermore there lies several programs regarding the aim for the improvement of social
inclusion and student equity which is under the consideration of the review. The choice of
database is another weakness or limitation of the methodology adopted by the researcher. It is to
note that the researchers of the research study utilized scopus and Google scholar for
constructing the research study, however other data bases have not been considered which might
have provided additional beneficial results. The national policy study highlighted in the research
study mainly targeted over the employability and employment skills, however very few
empirical studies have actually addressed the unemployed learners (Lambert, 2020). This
specific study for the more relax the representation for notion of indigenous groups and their
knowledges towards their right of free education regarding their cultural understanding. Very
less representation of authors from South Africa where being considered in this research study
which is also a disadvantage.
Importance of the topic
Massive open online courses targets people who have been traditionally excluded from
their basic or higher education. While there have been several open universities throughout the
world the online courses aims to make an additional contribution without no entry fees. The
importance of massive open online courses includes attainment of skills, wealth and finally hope.
Though online education system targets individuals who have been debated or left education at
an early stage due to personal reasons, so that they can fulfill their wish, the demographics

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related to the massive open online course explains that majority of the learners in rolling to the
courses are highly qualified professional. However there lies several importance of the massive
online education like access to education irrespective of the location, flexibility and comfort and
finally communication and share of knowledges through the global platform.
The supportive evidence
Most of the literature that has been used by the author in this research study claim interest
was advancement of student equity and social inclusion with low confidence, skills and low level
of education. Existing literature in this topic highlighted the flood assessment of multilingual
languages for addressing the socio-economic disadvantage within the region of developing
countries (Lambert, 2020). The supporting evidence in the context of massive online open course
design is the six week long TESS India teacher training and edX which has been beneficial for
learners hailing from remote locations and multiple regions. For the successful programs
delivered online uses of a wide range of online supports like European bilingual learning
program which provide mother tongue facilitation in the online platform with the inclusion of 7
languages for supplementing English language online course as well as authentic task.
Relevance to field of distance education
Regarding the relevance to the field of distance education massive online open courses
aims the involvement of interdisciplinary development team with the collaboration of teaching
expertise for widening the participation of the learner. This aim of the online course is somewhat
similar to the distance educational program which targets to facilitate learners or people who
have not completed their education or might have dropped out due to some personal issues
(Lambert, 2020). The researcher of this research study highlighted the essentiality of the
investigation done by the universities for partnering with certain community groups for

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promotion as well as the development of a massive online open courses for ensuring that the
needs of the community people are made properly.

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Reference
Lambert, S. R. (2020). Do MOOCs contribute to student equity and social inclusion? A
systematic review 2014–18. Computers & Education, 145, 103693.