Minnesota officials have sent a you're-not-welcome-here letter to Coursera, a California-based startup that partners with universities such as Princeton and the California Institute of Technology to offer free, online college courses.The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on the dispute, which so far has cropped up only in Minnesota.Coursera has been informed by the Minnesota Office of Higher Education that under Minnesota Statutes (136A.61 to 136A.71), a university cannot offer online courses to Minnesota residents unless the university has received authorization from the State of Minnesota to do so. If you are a resident of Minnesota, you agree that either (1) you will not take courses on Coursera, or (2) for each class that you take, the majority of work you do for the class will be done from outside the State of Minnesota.
Slate.com also covers the issue, awarding Minnesota the grand prize for "most creative use of government to stifle innovation.Minneosta officials defended the move, adding that the 20-year-old law is designed to protect consumers, because they presumably might lose the money they didn't spend.Coursera is one of a growing number of sources of free college-level courses, often presented by top-shelf colleges themselves. The catch is that there's little interaction with professors; students watch videos and take tests that are graded by computer or by other students.Most other colleges don't accept the courses as credit. The sector also includes players like edX, operated by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University and the University of California at Berkeley.
