Frequently Asked Questions

Frequently Asked Questions
Is this intended to work 100% as "distance learning" that would require computer access?
> Yes, and computer access with broadband video is needed.
Does the plan include access to human tutors to assist students with problems?
> Yes for courses for credit, - in interactive real time cyberspaces such as Google + group video Hangouts and virtual worlds. (And you or anyone could volunteer to teach in a Google + group video Hangouts, for example).
Does "school" include elementary & secondary education?
> At this point, best STEM OCW-centric World University and School is planning only to offer International Baccalaureate high school diplomas (possibly beginning in 2016?), and eventually in many languages, in addition to offering, first in English, the following, university degrees - bachelors, Ph.D., law and M.D. - see: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Admissions_at_World_University_and_School#World_University_and_School_Links - although anyone can add open, free, elementary school resources, here, for example - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#Kids.27_free_learning_materials.
On WUaS's open, wiki (editable web pages) side, World University and School facilitates open teaching and learning, for example, by teaching to your web camera (e.g. as Sal Khan does in Khan Academy), or by adding a new 'Subjects page, and then adding resources to it, or teaching there otherwise (e.g. in interactive, group, video spaces) - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Subjects.
What is World University & School's Mission?
World University & School's (http://worlduniversityandschool.org - like Wikipedia with best STEM Open Course Ware) - mission, in reaching out to the entire world, is to provide a free, wiki-based education platform and, through facilitating the development of broadband worldwide, to make our service accessible to under served parts of the world. The WUaS mission is thus to facilitate all levels of teaching and learning opportunities (and future degrees) through an open, editable wiki in all languages, nation-states and subjects with great universities, and for One Laptop per Child countries and everyone.
How do I become a matriculated student at World University & School?
Apply this autumn 2013 for the first, best STEM OCW-centric (accrediting on CC MIT OCW in 7 languages and CC Yale OYC for planning purposes), undergraduate class which will matriculate online in the autumn of 2016 -
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Admissions_at_World_University_and_School.
WUaS has begun the accreditation process to offer, Creative Commons' licensed, bachelor, Ph.D., law and M.D. degrees, as well as I.B. diplomas, online and first in English, beginning with the bachelor's degree in autumn 2016.
See the links here for information about the developing, WUaS, degree programs -
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Admissions_at_World_University_and_School#World_University_and_School_Links.
WUaS seeks f/Friendly, overachieving, high school and college students to enjoy learning, e.g. via the conference method online in Google + group video Hangouts. WUaS is starting to accredit on Creative Commons’ licensed best STEM OCW’s, Open Educational Resources for free, online, interactive, bachelor (36 CC OCW courses), Ph.D., I.B. Law and M.D. degrees, in many languages and countries, with the first, matriculating, bachelor's degree class beginning in 2016 in English.
Students will purchase their own books and computers, and probably be living at home, in the neighborhoods where they went to high school.
If I'm a parent, what confidence can you give me that you're going to become fully accredited at the end of my student's undergraduate education? In what timeline will you accredit? If you don't become fully accredited, will my student be able to transfer their credits from your university to a fully accredited one?
Bureau of Private Postsecondary Eduction (BPPE) gave the 'green light' of approval to WUaS recently. WUaS is now proceeding with accreditation with the state of California's BPPE.
With BBPE approval, WUaS will then accredit with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC senior), which is a three stage process, and WUaS will become only fully accredited after we graduate our first undergraduate class, probably in 2020.
WUaS will address questions of transferring as we accredit with WASC senior.
What else is WUaS?
WUaS is also a Free, Open, Education Wiki, where YOU, or anyone, can Teach & Learn, planned for 7,929+ languages and 242+ countries.
WUaS also has a beginning, collaborative, real time Music School.
How do I teach at, or add resources to, World University & School?
World University and School is for free, open teaching and learning resources ... (and not advertising). If you've taught to a web camera, or in other ways online, click 'edit this page,' and copy the format a nearby reference, into the appropriate section. Or hop into a virtual world, or onto Skype, and teach live there ... WUaS can add any live teaching to the bud of its scheduling calendar. Please join these groups to stay in touch - https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/108179352492243955816/108179352492243955816/posts - or - http://groups.google.com/group/World-University-and-School - with an invitation to add teaching and learning resources :) Khan Academy (http://www.khanacademy.org/) is one good example of an individual teaching to his web camera, but there are many ways you can teach.
And please look through the WUaS Wiki (editable web pages) to learn from it - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com. There's a lot! of teaching and learning content here already, including around 100, undergraduate courses at MIT OCW in video - http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/audio-video-courses/ -(out of about 2,300 Creative Commons' licensed, MIT OCW courses). WUAS is an open, free world university and school, so anyone can teach here, - to their web camera, or interactively in a virtual world, as an open campus, and you'll find an enormous amount of material here, as teaching examples.
To schedule to teach interactively, simply join this Google Group - http://groups.google.com/group/World-University-and-School - and then you can schedule when you'd like to teach on the Google wiki-like calendar there, and how you'd like to teach. Or simply post a course online to http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#Individual_courses, or to the subject page, etc.
If credit- and degree- granting emerge at WUaS after some years, WUaS will let people know about that teaching process here. Right now, WUaS is an 'edit this page,' open, free university and school, potentially in all languages, nation states, subjects, and at all levels.
For the present, simply 'edit this page' at WUaS, and join the Google (http://groups.google.com/group/World-University-and-School) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=48753608141) groups to stay in touch.
How I can create an online course?
a. Build it gradually. For example, simply start teaching to your web camera for 3 minutes, mention a book, then build a syllabus and a series of lectures, and invite potentially learners to meet in a Google + Hangout, for example.
b. Use some of this course making software using, for example, Google's course-builder - https://code.google.com/p/course-builder/ - which is available here at WUaS's Course Management Systems - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Educational_Software#Course_Management_Systems - with other course-making software, or start one on a free wiki, which software is also accessible on this page.
c. For a MIT-centric course, that might eventually be taught for credit on the degree side of WUaS, use a MIT OCW course as a model, and then construct the course on a web page, or using the above software.
Once I teach to my webcam, how do I make that part of World University?
Answer: Post it to youtube.com, for example, and link that to a subject at World University, or create at new subject. Check out the Bassoon lesson here at the World University Music School: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University_Music_School by New York Philharmonic player Frank Morelli.
Or schedule when you'd like to teach in a virtual world at this wiki-like schedule (Google calendar), by adding your name to World University and School's Google Group: 
http://groups.google.com/group/World-University-and-School
(CALENDAR: Schedule classes you'd like to teach or see class schedules, after joining the World University and School's Google Group, in Google Calendar).
What is a link for a good introduction to the wiki?
Here's a Press Release for now ... http://worlduniversityandschool.blogspot.com/2012/10/press-release-for-world-university-and.html ... Who might be asking for this? Parents interested in free MIT-centric degrees in 2016 for their kids, or teachers and editors at wiki-World University and School ... http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University ?
I don't understand perhaps the stipulations of OCW, Wiki- and CC-licensed terms.
- OCW - OpenCourseWare ... WUaS, which began like Wikipedia with MIT OCW, seeks further to collaborate with and build on the OpenCourseWare movement, and seeks also to remain MIT OCW-centric in 7 languages, for its 2,300 courses in English with so much STEM resources and its 6 other languages, with institutional relations with universities that translate courses.
- WIKI- editable web pages. Wiki means "quick" in Hawaiian, and it's what makes Wikipedia unique and allows us all to teach to one another at World University, which is planned in all 7,929 languages, each as a wiki school. 
- CC-licensing which means Creative Commons' licensed. It allows for legal sharing of online resources, to complement copyright licensed material. Since WUaS is CC-licensed, CC allows WUaS to list, and accredit upon, particularly CC MIT OCW which is 7 languages and on CC Yale OYC. In seeking to become an online great university in most countries' main languages, this CC licensing will allow us to become uniquely CC MIT OCW- and CC Yale OYC-centric, and may allow us to fundraise to governments around the world in an unique way, because CC WUaS materials, including degrees, have to be free. 
"Do they mean that WU has any exclusive right to use any material that fits in these descriptions?" 
CC licensing means CC materials can be shared freely; WUaS will seek to build on these resources to offer online accrediting CC degrees.
"Is anyone able to go into these online-available websites on their own to access the same courses and material?" 
Yes, - but MIT OCW, for example, which has the most offerings, doesn't offer degrees, faculty interaction or sociality for learning, for example. A CC WUaS's degree will require commitment by matriculated students and will involve studying these materials over years. 
"If that's the case, then does WU really have anything to offer a prospective student that's valuable and unique?" 
WUaS is planning to offer free, since CC, accrediting degrees - Bachelor, Ph.D., Law and MD, as well as IB high school, first in English, then in UN and large languages, accrediting in most countries' main languages, if possible. Here too is an example of what WUaS might add uniquely to the above highest quality CC OCW "Bellis perennis: In what ways will WUaS successfully build in Pandora Music's thumbs up/down at accrediting WUaS with CC MIT OCW in VIDEO in 7 languages & CC YALE OYC? ..." http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2015/07/bellis-perennis-in-what-ways-will-wuas.html. One example of value can be found by comparing the cost of a free WUaS best STEM-centric degree with a MIT degree, for example.
"If WU is offering or planning to offer accredited college courses toward a prospective degree from any particular institution, then what sort of advice, counseling, admissions services might be planned or available for prospective students?" 
World University is seeking to offer its own accredited degrees. Here is the WUaS Admissions' page: 
Admissions at World University and School - 
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Admissions_at_World_University_and_School
See also these related counseling wiki pages, all of which will develop - 
Counseling - 
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Counseling
Finding / creating a job you really love - 
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Finding_/_creating_a_job_you_really_love
Career counseling -
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Career_counseling
WUaS Job hunting - 
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/WUaS_Job_hunting
"Does WU foresee any need at all for traditionally described faculty, engaging in academic functions of teaching, counseling, administration?" 
The initial faculty for World University are the MIT and Yale faculty in CC MIT OCW and CC Yale OYC video - for planning purposes. Administration will occur in Google Classroom and Google Apps for Education, and on the World University and School wiki, for example, and WUaS will be structured academically around its departments. In English for the undergraduate degree at the Bachelor's level, there will probably be 30 majors eventually, paralleling MIT's departments in these CC MIT OCW video courses: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/audio-video-courses/. 
"I really need more clarity about what the program is or could be that would justify our existence as an institution which would aid students or be worthy of financial grants."
WUaS will be offering free since CC online degrees that would otherwise cost $44,000 per year at a MIT or a Stanford, and seek to further great learning as well. 
In a wiki system of OCW for higher education, how can expertise be passed on and then assessed? How is this vital component of knowledge transmission handled in a wiki- OCW framework? I'm referring to the necessity of providing students with useful lenses, contexts through which to view and evaluate materials presented in course work. 
Please remember that WUaS has a wiki wing and a degree wing, planning accrediting Bachelor, PhD, Law and MD degrees as well as IB diplomas on the degree side, first in English. The degree side is time-limited and students will matriculate, and live graduate student instructors in Google + group video Hangouts and virtual worlds will evaluate matriculated students - to some degree with MIT / Stanford standards - for planning purposes. 
WUaS seeks to matriculate our first undergraduate class in 2016, graduating in 2020, and ideally incubated by Stanford accreditation-wise.
On the wiki side, WUaS will engage Wikipedia's citation practices, with students possibly responding on the wiki to the CC MIT OCW and the CC Yale OYC faculty in video, as academic standard - to deal with the "yahoo" issue. Academic subject pages may fork and fork and grow and grow with sandbox pages for "yahoos" as well. Stewards of pages, like on Wikipedia, will focus these. 
I encourage you also especially to check out related online resources in the following order - http://worlduniversityandschool.org/ - http://worlduniversityandschool.blogspot.com/ - http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/search/label/global%20university. 
===World University and School Licensing===
World University and School - like Wikipedia with Greatest Universities' OpenCourseWare - incorporated as a nonprofit effective April 2010 and is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, educational organization charity.
World University & School is a community of learners and teachers who value — and are themselves strengthened by — the rich diversity of its participants. In order to cultivate a flourishing teaching, learning and creating conversation in a diverse and complex world, WUaS welcomes all languages, students, families, faculty, board members, and staff with differences based on (but not limited to) race, color, ethnicity, religion, age, gender, sexual orientation, family structure, and economic background.
All content on this site is freely available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) - http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ .
WUaS: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University
Courses: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses
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Research: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Research
Hardware Resource Possibilities: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Hardware_Resource_Possibilities
Frequently Asked Questions at World University & School: 
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Frequently_Asked_Questions
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