Edx Reviews

The mechanical details of your quizzes course progress measurement and assignment upload have bugs and shortcomings Plenty more description from vocal complainers in the discussion areas Almost feels like a slap in the face to ask our opinion when it seems like you have an over-abundance of opinions coming in but not doing anything to address them

I am reviewing the edX class 7 00X Introduction to biology Secret of Life with Eric Lander the EdX class from MIT The class is not for beginners as advertised It assumes you have a Lot of preexisting knowledge They do not factor in all the right questions you get after watching lectures by Lander towards your certificate There were two additional final exams besides part I and II for a total of four exams this came as a surprise and they are labeled as ungraded yet if you skip them you can t unlock the next exam The interface is broken It told me I wasn t able to receive a certificate but if you refresh the page it suddenly counts your progress and lets you proceed MANY questions on the final exams were related to things never mentioned in class and I have documentation with screenshots I also have documentation of other online classmates leaving comments that the questions being asked assume you aren t a beginner even if the class is advertised as for beginners with no existing knowledge The class should prepare the learner for the questions meaning the amount of preparation should equal or exceed the level of difficulty of questions but in this class there is a great disparity between the preparation given and the style of questions The only reason why I am giving two stars instead of one is because Eric Lander is an engaging professor in the lectures They deal you low blows with redundantly worded questions questions about stuff which was never discussed in class and the final exam part 2 focused way too much on fruit fly genetics which I have documentation were explained quite superficially and explained in passing several months before the final They screw you over The style of questions and how to solve them was never shown in class regarding fruit fly genetics They again assume you re already some expert scientist with fruit fly knowledge Like they give you some formula for calculating the progeny of fruit flies but don t explain in depth They don t really give you the tools to succeed They throw you in the ocean and say swim without first taking you through the kiddie pool with flotation devices Like the style of questions in the finals were not shown in class Overall the difficulty of the questions and the preparation given in class are MILES APART a TOTAL DISPARITY Finally They know the class is brutal even for an 3 78 Cumulative GPA student as myself yet they take an average of both finals rather than add the total of one to the total of the other I had near 100 answered correctly questions in all the segments after lectures so you d think after I spent 450 00 in total for the class that I would have a certificate but they dealt me dirty and I learned a lot but have no certificate to show A complete waste of time they took my money and I have no certificate even though I see no reason as to why I am an excellent hard working student and independent researcher with her own STEM CELL PATENT in biology There was Way too much emphasis on the fruit fly genetics with poor preparation given to students Not everyone will go work with fruit flies hahahaha screw this class Also there were several segments that could EASILY be an entire CLASS in and of itself Save yourself don t take it 9 months later and - 450 00 less in my pocket I have no paper in my hand to show for my hard work I am extremely disappointed and feel cheated out of my money I could go on on and on with how ripped off I feel I have no comfort for my broken heart I deserve that certificate

Over two weeks since final assignment submitted and still not graded

I have ADHD I am currently unemployed A family member bought me this course as a gift I was ecstatic Since I m unemployed I m swamped with job searching preliminary final interviews building my portfolio and earning part time cash I ve also had several speedbumps in my personal life and couldn t progress in the course at the rate I was expecting Firstly navigating the course is a b tch The layout is incredibly confusing There are parts of the course that are marked incomplete that I submitted several times The syllabus is not accurate and very often the modules have more material than what s listed If you re trying to work around a course deadline tough You have to plow through unexpected small assignments and readings I m pretty sure other students are responsible for grading not a professional Many small assignments and reflections require interacting with your peers on the discussion board which basically doesn t happen I saw maybe 3 or 4 posts ranging back to last year that had any peer engagement One assignment required me to submit a rough outline draft I decided to wait until someone got back to me with notes and suggestions for my final draft Because that s what rough drafts are for I haven t heard back There s no coherent page that shows your submissions feedback All of that is annoying but fine I figured it ll just take a little longer to get feedback before I decide to move onto final assignments I figured that since you can join a course at any given time you can also finish it at you leisure There are proclamations all over the place about how you learn at your own pace and there are flexible deadlines I had to focus on interviews assessments appointments and my personal life so I decided to wait until I received graded feedback Since you can enroll in a course that s already begun so basically at any time I assumed completing the course was just as flexible I assumed any existing work would be rolled over to the next scheduled course in some capacity Nope If I don t finish this course in the next 3 days even though many of my completed sections are still marked as unfinished I lose the opportunity to get a certificate Its incredibly stressful and rigid There s also a recommended course on HOW TO COMPLETE A COURSE and navigate the website Its incredible dense takes forever I wish I was recommended that BEFORE purchasing the course and again the layout and site design is overwhelming and faulty For 140 bucks I d expect some timely responses and well programmed site mechanics Just do the free courses and spend your money elsewhere

I added an extra star for the effort the teachers went through to record the lecture videos because the visuals help with learning the concepts But that s about where it ends This was my second attempt at completing a particular course free version relevant to my current university studies During the first attempt I admittedly didn t manage my time well and I only completed 3 of the 6 weeks before I lost my access to the course I was bummed but I moved on Months later I see the same course has become available again I had to start from scratch and do all the tests again from week 1 I want to achieve a passing grade I knew the due date was 3 May so I worked hard to get to the end of the course this time As I logged on for what I planned to be my last session just before 8am on 3 May I found I no longer had access Apparently EdX in contrast to the rest of the world defines a 3 May closing date as a midnight on 2 May due date This is no doubt part of their plan to force people to buy the very overpriced verified certificate because it s the only way we won t lose all our progress and most people do use that last day to complete these online courses I m so frustrated I ve poured HOURS of valuable time into this course 3 weeks the first time and 5 weeks the second time and I have squat to show for it Not even the meaningless free certificate I emailed the support and begged to give me just two more hours of access since their due date was very misleading They said no of course Then I applied for the financial support to pay for the verified certificate which they rejected I wouldn t recommend EdX to anyone I have completed free and verified courses on Coursera and I haven t had any issues

The courses look resourceful but certifications are quite expensive They should include an option or financial aid like Coursera

The course was brilliant No questions on that However the website app is very clunky and out of date and the customer service isn t good When trying to work through what to do to resolve issues Please note that you need to have flash to validate documents No Apple devices were able to do this whichever way I did it I had to go to someone else s house to get it done Not ideal Some of the homework was difficult to complete due to the website design Please get up to date with your site processes and then it would be amazing I probably won t do another one due to the this as it was a little laborious to work through

See my previous review and this followed got an email today to give a good or bad response here is what I sent back No transparency and misrepresentation and still hasn t been resolved to a satisfactory level Clearly answers are given off a written format and no negotiation skills apparent To be told to unenroll and suck it up in so many words is not satisfactory I for one will not be studying with edX again as it is not transparent and has a level of misrepresentation when asking for students to pay for a verifiable certificate It also put the University in a bad light as it is assumed that the University is aware of the charges and that is not true Its a true shame that this behaviour can be perpetuated by not being clear in its intention The fact that the courses are apparently linked to a USA corporation but the support person in this case is located Pakistan makes me even more distrusting

The course is just fine But do not take this and expect to place out of a course for your high school My daughter s high school would not accept her physics course as EDX does not provide an official transcript She is now stuck taking the same physics class over

Cool course TERRIBLE service I had to cancel the certificate because It would not allow me to verify my account in any way I tried everything But there is no way to contact them Only FAQs because their request submission form is blocked due to an apparent increase in popularity of online education I do not understand how they can be providing expensive certificates if at the first round users are getting plenty of technical issues In addition I also lost all my progress in the course in the moment I bought the certificate and when I log in from other devices they didn t even recognise I was enrolled A shame because the course on CS by MIT was interesting