SSC CGL 2018 PYQ — Question 176

Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.

In mid-2012 I completed my first massive online open course, or MOOC, the kind widely offered by Coursera, EdX, Udacity and so on in partnership with different educational institutions. It was on clinical trials and ethical practices, offered by Johns Hopkins, on Coursera. This was shortly before the MOOC sensation hit India, and when Coursera, which was founded by two Stanford professors, itself was just a few months old. The MOOC bug had bit me. The course I’d completed was mainly designed for health care professionals who would be involved in actual clinical trials, not college students who had no prior knowledge of that area. I decided to enroll in the course because it was the only biology related course open at the time. However, I did see hope in that sometime in the future I’d be able to get a glimpse of what classes are like in the hallowed halls of major educational institutions around the world. By early 2013, Coursera and EdX had partnered with so many educational institutions and expanded their course offerings to include everything from food and nutrition to Greek mythology to business, that I was spoilt for choice. I spent hours going through course catalogues and poring over course descriptions, almost delirious with excitement at the fact that I was actually going to be able to take classes offered by universities I had only dreamt of attending.