What is Application Protocol Interfaces (APIs)

This chapter reports on a sustainable model created to increase engagement, success, and retention in a MOOC for learning computer programming within a United States-based national vocational program. The training organization was one of 10 national and regional organizations awarded scholarships by American-based information and telecommunications companies to participate in a MOOC to introduce and learn computer programming. The curriculum was informed and designed by multinational software technology corporations to address the dearth of computer programming talent in the USA. The academic unit set out to convert the poor state of MOOC completion rates, to convert the online opportunity into an active, supportive, and an engaging virtual space with a view to increase completion. Theoretical frameworks of scaffolding the learning and leveraging zones of proximal development were employed with precursor courses to help ramp up knowledge of an unknown subject area and skill. Social connectedness methods were also used to create teaching and learning communities (TLC) of support.