【增加语】：有人站内信问我该怎么去学习众多的open course。我没有特别好的经验，只不过不要带着一口吃成胖子的雄心以及三天打鱼的惰性。我觉得每周拿出1天时间的时间，认真去学习即可；然后按照老师的作业，认真完成；给自己设定好deadline很重要，譬如周末晚上9点之前一定要完成作业；到了期中那一周，就跟平常一样拿出1周时间反复复习。这样下来，一学期能同时学好2个open course，同时还不忘自己学校的课程，这已经很不错了。

讨论的话题：

1-2	Introduction: Defining the educational problem
3	Human capital theory: The basic economic perspective on education
4	Early childhood education: How important? (PDF)
5	When did earnings become so dependent on education? (PDF)
6-7	Do our regression estimates overestimate the impact of education on earnings? The case of ability bias. (PDF 1) (PDF 2)
7-8	If the return to education is real, does it reflect skills learned or is it a signal? (PDF)
9-10	Why has the rate of return to education increased? (PDF 1) (PDF 2)
11	What skills are now rewarded in the workplace? (PDF)
12	Midterm (PDF)
13-14	Do smaller classes raise achievement? (PDF 1) (PDF 2)
15-16	School vouchers and parental choice (PDF 1) (PDF 2)
17-18	School accountability, standards and testing (PDF)
19-20	Teacher quality and teacher training (PDF)
21-22	Can technology complement what teachers do? (PDF 1) (PDF 2)
23	Higher education: Basic issues and structure (PDF)
24-25	Higher education policy (PDF 1) (PDF 2)

公开课的好处是，把该教授对该领域的认识做了初步总结；个人感觉这对于寻找一个自己喜欢的topic还是很有帮助的。要进一步增强对某个topic的理解，还是要自己进一步挖掘相关paper阅读，仅仅靠公开课无法深入。

这个公开课后面还跟了相关的课后作业和两次考试，对于想要进入该领域的本科/硕士以及博士一年级学生，还是很有启发作用的。