Designing for Diversity: A Qualitative Content Analysis of Heutagogy Features in India’s MOOCs under NEP 2020

The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 positions flexibility, learner autonomy, and inclusive access as central pillars of higher education reform in India, with the Academic Bank of Credits enabling students to accumulate and transfer credits across institutions. SWAYAM, India’s national Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) platform, is a key instrument for operationalizing these reforms, offering credit-eligible courses across disciplines through a four-quadrant design of video lectures, readings, self-assessments, and discussion forums. Grounded in the principles of heutagogy—self-determined learning emphasizing agency, adaptability, and capability development—this study investigates the extent to which credit-eligible SWAYAM courses embed diversity-oriented design features. Using Mayring’s (2000) structured qualitative content analysis, a purposive sample of fifteen courses from multiple disciplines and national coordinators was examined. A coding framework derived from heutagogical literature (Blaschke, 2012) (Hase & Kenyon, 2000) addressed six dimensions: learner agency and choice, self-reflection and metacognition, flexibility in pathways and pacing, authentic and contextualized learning, capability development, and learner-generated content, with inclusivity markers such as multilingual accessibility and institutional support integrated within each dimension. Findings reveal notable variability across disciplines: management and professional courses often demonstrate greater flexibility and opportunities for learner choice, while several STEM courses follow rigid, content-heavy structures with limited adaptability. Multimodal delivery was common, but multilingual integration, adaptive assessments, and culturally contextualized materials were less consistently implemented. The study contributes evidence-based recommendations for MOOC designers, national coordinators, and policymakers to strengthen alignment between course design and NEP 2020’s vision of equitable, flexible, and self-determined learning.