In a few weeks I'll have completed every MIT course required to earn an undergrad EECS degree minus the physical education credits. It took me about two years. Some of the courses on their OpenCourseware[1] were a bit out of date and I supplemented the MIT courses with a few additional courses from Harvard (I'd read on HN that CS50[2] was worthwhile and was not disappointed) and Stanford[3]. I did not spend even one penny. Then again, I also won't get that very expensive piece of paper we call a "degree" so it's definitely a tradeoff. I'd already paid for several expensive pieces of paper so it didn't seem necessary to me but I can definitely appreciate that having at least one matters. MOOCs give you the same knowledge but they really don't at all give you the same credentials. It's silly but it's reality.
Most of the more popular courses have discord or slack where you can work with other participants. A lot of the CS courses have automated the grading of problem sets. CS50 uses GitHub to submit and grade assignments, for example. There were a lot of frustrating moments for sure but I definitely spent a lot more time with the material and learned a lot more than I would have if I had been given more "support" like you get in a typical classroom. There's definitely a tradeoff. It worked great for me but I had a genuine interest in the topics. I'm also 32. I don't think for a second I could have managed to get as much out of MOOCs as an 18-22 year old.
A minor complaint given that the superb education cost me exactly $0.00 but there are a lot of really good free courses available but you have to hunt for them. For example Paul Hegarty teaches a really great introductory course on developing for iOS with Swift and it's freely available to everyone but it's not listed on Standford's online catalog and the iTunesU version is woefully outdated. The latest version[4] is available on YouTube and even has a dedicated website. I can't even remember how I found the newer course. I also stumbled across "The Ethics of Technological Disruption"[5] by looking at Stanford's YouTube channel playlists. Like the Swift course, it wasn't listed in the university's catalog of free courses.
All that is to say, it's entirely possible, if you're willing to put in the effort not only once you're in the class, but sometimes just to get there as well.
[1] https://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm
[2] https://cs50.harvard.edu/x/2020/
[3] https://online.stanford.edu/search-catalog?free_or_paid%5Bfr...
[4] https://cs193p.sites.stanford.edu
[5] https://techethics.stanford.edu
