Want to take a course from MIT, one of the world’s most respected technology schools? You don’t have to have near-perfect SAT scores, you don’t have to have a 4.0 GPA, you don’t have to pay the $50,000 tuition; in fact, you don’t even have to be enrolled as a student. . It sounds too good to be true? MIT has put its entire course catalog online so anyone who wants to check out class lectures, class notes, assignments, and other materials can do so through their computer.
Online education continues to change the way educators and students view higher education, and MIT’s open courses are just one of the many ways that traditional schools are adapting to technological advances. Due to the expansion of online education, the OpenCourseWare Consortium, a non-profit organization committed to advancing global education opportunities, was created to provide students around the world with the opportunity to access higher education courses. and relevant material.
MIT isn’t the only prestigious field school getting involved. Stanford, Tufts, Yale, the University of Michigan, and Harvard also offer many, if not all, of their online courses for free. So why give away something that many students pay so much for? “My deep belief is that as academics, we have a duty to spread our ideas as far and freely as possible,” says Rebecca Henderson, a business professor at MIT and Harvard.
Sharing the world’s knowledge is the goal of the OpenCourseWare Consortium. Obtaining copyright from more schools and then delivering the material effectively, as well as long-term funding, are issues that are still being addressed. Initial funding came from the private sector through schools and thriving organizations such as the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. But, say the directors of the Consortium, “depending on philanthropy is not sustainable.”
To address the sustainability, copyright and course effectiveness of the Open Education movement, activists, educators and scientists will gather in Barcelona for meetings on education, accessibility and trends in Open Education. Open Ed 2011 and Drumbeat Learning Freedom and the Web Festival will come together to address the future of education and the Web and the “decisions needed to make open education a reality” as well as “impact and sustainability.”
Mary Lou Forward, executive director of the OpenCourseWare Consortium, plans to attend both meetings. Unequal access to education is one of the most prominent reasons OpenCourseWare was developed, bringing free education to the masses is a concept that is always on Forward’s mind. “What I think about all the time,” she says, “are ways to bring education to people.”
While open courses do not provide students with actual course credit or an eventual degree, they are used by many for self-study or to find areas of study that might interest them in their final career. In addition, open courses give disadvantaged students or students with little traditional access who may be unable to attend university the opportunity to study and learn exactly what their peers are studying elsewhere.
OpenCourseWare hopes to eventually make national and global higher education courses freely available to students and learners around the world.