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Coursera makes courses available for free to the unemployed
Coursera is helping governments return people to work by offering its online courses for free.
Google's free class teaches you how to create AR experiences
If you've ever wanted to create augmented reality experiences but had no idea where to start, Google might have your back. It's releasing a free Introduction to Augmented Reality and ARCore class on Coursera that teaches you how to develop AR content, even if you have no knowledge of the format. Walk through the 15-hour program and you should know how to use both ARCore as well as resources like Google's own Poly object library.
Google and other tech titans pledge to help refugees
Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and other big tech corporations have joined hands with the White House to help refugees across the globe. They were among the members of the private sector that answered the president's Call to Action back in June. Now, the administration has published the complete list of participants, along with a short description of what they're doing for the cause. Google has promised to fund and lend its technical expertise to non-government orgs providing free education to 10,000 out-of-school Lebanese kids. If you'll recall, the big G also donated $5.3 million worth of Chromebooks to European refugees earlier this year.
Coursera lets you learn on the go with new iPhone app
Coursera debuted its iPhone app on Tuesday, bringing more than 500 free courses to mobile devices for the first time. Coursera is an up-and-coming online learning platform known for its MOOCs (Massive Open Online Course). These courses are open to thousands of students at once and foster collaboration between students through peer-graded assignments and other interactive tools. Coursera offers courses for free in a variety of disciplines that cover everything from the arts to engineering. Each course features video tutorials from respected university professors and online quizzes to measure your progress. You can enroll in a course for free, but you have to pay if you want official credit for completing a course. Once a web-only platform, the new Coursera app brings most of the features of the website to your iPhone. You can browse and enroll in courses from your iPhone. You also can watch course video lectures either by streaming them over a cellular connection or downloading them to your device. It's perfect for anyone who wants to fill their spare time with educational activities. I know if I was commuting, I would be firing up Coursera to learn about Medical Neuroscience instead of just staring idly out the window. The Coursera app is available for free from the iOS App Store. You will need to sign up for a Coursera account if you want to access the material on your mobile device.
Coursera's iOS app expands the reach of online education
Coursera is one of the largest US providers of free education through MOOCs (massive open online courses). One month ago, the company announced its collaboration with the State Department to develop educational hubs around the world, where students could participate in MOOCs as a group. Now, the educational initiative has taken its mobility one step further with an iOS app. Students can take advantage of hundreds of courses on the go thanks to features like a personal dashboard, syllabus access and quizzes. Lecture videos are available to stream on your iPhone, with an option to download for offline viewing later on. In the interest of data-efficiency, the app was designed with simplicity in mind and isn't yet capable of replacing Coursera.org. New features and platforms, however, are promised for 2014.
Coursera teams up with State Department on series of MOOC-based 'learning hubs' around the world
Coursera is already one of the leading providers of MOOCs (or massive open online courses) in the US, and its now getting a helping hand from none other than the US government in broadening its worldwide ambitions. The company announced a new initiative today that will see it partner with the State Department and a number of other organizations on a series of "learning hubs" around the world, where students will be able to go and access the internet and participate in MOOCs as a group. Those classes won't be quite as "massive" as your usual MOOC, however. According the The New York Times, the classes will all be small ones -- some with as few as 15 students -- and they'll be supplemented by weekly in-person sessions with a local instructor for what Coursera's Lila Ibrahim describes as a "blended learning experience." For its part, the State Department says that it hopes the courses will not only help students where they are, but "help connect them to U.S. higher education institutions" as well.
SUNY partners with Coursera for massively open online course experiment
Massive open online courses have the potential to alter how we teach and learn as a society, but unlike other methods that are steeped in centuries of trial and error, the MOOC concept remains experimental and unproven -- often criticized as better suited for edification than rigorous education. Like edX, Coursera is working to challenge that assumption, and today the online course provider announced partnerships with ten public university systems that'll integrate lessons from Coursera into the classroom. Most notably, The State University of New York is participating, which boasts 64 campuses and an enrollment of nearly half a million students. While its implementation remains up in the air, SUNY aims to introduce Coursera materials this fall and over the next few years as part of its Open SUNY initiative. Like SUNY, all partner schools may adapt lessons from Coursera as they see fit, and professors will have the opportunity to develop online courses for Coursera. Most significantly, the pilot programs will give universities an opportunity to evaluate the effectiveness of Coursera material, which could go a long way toward legitimizing the MOOC concept. As another happy consequence, universities may choose to offer for-credit courses from Coursera to non-matriculated students. For a greater understanding of this grand experiment, just hit up the source links. [Image credit: Dave Herholz / Flickr]
