Universities Offering Free Courses Online

MIT - “MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) is a web-based publication of virtually all MIT course content. OCW is open and available to the world and is a permanent MIT activity.” MIT’s offering covers a huge range of courses. They have a YouTube channel and offer both audio and video versions of many of their lectures.

Courses Offered - Over 1800

University of California: Berkeley - “Every semester, UC Berkeley webcasts select courses and events for live viewing and on-demand replay over the Internet.” Berkeley’s offering is a little more limited than MIT’s, but it is still substantial. Like MIT, Berkeley has most of its lectures in both audio and video formats.

Courses Offered - Biology, Chemistry, Computer Sciences, Electrical Engineering, History, Geography, Physics, Psychology among others.

CMU (OLI) - “Using intelligent tutoring systems, virtual laboratories, simulations, and frequent opportunities for assessment and feedback, OLI builds courses that are intended to enact instruction – or, more precisely, to enact the kind of dynamic, flexible, and responsive instruction that fosters learning.” CMU offers a handful of courses concentrated around the Sciences. The course materials that they provide alongside are really well organized.

Courses Offered - Engineering Statics, Statistics, Biology, Chemistry, Economics, French, Logic, Physics, Research Methods and Discrete Math

Tufts - “Tufts OpenCourseWare is part of a new educational movement initiated by MIT that provides free access to course content for everyone online. Tufts’ initial course offerings demonstrate the University’s strength in the life sciences in addition to its multidisciplinary approach, international perspective and underlying ethic of service to its local, national and international communities.”

Courses Offered - Agricultural Sciences, Medicine, Genetics, Dentistry, Negotiations, Modern Physics, Law, Nutrition, Film Making and Public Policy among others.

Stanford - “Stanford on iTunes U provides access to a wide range of Stanford-related digital audio content via the iTunes Store, Apple’s popular online music, video, and podcast service.”

Courses Offered - Human-Computer Interaction, The Future Of The Internet, Straight Talk About Stem Cells, Anatomy of Movement, Global Geopolitics, Convex Optimization and Introduction to Robotics among others.

Utah State University - “Utah State OpenCourseWare is a collection of educational material used in our formal campus courses, and seeks to provide people around the world with an opportunity to access high quality learning opportunities.” Utah’s courses are entirely text-based, but they do cover an extremely broad range of topics including Theater Arts and Education.

Courses Offered - Anthropology, Biology, Economics, Education, Electrical Engineering, English, Instructional Technologies, Physics, Theater Arts among others.

University of California: Irvine - “The University of California at Irvine has a long history of social engagement. As a leading public research University, an important part of its mission is to showcase and disseminate the research and scholarship of the University to the public. Open educational content is a concept that will advance human knowledge, creativity, lifelong learning, and the social welfare of educators, students, and self-learners across the globe.”

Irvine only offers a smattering of text-based courses, but if you are interested in business it isn’t a bad start.

Courses Offered - Capital Markets, Fundamental Of Business Analysis, Fundamentals Of Personal Financial Planning, Spa Operations among others

Wikieducator - Wikieducator is a program that is taking a different slant on education online. The idea is that through Wiki technology and a host of other learning tools they should be able to supplement traditional curriculums with online-only classes and in the long run provide a free version of the educational curriculum by 2015. The initiative is being developed in collaboration with the Free Culture Movement and is being sponsored by the Commonwealth of Learning, an organization designed to encourage the development and sharing of open learning/distance education knowledge, resources and technologies. As it stands they have courses ranging from Physical Chemistry to Design and Graphics Communication all the way to a comprehensive course on Facilitating Online Communities.

While this initiative has a lot of potential, they are in need of the type of grass roots support that Wikipedia received if they are going to provide a truly valuable service.

There is another great collection of free courses list available at ZaidLearn

Happy Reading…