Uni of Adelaide's online courses reach 300,000 worldwide

Wednesday, 6 July 2016

The University of Adelaide’s open digital learning program, AdelaideX, has reached 300 000 students from 200 countries around the world – just two years since the program was launched.

The large number of enrolments demonstrate the leading profile the University of Adelaide has built among approximately 500 universities now offering MOOCs worldwide.

Since its launch, AdelaideX has released seven Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in topics from across the university curriculum, including both live classes, and on-demand courses which students can enrol in at any time.

The most popular course so far is Introduction to Project Management, developed with the University’s Entrepreneurship, Commercialisation and Innovation Centre. In just five months, this MOOC has attracted more than 100,000 students from 200 countries, putting it into an elite group of MOOCs worldwide which have achieved this milestone.

Other popular MOOCs are World of Wine (46,780), Think. Create. Code (45,964) and Cyberwar, Surveillance and Security (37,256).

AdelaideX operates in partnership with edX, one of the world’s leading online platforms.

“We are offering free, high-quality learning opportunities that enrich the courses and programs we already offer on campus, across fields as diverse as biology, law, linguistics, computer programming and wine-making,” says Professor Philippa Levy, Pro Vice-Chancellor (Student Learning).

“We’re connecting with students around the globe, and it’s opening up some exciting opportunities in parts of the world where the University is pursuing closer ties ─ in Asia, Europe, the Americas and other locations.

“The MOOCs are also leading us in new ways of using digital technologies to enhance our on-campus courses.”

The MOOCs are mostly pitched at introductory level ─ an ideal way for students thinking about future university study to get a taste of the kinds of subjects and learning experience on offer.

“In Australia, MOOCs have proven popular with hundreds of high school students and pre-university students, who are looking for ways to gauge whether a program is right for them,” says Dr Katy McDevitt, AdelaideX Program Manager. “We’re also seeing very encouraging take-up of MOOCs among our current on-campus students.”

The leading countries for MOOC enrolments are the United States, India, Australia, the United Kingdom and Canada, and there is significant growth taking place in developing economies, particularly in Asia and Africa, where students commonly connect to online learning using mobile devices.

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