MIT Opencourseware @ Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Students around the world are so impressed with MIT Opencourseware that we felt it is suitable to share an article on exactly what MIT open courseware entails and exactly what areas of expertise they share with the public. In an open culture society, more and more Universities are sharing open courseware with the public – and not only does opencourseware of many universities include a library of past recorded lectures but many of them such as LSE for example will host live recordings or very recent recordings of which is then released in the form of free online courses or online media. The MIT opencourseware, also known as MIT OCW offers a range of free online courses to the public and it seems that he idea is that besides hosting opencourseware in order to promote openness in society, it is also useful to persuade learners of free courses to later sign up and joing the university on paid courses, hence, whilst MIT opencourseware is responsible for helping thousands for foreign learners around the world access high quality education for free, it is equally helpful to increase enrolments as a marketing vehicle. Overall MIT opencourseware could be regarded as somewhat of a win-win situation for both the establishment University and the learners who access the free courses online. The MIT opencourseware initiation dates back to October 2002 when it was announced, hence it is very clear from the current website that there are no more teething problems and that it is indeed a very streamlined system the is user friendly. Myfreecoursesonline.com decided that because of the high quality content hosted on MIT opencourseware that we would refer many visitors to the institution and has since commenced with publishing several free links that will lead learners to the MIT opencourseware website where they can engage directly with MIT. Intellectual property: The massive collection of intellectual property available via MIT opencourseware is wholly owned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and clearly this has been a step whereby the institute has weighed the benefits of mass marketing and branding vs the perceived giving away of intellectual property. Conventional mindsets would have prevented MIT opencourseware to ever launch however it seems that a modern and globalist approach from an open cultured society must have prevailed and the MIT opencourseware has been launched successfully amidst claims that it cost just under $4M per annum to maintain. What do people learn at MIT opencourseware? Whilst current sponsors appeared to be Mathworks, Edx and Dow, the variety of subjects hosted is fairly broad and includes the following:
• Aeronautics and Astronautics @ MIT OCW
• Anthropology @ MIT OCW
• Architecture @ MIT OCW
• Athletics, Physical Education and Recreation @ MIT OCW
• Biological Engineering @ MIT OCW
• Biology @ MIT OCW
• Brain and Cognitive Sciences @ MIT OCW • Chemical Engineering @ MIT OCW • Chemistry @ MIT OCW • Civil and Environmental Engineering @ MIT OCW • Comparative Media Studies @ MIT OCW • Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences @ MIT OCW • Economics @ MIT OCW • Electrical Engineering and Computer Science @ MIT OCW • Engineering Systems Division @ MIT OCW • Experimental Study Group @ MIT OCW • Foreign Languages and Literatures @ MIT OCW • Health Sciences and Technology @ MIT OCW • History @ MIT OCW • Linguistics and Philosophy @ MIT OCW • Literature @ MIT OCW • Materials Science and Engineering @ MIT OCW • Mathematics @ MIT OCW • Mechanical Engineering @ MIT OCW • Media Arts and Sciences @ MIT OCW • Music and Theater Arts @ MIT OCW • Nuclear Science and Engineering @ MIT OCW • Physics @ MIT OCW • Political Science @ MIT OCW • Science, Technology, and Society @ MIT OCW • Sloan School of Management @ MIT OCW • Special Programs @ MIT OCW • Supplemental Resources @ MIT OCW • Urban Studies and Planning @ MIT OCW • Women’s and Gender Studies @ MIT OCW • Writing and Humanistic Studies @ MIT OCW
Just how popular is MIT opencourseware today? Public data according to Graphbuzz would suggest that between August 2011 and August 2012 the average monthly traffic ranged between 1.2 Million and 900 Thousand unique visitors, peaking at around 1.5 million visitors. If we bear in mind that MIT opencourseware would probably engage many learners to return to the site, estimates are that there could be as much as 4 million visitors per month although this figure has not been confirmed yet. It seems that through opencourseware MIT is indeed aspiring to be one of the leading providers of online distance learning education and sharing through a culture of openness. With learning platforms such as the Ipad5, samsung galaxy tab and blackberry devices, learning on the go has never been this easy and MIT will sure be available on the screens of many learners. Access to general open coursewares from several universities: It seems to be the policy that in most cases users are not required to log in, henceforth some universities are not building a database of followers, whereas for other courses brief login details are required before the learning materials can be accessed. IP logging is not applied to the extend whereby users are restricted from different countries hence, unless a regime blocks access to USA websites, opencourseware can technically be accessed from any country in the world. Almost all the free course listings on myfreecoursesonline.com has MIT opencoursware courses listed and we also have listings from Harvard, Stanford, LSE, Berkeley and several other top universities. Myfreecoursesonline.com is not affiliated to MIT or any universities.
