North Texas Daily

UNT is planning to offer non-credit online courses through Coursera, an online education company, within the next year, according to a university press release.

The classes will be offered in a massive open online course (MOOC) format. A MOOC is an online course that traditionally has no limit on attendance and is available to all.

“We plan to launch three to five MOOCs within the next year,” Adam Fein, UNT vice president of digital strategy and innovation, said in the press release. “In support of our mission to provide access to education, our plan is to continue to explore options to give North Texas students and learners from around the globe flexible learning options and more ways to help them reach academic and career goals.”

Users will have the option to enroll in the course for free, while paying a fee if they want to complete quizzes and receive a certification.

“Engaging with courses on the Coursera platform gives learners access to the subject matter but also a sense of ethos of being a UNT student and exposure to UNT faculty who care deeply about teaching students and quality learning outcomes,” Karen Bollinger, UNT assistant vice president of digital growth, said in the press release.

An estimated 101 million students, 900 universities and more than 11,000 courses are in MOOC format worldwide, according to 2018 statistics from Class Central, a search engine dedicated to finding and aggregating MOOC courses that publishes yearly statistics for online offerings. 

Coursera, edX, XuetangX, Udacity and FutureLearn were listed as the top global providers of MOOCs. 

Other countries, such as India, have taken to making a national MOOC platform where students can complete part of their degree online. 

“We are pleased to partner with UNT and look forward to adding UNT courses to the Coursera learning platform that currently serves 40 million learners, 1,800 businesses and over 150 top universities,” Coursera CEO Jeff Maggioncalda said in the press release.