The last few months have seen several announcements of changes in the online learning sphere.

Closure of Open2Study

There has been some consternation among learners with the closure of the free online course provider Open2Study as of January 2019. Open2Study was one of the few providers that continued to offer free certificates. The four-week courses were often basic “taster” courses, frequently recommending, “If you want to learn more about this topic, head over to Australian Open Universities and enroll in the paid course.” Open2Study offered courses in several subjects unavailable for free anywhere else. Read more about the closure here.

Coursera Community

Since the advent of MOOCs, discussion forums have been a popular feature. The early courses had thousands of learners, sometimes more than a hundred thousand in one session. The discussions were dynamic, with questions answered quickly from all over the world.

Since thousands of courses are now available with many repeated frequently, participant numbers per course have declined. Your discussion post may go unanswered for days, or possibly never attract a response.

Coursera has addressed this issue by creating a platform-wide discussion forum, available to all Coursera members. Since its inception about five months ago, more than 3700 Coursera members have joined the Coursera Community, writing posts in over 700 threads.

Class Central Help Center

Readers may already know that I assist with Help and Support over at Class Central. Along with answering emails from online learners all over the world, I have written articles for a Help Center with guides to using Class Central effectively, frequently asked questions (FAQ) about Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), and answers to common questions about four popular MOOC providers: Coursera, edX, FutureLearn, and Udacity.

If you are new to online learning, or even if you have already taken some courses, you may be interested in the Beginners Guide to Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) which discusses many aspects of online courses.

Class Central Custom Lists

Another recent innovation at Class Central is custom lists.

Class Central users have been able to add MOOCs to their profile for quite some time. Selecting the Add button on a course information page (such as this one), then selecting Interested adds the course to your “Interested” list. It also sends an email from Class Central when a new run of the course is coming up. Other default lists are “Taking right now” and “Completed/audited”, which do not trigger reminder emails.

Now, you can also create up to five custom lists using the Add button. You can make the lists Private (only visible to you), Public (anyone can view the list and search engines can find it), or Unlisted (don’t appear in searches, but anyone with the URL can view the list). For example, you may want to let your friends know what Data Science classes you have done. Make your Unlisted list and share the URL.

Here is my Public list of My Favourite Classes. Be warned, though, I might change my mind at any time! It was hard deciding which classes to add to the list. Sadly, some of my favourite courses are no longer available.

EdX limits free access to courses

EdX now limits the length of time that learners can access their courses for free. Assessments are also unavailable without paying. If you pay, you can then keep online access to the courses indefinitely as well as receive a certificate if you earn enough marks in the course assessments. EdX encourages learners to pay within two weeks of starting the course.

Udacity Turmoil

After massive growth in student numbers and revenue in 2017, 2018 saw a slowdown and many changes within Udacity. Nanodegree prices increased, their workforce decreased, and their CEO resigned. Read more in this report from Class Central.

FutureLearn Unlimited

Recently, FutureLearn announced a paid option to access hundreds of courses, including certificates, for twelve months. If you earn a certificate in a course, you can continue to access the course even after the twelve months is up.

A Final Thought

The world of online learning is constantly evolving.

By Pat Bowden, published March 19, 2019.