Massive Open Online Courses

TU Delft to offer free Massive Open Online Courses

25 February 2013, by Mark McDaid

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The Delft University of Technology is to offer a range of courses online via edX, a non-profit platform for online education. The oldest public technical university in the country will join educational heavyweights such as Harvard and MIT in offering free courses to anyone with an internet connection.

The courses, known as "Massive Open Online Courses" (MOOCs), do not require an applicant to have any prior education or to take an entry examination.

The first courses to be offered on the platform this year will be on Water Treatment Engineering, Solar Energy and Introduction to Aerospace Engineering, and they will be taught like any other course followed by on-campus students.

The courses will last for eight weeks and all of the course material, including video recordings and trial examinations, will be posted on edX. Students will also have the opportunity to interact with their fellow participants.

Though the university has already published over one hundred courses on another platform, OpenCourseWare, this new initiative ties participants into the campus rhythm of following a course over an eight week period.