Want to take some college level courses?
No tuition money?
No problem!
Many prestigious Colleges and Universities have begun making a portion of their courses available online for free as part of an OpenSource initiative. The OpenSource movement is working to further the idea that knowledge should be free, and the access to information is a right rather than a privilege. Most of the courses available are complete lesson plans along with all text materials and lecture notes. Even though you can't receive college credit for completing a course, you can learn more about a topic that you are interested in or brush up on some skills in you professional field. From Archeology to Foreign Languages, almost any course in any area of expertise is available right at your fingertips for free.
Here are some of the best online college offerings:
MIT OpenCourseWare- If you are looking for a wide array of courses, MIT is the place to go. Their site offers over 1,900 courses for you to chose from. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology was at the forefront of the OpenSource movement and now offers courses in many languages to make their program available to virtually anyone in the world.
Open University- The Open University is the UK's largest academic institution. The school's OpenLearn website gives everyone free access to both undergraduate and graduate-level course materials from The Open University. Courses cover a wide range of topics, such as the arts, history, business, education, IT and computing, mathematics and statistics, science, health and technology.
Carnegie Mellon University- offers a wide variety of courses in their OpenLearning program. This program is designed to be accessible to anyone with basic college preparation. Unlike the programs at other universities, which are copies of class materials, these are specially designed to teach the subjects at a beginner level so that more people can take advantage these courses.
University of California, Berkeley- UC Berkeley has been offering webcasts of their courses since early in 2001, and now offers more options and courses in both on demand and live webcast formats. UC Berkeley is one of the most popular public universities in the country and offer courses from a wide spectrum of fields.
Stanford- Stanford University has teamed up with iTunes U to offer Stanford lectures via podcast. The podcasts can be downloaded and played on any computer or mp3 player. The lecture work as a sort of learning audio book, because you carry them with you to listen to anywhere. Although you don't always get the assignments and lecture notes, you can brush up on a subject or two just by listening in.
Don't let the price of tuition keep you from learning. Even if you aren't getting college credits, taking a few courses is a great way to keep growing and learning, and with so many options available now with the power of the internet, there is no better time than the present to learn something new.
By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a freelance writer and regular contributor to several websites and other publications, a volunteer, a full time mom and an active job seeker.
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