Almost all of us are familiar with Coursera. Many of us completed or are completing various interesting courses with the help of Coursera during this pandemic. But did you know about it before the pandemic? You will be amazed to know that Coursera grew from 30 universities using it to over 3,700 during this pandemic! And now it’s a public company! What will that mean for higher education? Continue reading to know more about Coursera, its before and after the pandemic period, and its uses in Bangladesh.
What is Coursera?
Coursera is an online learning platform founded by two computer science professors from Stanford University. It has partnered with over 200 of the world’s leading universities and companies, including Yale, Princeton, UPenn, Google, IBM, Amazon, Facebook, and others, to deliver thousands of online courses.
Individual courses, as well as bachelor’s and master’s degree programs, are available on the web to help students overcome barriers to higher education. Professional certificate programs are also used to assist employees with obtaining new positions or promotions.
Coursera and the pandemic period:
Campus closures caused by the coronavirus have affected almost 70% of the world’s students. Hundreds of millions of students in colleges and universities around the world are among them. Students are worried about the effect of a prolonged interruption on their capacity to build good careers, since they are uncertain when they will be able to return to campus entirely, and several summer internships have been canceled. While on-campus education is interrupted, learning must continue.
Current undergraduate, graduate, or recently graduated students with a verified school email can sign up to get free access to over 3,800 courses, 150 Guided Projects, 400 Specializations, and 11 Professional Certificates.
Students can learn from some of the best teachers in the world and receive certificates from some of the world’s largest universities, such as the University of Michigan, Yale University, and Duke University, through Coursera. Professional Qualifications from top business mentors such as Google and SAS help students build in-demand skills and become job-ready.
Coursera was founded with a mission to serve the world through learning. At a time when the future of students everywhere is at stake, Coursera promises to do everything possible to help them continue learning off-campus.
Coursera and other MOOCs are seeing an increase in participation during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to CEO Jeff Maggioncalda, the company signed up 30 million customers in 2020 alone. “In some cases, COVID was like a huge required online learning experiment,” he says.
According to Maggioncalda, the rise in users is attributed to both people sitting at home with spare time on their hands and others who have been laid off or furloughed.
“This is a shock to the system due to COVID,” he says. “But there’s been a long trend toward job automation that’s been happening for years and years.” In response, people need to reskill for the slew of digital jobs that are emerging, he adds.
Science, technology, and business are the three categories of skills most in demand on Coursera. “We often say internally, ‘Skills pay the bills,’” he notes. “That’s really what people buy.”
Coursera and Bangladesh during the pandemic period:
Universities in Bangladesh have used Coursera for Campus to represent over 99,000 students who have enrolled in over 1.2 million classes. Coursera for Campus has been used by higher education institutions to encourage continuous learning, provide supplemental material to degree programs, and train students for jobs and internships. American International University-Bangladesh (AIUB), North South University, Daffodil International University, and Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology are among them.
Dr. Carmen, Vice-Chancellor of American International University, Bangladesh, said, “Disrupted by the pandemic, the education ecosystem is going through a massive digital transformation. Building a hybrid education system with technology and high-quality content at the core is the future of learning. Coursera for Campus platform has allowed us to deliver multidisciplinary and job-relevant content to our students. We are excited to see it launch new platform features that are central to academic rigor.”
Coursera is Now a Public Company. What Does That Mean for Higher Education?
Coursera’s founders and CEO rang the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange recently, marking the first time an edtech firm has gone public.
According to Maggioncalda, Coursera went into the IPO with $275 million in the bank, taking the company’s overall cash on hand to nearly $1 billion.
All that is needed, for one thing, more robot teaching-tech behind the scenes.
Maggioncalda. said, “We are always building more AI into the teaching experience and the learning experience. “On the learning side, that means more personalized learning. On the teaching side, [it means] improved student-success dashboards that predict every student’s grade every day and predict the chance that students stop [out of] the degree program.”
He said the influx will also help expand the platform’s integration with learning management systems.
It’s worth noting that despite all the investment, the company still is not profitable.
Coursera and the Post-Pandemic period:
Is Coursera’s CEO worried about a post-pandemic slump in online learning?
Won’t interest in online learning wane as universities look forward to completely reopening campuses after the pandemic?
According to Maggioncalda, the experience of trying online would inspire more students and colleges to continue pursuing more online learning than they traditionally did, resulting in a new combination of interactive and in-person learning.
“Undergraduates, particularly international students and working adults who are older and have families and careers, will do more online,” he predicted. “They will pursue college and get their degrees online.”
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Tahani Tahmid Elma/Intern YSSE
