George Washington University adopts Open Edx to launch 3 MOOCs
When it comes to MOOCs, George Washington University (GWU) lets the faculty take the lead. Lorena A. Barba, in a recent blog post announced her MOOC, Practical Numerical Methods with Python, and mentioned that the MOOC content will be openly available. All materials will be open source (the content via Creative Commons Attribution CC-BY 4.0 and code via the … Continued
When it comes to MOOCs, George Washington University (GWU) lets the faculty take the lead. Lorena A. Barba, in a recent blog post announced her MOOC, Practical Numerical Methods with Python, and mentioned that the MOOC content will be openly available. All materials will be open source (the content via Creative Commons Attribution CC-BY 4.0 and code via the MIT license).
“We adopt and embrace the open-source model in our educational endeavor.” – Lorena A. Barba
GWU’s MOOCs are being hosted on their own instance of Open edX in order to “offer a MOOC without surrendering our IP to for-profits or subjecting students to creepy data mining“. Open edX is the open-source code that powers edX, the popular MOOC platform from MIT and Harvard University. Its seems to be gaining in popularity, as it has been adopted by Queen Raina foundation for the Edraak MOOC platform, MongoDb University, French Universities, and others.
Practical Numerical Methods with Python
The course aims for students to achieve the following:
- connect the physics represented by a mathematical model to the characteristics of numerical methods to be able to select a good solution method
- implement a numerical solution method in a well-designed, correct computer program
- interpret the numerical solutions that were obtained in regards to their accuracy and suitability for applications
Start Date: 18th August
Just-in-Time Online Modules in Engineering Computing
This is a set of computational modules aimed at supporting engineering students with their computational needs in the curriculum. Each module is self-contained and consists of a set of lessons motivated by applications in engineering courses. The computing is done using scientific Python.
Start Date: 25th August
Aerodynamics / Hydrodynamics
This course aims to give a foundation in the classical theories of aerodynamics of ideal fluids, as they apply to aerospace engineering design, and it aims to provide competency in solution methods and understanding of their approximation power and sources of error.
Start Date 12th Jan. 2015
GWU is a great university, if you are interested in any of these MOOCs, you should check them out!
Photo Credit:“GWU School of Public Health Building 42840” is copyright (c) Ted Eytan and made available under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 license
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Lorena A. Barba
Thank you for covering our initiative with our customized instance of the Open edX platform and our first MOOC starting soon.
Note that the “course” titled “Just-in-time online modules in engineering computing” is not really a MOOC, but rather a set of lessons to support undergraduate students to become happier users of computation in their studies. But all that we do is open-source/open-access, so anyone is welcome to check out and use those materials, too.