Recently, I finished my 100th Coursera course. I took 43 of those courses on Coursera’s original platform, within four years (2012 -2016). The other 57 took nine years to finish.
The platform has evolved over those years, with some excellent improvements as well as changes that I wasn’t as happy about. I took my first course as a fresh retiree in November 2012, and since then, I’ve completed 220 MOOCs and other online courses starting with Coursera and later branching out to other providers.
The Start of a New Adventure
In late 2012, I retired from my job as a customer service officer at a financial institution. I planned to spend my time making handcrafts, gardening, and enjoying time with my family.
My husband had just taken Andrew Ng’s original Machine Learning course on Coursera and found it an exceptional learning experience. Knowing my lifelong interest in astronomy, he mentioned that an astronomy course from Duke University was coming up, so I enrolled. I ignored notes like, “This will be a particularly busy and challenging unit, but hard work here will pay off later.”
I crashed and burned in the astronomy course. I couldn’t cope with the mathematics and physics. Although I had taken these subjects in senior high school, that was nearly 40 years earlier, and far too rusty. I found myself spending hours on the weekly homework and discovered I didn’t want to spend my retirement straining my brain to calculate how to send a rocket to Mars.
Then I realized I didn’t have to pass the course. It didn’t matter! I could still learn some facts about astronomy without actually gaining a pass mark. I spent the rest of the course watching videos about the stars and the cosmos without the stress of the homework. I decided I enjoyed taking online courses.
On to More Courses
I completed Computer Science 101 from Stanford, another interesting course that’s no longer available. Unlike other Coursera courses at the time, it did not offer a Statement of Accomplishment. It was an introduction to how computers worked for a tech dinosaur like me. I knew how to use specific software, but this course helped me understand other applications.
During the next few months, I enrolled in nutrition, logic, and biology courses. I loved learning from professors at Columbia, Duke, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, the University of California, and others, and was delighted to earn nine free Coursera Statements of Accomplishment in 2013.
An unexpected bonus was getting to know learners who shared my interests from all over the world. I hadn’t thought that online learning would have a social aspect. Some of those early courses had fascinating discussion threads about the course material and, sometimes, the subjects were as simple as “What course will you take next?”
My MOOC Addiction
By 2014, my interests had expanded to ecology and climate change, history, creativity, entrepreneurship, and more. I took Archaeology’s Dirty Little Secrets from Brown University and found Sue Alcock’s teaching style so inspiring that immediately after finishing, I enrolled in five more courses (in addition to the two I had already joined).
Much to my husband’s dismay, all my time was spent at the computer watching videos and taking quizzes. The hard deadlines of the time made it tricky, but I managed to finish five of them despite having limited internet and while being on vacation for two weeks. It helped that I could download the videos and watch them offline.
With rumors of Coursera establishing a sustainable business model and the possible introduction of fees, I started exploring other platforms. I took several courses on the Australian site Open2Study (which later shut down) and completed 23 courses in 2014. My online learning addiction was in full swing!
Learning How to Learn
I discovered Barbara Oakley’s Learning How to Learn and became an instant fan.
Although I’d made the most of receiving free Statements of Accomplishment, this course did not offer a free certificate. I decided it was a course worth paying for, so I bought my first Verified Certificate and worked through the course again. I joined Class Central the day I received my Verified Certificate for Learning How to Learn; my addiction was paying off.
Class Central made it easier for me to explore and observe learning platforms. One such observation was how Coursera has evolved into an online learning giant right before my eyes.
Coursera’s New Platform Vs the Old One
I clearly remember when Coursera introduced its new platform in 2015. The biggest difference was the flexibility of course availability and deadlines. Instead of being restricted to one or two sessions per year, you could join a course at any time. I was delighted not to be restricted by fixed enrollment dates and hard deadlines, but after the dynamic discussion forums of the old Coursera platform, I struggled with the new format. I still can’t explain why, but the discussion forums have never managed to achieve the same easy flow as before.
Another difference is that some courses do not allow free access to graded items, which are only available to paying learners. I’m still happy, though, because over two thousand courses are still completely free, only requiring a payment if you want the certificate.
My first course on the new platform was Origins – Formation of the Universe, Solar System, Earth and Life from the University of Copenhagen. The course material was comprehensive, interesting, and well-presented, and after the amazing Learning How to Learn, I paid for a Verified Certificate.
With the new flexible learning model, Coursera allowed me to take up to 180 days to finish the course. I came perilously close to missing the deadline, particularly after the official length of the course was over and the discussion forums were deserted. I found that even though I’m happy to sit at my computer and study in solitary splendor, I also enjoy the social contact with people from all around the world.
I also missed being able to quickly download all the course videos. On the old platform, it was a case of clicking the download button beside each video, and they would automatically sort themselves because the videos were already numbered and named. With the new platform, each video had to be downloaded from its own page, then named manually, because they were all labelled Index. One of the earliest articles I remember reading on Class Central explained how to download the old courses before they disappeared with the shutdown of Coursera’s original platform.
I really liked being able to download the videos because back in 2012, we had a slow internet connection, and it was efficient to download the videos and then watch them offline. It also didn’t take up too much of our limited data when I wanted to re-watch videos or sections of them.
Shorter, More Flexible, and Easier to Pass
Back in 2012, many courses were modelled on university schedules, with strict weekly deadlines for graded items. It took a few years for the online course providers to understand and adapt to the market of mostly working professionals fitting online learning into their busy lives.
Many early courses were designed for the on-campus student lifestyle whose lives are governed by their study timetables. Now, most courses are self-paced, with flexible starting dates and deadlines. Courses have also generally become shorter, with many taking less than 10 hours. Some are as short as 2 or 3 hours!
Many early courses recommended 5-10 hours of study each week for 8-12 weeks. Now, some of those early courses have been broken up into a Specialization of 4 shorter courses, for example, Think Again: How to Reason and Argue, which is now the Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking Specialization.
It’s also easier to pass many Coursera courses now than in the early days. Most graded items allow multiple attempts to pass, whereas previously, you only had one or two attempts (similar to an official university exam). Most graded items are multiple-choice quizzes, although thousands of courses have peer-reviewed items.
Some courses now use AI to grade written assignments, which might be more reliable than humans with low motivation levels or minimal written language skills. I’ve also found the AI tool called “Coursera Coach” useful to help with understanding course material and revision.
The Learning Journey Continues
My interests are broad—science, writing, health, music, using AI, personal growth, even programming (thank you, Dr. Chuck, for introducing me to Python!) I binged Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python) within four days, a few months after auditing most of the course. After taking the same course to test three different platforms, I now understand the rudiments of Python programming.
While I’m exploring and observing, I’m not stopping. I found it quite a challenge to complete the five courses of the Google IT Support Professional Certificate, but I earned certificates from both Coursera and Credly for the achievement.
Some Other Coursera Courses I’ve Loved
- Mountains 101 (University of Alberta)
- The Science of the Solar System (Caltech)
- A Life of Happiness and Fulfillment (Indian School of Business)
- The Truth About Cats and Dogs (The University of Edinburgh)
- Writing for Young Readers: Opening the Treasure Chest (Commonwealth Education Trust)
- Understanding Plants – What a Plant Knows (Tel Aviv University)
Plus many more!
Nine years after the introduction of Coursera’s updated platform, I love the immense flexibility, but I still mourn the loss of those early discussions.
I feel privileged to take courses from Stanford, Penn, Johns Hopkins, Google, Microsoft, and more, in my own home, and it all started with Coursera. I’m also on the annual Coursera Plus subscription, and have a long list of unlimited access courses I want to complete. There just aren’t enough hours in the week to fulfill my online learning addiction!
The post 100 Courses Since 2012: How I’ve Witnessed Coursera’s Transformation appeared first on The Report by Class Central.
