For the second year in a row, one of the ELP’s MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses)—English for Career Development—has been ranked in Coursera’s top ten most popular courses worldwide for 2018. Additionally, this course has moved up its rank from 8th place in 2017 to 6th place in 2018. This marks another success in the ELP’s efforts to reach diverse students worldwide and expand access to those who cannot physically come to the University of Pennsylvania’s campus.
Since its inception, the course has attracted over 236,000 learners worldwide, and has achieved an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars. Learners come from all continents, with the greatest number coming from Brazil. The percentage of learners from Africa and Asia also significantly exceeds the percentage of learners from those continents taking a typical Coursera course. Through readings, videos, quizzes, and peer-reviewed spoken and written submissions, learners can explore the materials in interactive and engaging ways. Additionally, participants can directly engage with peers by sharing their thoughts and course submissions with other learners on discussion forums. Learners have commented on not only the usefulness of the course to their English learning and career development, but also the effective instruction and multi-faceted course design. Many have also particularly enjoyed ELP instructors Brian McManus and Robyn Turner’s lively yet informative simulations of interviews and other role plays.
The English for Career Development course is one of the ELP’s five Department of State-sponsored MOOCs on Coursera, along with English for Medial Literacy, English for STEM, English for Journalism, and English for Business and Entrepreneurship. These five courses have attracted over half a million learners combined, allowing diverse learners to access top-quality instruction for free at their own convenience. Additionally, the latter two courses, along with English for Career Development, are in the 10 most popular Coursera MOOCs out of over 100 developed by the University of Pennsylvania.
As one of the top online learning platforms, Coursera provides 37 million learners access to more than 3,100 courses and 300 specializations. The ELP is proud to partner with Coursera and the Department of State and looks forward to continuing its reach to more learners worldwide.
