Accra Technical University, Coursera partner to support students with online learning during coronavirus

Through Coursera for Campus and Coursera’s Coronavirus Response Initiative,
Accra Technical University students and staff will gain free access to 3,800+ courses from the world’s top university and industry educators

Accra Technical University is switching to online blended learning from 21st September 2020. This extraordinary online education affects all courses, thus, 10,000 students and staff of the University will have free access to their own Accra Technical University Coursera Learners Platform through Coursera’s Coronavirus Response Initiative, which provides every impacted university in the world with a set of free licenses to Coursera’s course catalogue to deliver job-relevant, multi-disciplinary online learning to learners.

Coursera, the world’s leading learning online platform was founded by Stanford professors Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng with a vision of providing life-transforming learning experiences to anyone, anywhere. Today, more than 60 million learners from around the world use Coursera to learn skills of the future. Coursera offers more than 3,800 courses from 200 of the world’s top university and industry educators, including Yale University and the University of London, as well as major companies such as Google and IBM.

“COVID-19 has impacted higher education institutions around the world, disrupting the lives of more than 1.4 billion students in 156 countries. At this critical moment, higher education institutions must work together to swiftly embrace digital courses and address the needs of their students online,” said Leah Belsky, Chief Enterprise Officer at Coursera. “We are humbled to partner with Accra Technical University, which is setting an example during this difficult time by supporting students with online learning and enabling seamless continuation of their studies.”

Coursera courses and guided projects, which span popular university subjects like engineering, business, data science, health, and arts, are divided into weekly modules with video and reading lessons. Course performance is assessed via quizzes and peer assignments, and learners receive a certificate upon completion.

Coursera courses will complement current Accra Technical University curricula with curation of courses including the African Association of Universities Seven Skills for Success, the Coursera Data Skills Academy for Data Literacy Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence as well as basic course matching for curating collections of courses that will provide a substitute for on-campus courses that cannot be taught in person for the moment.

According to the Acting Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Accra Technical University, Professor Amevi Acakpovi, the University approached Coursera to support its development of online learning as a strategic objective in the Institutional Development Plan of the University in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic which has had a toll on its educational activities. This partnership he said, ‘‘means that both students and teachers will be beneficiaries of high-quality library of courseware from a plethora of Coursera partners. Students can even go ahead to learn and acquire new skills on their own’’. He added, “the goal of this partnership is to provide a broad support for the implementation of extraordinary online learning. The medium-term objective of this collaboration is to promote the integration of some of the Coursera courses into the university curricula as well”.

To access Coursera, students and staff need to register for the Accra Technical University Coursera Learning platform today with their @atu.edu.gh email address at this link: https://www.coursera.org/programs/accra-technical-university-on-coursera-iafcb