Initiatives: Online Learning

Since its inception, the Kirwan Center has been supporting USM institutions in making strategic forays into online learning. “Online learning” in this context is defined as any learning environment that makes substantive use of a web-based component that enables collaboration and access to content beyond the classroom. Online learning strategies across the USM range from fully online degree/certificate programs, to MOOCs, to hybrid and "flipped" courses.

To advance this work, the Kirwan Center has launched USMx to help institutions  leverage the affordances of online learning to give students the flexibility to interact with content, faculty, and learning communities in the ways that best meet their needs. 

The USMx mission is to provide both access to innovative e-learning technologies as well as the resources, support, and planning necessary for strategic implementation of online learning.  This, in turn, helps our institutions achieve their mission of providing access to high quality, affordable higher education to a diverse student body both in Maryland and across the globe.

    In addition to UMUC, which offers over 90 fully online programs, the USM now has 44 degree programs offered entirely online.

    Our Work in Online Learning

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    2016

    Filtered By:

    2016
    September 20, 2016

    The University of Maryland University College (UMUC) and the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) launched the first free online course under the University System of Maryland's online learning partnership with edX, a nonprofit online learning destination founded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to increase global access to high-quality education. The first offering, "Global Health - The Lessons of Ebola," is a free global health course that explores opportunities and challenges to advancing health in developing countries.  Using the open access edX platform, the six-week course launched on September 20, 2016 and will explore how multidisciplinary teams can work more effectively together to address global health needs.

    July 27, 2016

    The University System of Maryland (USM) has entered into a groundbreaking partnership with edX, the nonprofit online learning destination founded by Harvard and MIT in 2012 to increase global access to high-quality education. The agreement is designed to further increase student success, as well as the access, affordability, and quality of higher education in Maryland and around the world.

    The new partnership brings together a diverse university system comprising 12 institutions—including University of Maryland University College (UMUC), a pioneer in delivering online courses globally and developing innovative online learning models for adult students—with edX’s research to supercharge data analytics that can help improve learning outcomes for diverse student groups.