Coursera — Free Online Courses (MOOC), Certificates, Specialization, and Degrees
What is Coursera?
Coursera is an education platform that partners with top universities (~150) and organizations worldwide, to offer online courses(~2000) for anyone to take.
These courses are commonly referred to as MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) and have traditionally been free. Though the “free” business model has started to change quite rapidly with “Certificates,” “Specializations” and most recently “Degrees” which require payment.
So are Coursera Courses Free…?
Yes (I’ll tell you how below) and no.
In the past you could take a Coursera course at no charge and earn a certificate. This has changed.
The majority of courses on Coursera now have a “freemium” model, which has two main options:
Option 1: 7 Day Free Trial — after which you pay a monthly subscription
Option 2: You can “audit” the course and watch the videos; however, if you want to your assessments to be graded and earn the verified certificate you have to pay for that.
Subscription Pricing (after 7 Day Free Trial)
In the past you could enroll in a course and pay a 1-time fee for the assessment/certificate; however, the trend is that Coursera is moving to a subscription model. This is where you’d pay ~$39–79/month and have access to the course and be able to earn the certificate. The idea is that the faster you take courses, the more money you can save.
Specializations
Coursera has “course bundles” called “Specializations” that tend to be their high-end packages where there are 4–9 courses that make up the Specialization. These use to offer a one-time price or a subscription option, though I believe they are starting to move more and more to subscription only pricing. These specializations usually take 4–6 months to complete and cost on average $39-$79/month.
These specializations also have also started to implement a 7 day free trial upon which you are then entered into a subscription billing model.
So how do you enroll in a course for free?
If the course is part of a “Specialization” (which most are starting to be bundled into) then you cannot audit it. Your best option is to do the 7 day trial and to zip through it all in a week.
But if the course is standalone (not part of a Specialization) then you usually have the “audit” option, though it is can be tricky to find the first time.
With the “audit” option — you generally won’t have access to graded assessments or a verified certificate — but you can access the course content.
Auditing a Course for Free
There are 3 different scenarios you could run into when trying to enroll in a course for free (“auditing”):
- The course is part of a Specialization and you can’t audit it.
- The course is offered under a “Subscription” basis
- The course is offered under a “Certificate Purchase” basis
If you land on the subscription offering — you will know it because it will ask you to start your free trial — but if you want to “Audit” it for free than…
Click on “Audit” in the bottom left hand corner of the popup box (DON’T click “Start Free Trial”)
If it’s the Certificate Purchase option then just click “Audit Only”
Professional Certificate (Brand New!)
This latest option — the professional certificate — is designed for-credit at universities and is suppose to be comparable to those awarded to on-campus students.
These courses are quite a bit more expensive. They consist of a bundle of courses, take several months to complete, and cost several thousand dollars.
Professional Project Management — Example
My initial impression is that these Professional Certificates are designed for employers to pay for their employees to take.
Degrees
Most recently, Coursera has partnered with the University of Illisnois and HEC Paris to offer 4 different Master Degrees:
- Master of Business Administration (MBA)
- Master of Computer Science in Data Science
- Master of Science in Accounting
- Master’s in Innovation and Entrepreneurship
In order to enroll in a Masters Program you do have to apply. Here’s details from the website:
I hope this overview was semi-helpful, and if you find anything that’s changed, please just let me know (I’ll work on keeping this up-to-date but knowing how rapidly Coursera changes pricing…no promises :)
Please share/comment with feedback!
Thanks so much!
Kevin
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Kevin Stock is the CEO at CredEd, inventor of the NED (sleep apnea and snoring device), and author of Yourdrum (←read this. just do it.)
