Behind the scenes at MITx in 2023
A roundup of the year’s top tips from the teams behind the making of MITx open online courses
By MITx
With the launch of its first massive open online course (MOOC) in 2012, MITx began as an experiment in online learning. Since then, we have expanded our offerings and enrolled millions of learners from around the world in more than 250 free online courses.
Each year, MITx works with MIT faculty to create new online learning experiences that aim to make education more accessible for all types of learners — both on and off campus.
So what’s been happening at MITx this year? Discover our latest innovations, explore top tips from our design and production teams, and get a behind-the-scenes look at the secret sauce that goes into the making of MITx MOOCs.
2023 in numbers
In 2023, MITx ran 180 free online courses covering more than 25 MIT subjects, and saw all-time enrollment exceed 13.5 million registered learners representing nearly every age group and region across the world. This year, MITx also awarded more than 15,000 certificates.
Only three months into the year, MITx media servers surpassed 1.0 petabyte of video data across MITx, OCW, and xPRO. Coincidentally, that same month Lana Scott, manager of media services, presented on how to manage, archive, and re-use large quantities of video resources.
The MITx accessibility team has continued to review courses to ensure they include the digital features that make them accessible to learners with disabilities. They also field learner requests for additional individualized accommodations. To date, the team has processed more than 600 accommodation requests that facilitate equal access to online education for MITx learners.
The MITx intellectual property team has continued to track third party content, with over 12,000 objects sourced from Wikimedia, which includes stable links from the Internet Archive. These efforts help maintain the openness of the internet, one page at a time.
Digital innovation and thought leadership
MITx is proud to be at the forefront of innovations and best practices in online learning. Here’s a roundup of some of our best teaching and learning moments of the year:
- A ‘mind and hand’ approach to online learning
- Empowering the globe to mitigate climate change through MIT courses
- “A whole world of potential learners and potential knowledge to gain”
- How MIT digital learning scientists are fostering inclusive teaching practices
- New dashboard supports online learners’ self-regulated learning and performance
- For online courses, what counts as completion?
- Introducing interventions that help online learners
- Democratizing education: Bringing MIT excellence to the masses
- Learning with MOOCs conference shines light on the latest advances in online learning
A culture of collaboration
MITx is composed of several teams of in-house experts and specialists in online learning design, educational technology, audiovisual media, intellectual property, project administration, and online accessibility. Together, we support MIT faculty and instructors in the development of free, scalable, MIT-quality courses for learners around the world.
Like every workplace, MITx has a rich social culture. Ours is defined by personalized pet emojis, squabbles about the merits of burritos vs. tacos, and a shared love for open education and all things nerdy.
What’s next for MITx in 2024?
With another 140 courses in active development, including some 15 brand-new MOOCs planned to launch next year in topics such as multivariable calculus, computational data science in physics, urban mobility, entrepreneurial strategy, and learning and memory, we expect to continue offering a robust catalog on edX and MITx Online in 2024.
Learn more about MITx and enroll for free in a course.
Curious about what we did last year? Check out our 2022 edition of behind the scenes at MITx.
