To make the most of these courses a student has to obtain basic high-school knowledge. The main advantage of online learning is that students don`t have to spend their time on visiting classes. The only thing they need is a device with internet connection.

A complete listing of distance learning courses developed by ITMO University will be accessible at the end of September. Now ITMO University offers the following courses: “Linear electric circuits”, “Web programming”, “Mechatronics and robotics system control”, and “Theory of graphs: methods and algorithms”. The duration of these courses is about two months.

Apart from the open source platform ITMO University also organized ‘’ITMO courses’’ in 2013. Thanks to this project lectures of ITMO University`s professors became globally accessible. However to develop the national platform it was necessary to invent new standards of teaching: ITMO University experts improved their lectures in order to present them to wide audience.

“After opening ‘’ITMO courses’’ platform we decided to collaborate with other Russian universities in order to launch a full-fledged project,” said Dmitriy Kopylov, head of multimedia technologies lab of Distance Learning Center.

After completing these online courses students receive certificates accepted by partner universities. Thus instead of following a course at a university students can follow it online. It is the main advantage of this open source platform.

“Thanks to this project students get an opportunity to estimate quality of a university and its professors. Before following some course one can read a special description, which contains the information about duration of a course, main topics and study load,” noted Mr. Kopylov.

Apart from engineering disciplines the national open source platform also offers courses related to humanities.All courses are free. 

Polina Poleschuk

News portal editorial office