EMC-LM 3rd empowering seminar - microcredentials from the open university by Rebecca Ferguson, The OUUK

1. Short courses and Microcredentials
EMC-LM third empowering seminar
Thursday 25th November 2021

5. COURSE COMMISSIONING APPROACH
An industry demand-led approach has been adopted for the development of the OU’s paid-for short course offer on the FutureLearn
platform.
Our OU insight team are working closely with the insight team at FutureLearn to combine market insight data from OU, FutureLearn and
SEEK to identify priority subject areas.
The following subjects are areas of focus, given the combined insight activity:
1. Business and Management
2. Data and Technology
3. Environment and Sustainability
4. Education and Learning
5. Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion
6. Health and Social Care.
These include subject areas with the highest career-based demand in the marketplace and also areas where OU strategic priorities, based
on our mission, and areas of specialist expertise at the OU, are backed by a strong level of demand.
A number of ‘learner pathways’ across the six priority subject themes have now been identified and designed to move learnersthrough the
OU’s offer on the FutureLearn platform across free resources, ExpertTracks and on to microcredentials.

6. 6
PRODUCT OUTLINE
Free short
course
4 - 24 learning hours
Read, watch, listen
for free
Pay for ongoing access,
tests and certificate
Prices range from
free – £99
or
£199 p/year full catalogue
Microcredential
100 - 150 learning hours
Paid access
Credit awarded
10 – 15 UK credits =
4 – 6 ECTS =
2 – 3 US credits
Endorsed industry
partners
• What is a Microcredential?
• Short, affordable, accredited course
• Worth 10 to 15 credits
• Requires 100 to 150 hours part-time study over 10 -12 weeks
• Aimed at a new group of students
• may already be in work and or have a postgraduate qualification
• looking to progress within their existing career field, or develop new skills
• What is an ExpertTrack?
• ExpertTracks are collections of courses that
allow a learner to go deeper in to a subject
with payment via a flexible subscription
model
ExpertTrack
3 - 5 short courses
Monthly subscription,
7 day free trial
Pay for access to
content after 7 days,
assessments and
certificates

7. 7
COURSE EXAMPLES

8. 8
AGILE BUSINESS PATHWAY (IN COLLABORATION WITH ABC)
Free Short
Course

10. DELIVERY APPROACH
New unit within the OU established to drive the development of paid short
courses on the FutureLearn platform.
Harnesses the existing knowledge and expertise of key teams across the OU
including:
1. Academic teams in Faculties
2. Learning Design and Production Services
3. Marketing and Communications (including insight)
4. Academic Services
5. Academic Strategy
Launched with x2 microcredentials in February 2020,
Total of microcredential courses in market now = x21

12. Thank you