The consortium is formulated based on the expertise of these universities in developing and delivering quality online learning platforms. It includes Allama Iqbal Open University, Agha Khan University, Balochistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management Sciences, COMSATS University, Habib University, Hazara University, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore College for Women University, National University of Sciences and Technology, University of Baltistan, and Virtual University of Pakistan.
Vice Chancellors and senior officials of all these universities attended meeting. The new curriculum adds 11 core courses drawn from five broad categories of HEC undergraduate policy courses.
These universities will contribute courses on PakistanEdX by offering multilingual options in these five categories of Arts and Humanities, Social Sciences, Quantitative Skills, Natural Sciences, and Expository Writing.
PakistanEdX is a key activity launched under the umbrella of HEC’s HEDP project supported by the World Bank. It aims to offer Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in line with well-known international platforms, i.e. Coursera, EdX, with the vision to expand the horizon of quality education on national level especially targeting the far-flung and under-privileged areas. PakistanEdX will provide subsidised courses (MOOCs) to the underprivileged youth, prepared by high-quality faculty.
The platform is developed by the same organization which has been a major developer for several international learning platforms like MIT/Harvard’s edX, University of California San Diego, edX, and Wikimedia. The technology built by this firm has already served over 55 million students worldwide.
The platform will be complemented by HEC PERN project which is expanding quality internet access to all universities and affiliating colleges.
Rector NUST Lt. General Bukhari said, “We at NUST offer our full support for this visionary initiative. Its right time to take advantage of this opportunity and enable our future generations with right blend of new learning. I appreciate entire HEC/HEDP team for this remarkable endeavour.” Discussions were led by Ms. Maryam Riaz, Project Coordinator, HEDP.