FutureLearn

History

FutureLearn was launched with 12 university partners, seeking those who "consistently rank at the top end of the…league tables". The 12 founding partners are: The Open University, University of Birmingham, University of Bristol, Cardiff University, University of East Anglia, University of Exeter, King's College London, Lancaster University, University of Leeds, University of Southampton, St Andrews University, and University of Warwick.

The launch was described as a move to 'fight back' and provide a space for UK institutions to engage in the MOOC space. FutureLearn's CEO, Simon Nelson, previously worked at the BBC.

Prior to the launch of FutureLearn few British universities had run online courses. Two (the University of Edinburgh and the University of London) had previously signed up to offer such courses through Coursera, while The Open University had been publishing a variety of online courses through its OpenLearn platform since 2006, although these were designed for self-directed study rather than cohort learning.

Partners

The following UK universities are partnered with FutureLearn (in alphabetical order):

University of Aberdeen

University of Bath

University of Birmingham (founding partner)

University of Bristol (founding partner)

Cardiff University (founding partner)

University College London

University of Dundee

Durham University

University of East Anglia (founding partner)

University of Edinburgh

University of Exeter (founding partner)

University of Glasgow

University of Kent

King's College London (founding partner)

Lancaster University (founding partner)

University of Leeds (founding partner)

University of Leicester

University of Liverpool

London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Loughborough University

University of Manchester

Newcastle University

University of Nottingham

Queen’s University Belfast

The Open University (founding partner)

University of Reading

Royal Holloway, University of London

University of Sheffield

University of Southampton (founding partner)

St Andrews University (founding partner)

University of Strathclyde

University of Warwick (founding partner)

University of York

Non-UK university partners include:

University of Auckland, New Zealand

University of Basel, Switzerland

University of Bergen, Norway

University of Cape Town, South Africa

Complutense University of Madrid, Spain

Fudan University, China

University of Groningen, Netherlands

Hanyang University

Keio University, Japan

University of Los Andes, Colombia

Monash University, Australia

University of Oslo, Norway

Université Paris Diderot, France

Pompeu Fabra University, Spain

Queensland University of Technology, Australia

Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China

University of New South Wales, Australia

Sungkyunkwan University, South Korea

Tel Aviv University, Israel

University of Twente, Netherlands

Trinity College Dublin, Republic of Ireland

Uppsala University, Sweden

University of Wollongong Australia

Yonsei University, South Korea

UNSW Australia, Australia

University College Dublin, Ireland

RMIT University, Australia

Non-university partners include:

Ambition School Leadership

American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE)

BMJ

British Council

The British Film Institute (BFI)

British Library

British Museum

Cambridge English Language Assessment

Cancer Research UK

Chartered Institute of Building Academy

Common Purpose

Creative Skillset

D&AD

ENAC

EUMETSAT

European Space Agency

Girl's Day School Trust

Health Education England

Houses of Parliament

International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies

Into Film

National Film and Television School

National STEM Learning Centre

Partnership for Advanced Computing in London (PRACE)

Raspberry Pi Foundation

Stockholm Environment Institute

UCAS

UNESCO

Courses

FutureLearn's courses span a broad range of topics. The first course opened on 14 October 2013. The first courses to be made available included "Web science: how the web is changing the world" (University of Southampton), "Introduction to ecosystems" (The Open University), "Improving your image: dental photography in practice" (University of Birmingham), "Causes of war" (King's College London), "The discovery of the Higgs boson" (University of Edinburgh), "Discover dentistry" (University of Sheffield), "Muslims in Britain: changes and challenges" (Cardiff University), "Begin programming: build your first mobile game" (University of Reading) and "England in the time of King Richard III" (University of Leicester). The first course to launch was "The secret power of brands", conducted by professor Robert Jones of the University of East Anglia.