To serve our users, we have developed:
Courses: most courses combine text, videos, and exercises. It can take several hours to finish one, and they are free for everyone.
Paths: these are a combination of courses, projects, mentorship, and a community discussion section. They require a Premium Plus account and usually take between six and twelve months to complete. Paths can lead to a state-endorsed degree!
Consider someone like Michael (see personas chapter). He's a student, so he doesn't have much money, and he's already in a business school anyway. He feels he needs more skills, so he's going to pick a few courses to learn more about programming.
On the other hand, Jennifer has a lot of interest in paths. She wants to prepare for a new job and knows it will take time. But because she's a job seeker, she can dedicate the time and effort required.
Jennifer also likes the fact that OpenClassrooms online degrees are recognized. Her first question was, "How are they recognized?"
Courses
A course starts with a video trailer, followed by a short text introduction showing what students will learn.
Check out a video teaser to get a sense of the energy! 🌟
A course is usually divided into parts and then chapters. For example, this course has three parts and thirteen chapters:
A course usually has between two to four sections, with five chapters in each. Naturally, this varies as each course is different.
There are exercises at the end of each section:
Quizzes: a fast way of checking if students have understood the previous chapters.
Activities: small assignments that they must complete.
We do our best to make these courses engaging, useful, and fun at the same time. That's why we look for teachers who are passionate about what they do. 😃
Paths
A path is designed based on the skills students need to do a job. On a path, they'll find:
Courses: already discussed.
Projects: each project requires several weeks or months of work to finish. Completing them demonstrates that they have acquired the skills.
We offer several paths like these:
Each path has a short description to explain what students will learn, what the professional sector is like, and what they will need to do to complete the path.
If you scroll down, you'll see the list of courses and projects that this path combines:
A student has to complete all the projects to finish the path (and possibly earn their degree). Courses are optional; however, they serve as a basis to help them complete the projects. We call this a project-driven approach.
Once a student joins a path, they get a mentor and access to the community discussion space on Slack:
The vocational training's key element is the weekly videoconference with a mentor, who will help the student stay on track, keep motivated, and focused! 💪
We hope this short introduction gives you a better idea of what we do! 🙂
