Ten inspiring learner stories from MIT Open Learning
Discover how learners around the world have used Open Learning to start, switch, or advance their careers.
By Stephen Nelson
MIT has a history of providing some of the best on-campus education in the world. The Institute was also the first higher education institution to make educational resources freely available online. Millions of learners from around the world have used MIT Open Learning — including MIT OpenCourseWare and MITx — to start, switch, or advance their careers. Here, we share some of their inspiring learning journeys.
Mastering online learning to level up
Abigael Bamgboye, an accomplished and highly self-motivated university graduate, completed the MITx MicroMasters in Data and Economic Development Policy program, which started with an initial exchange program in 2019 and culminated with a certificate in 2021. She describes how the program helped her feel ready to tackle any educational or career challenge that comes her way.
“Ultimately, there are so many ways that the MicroMasters has enhanced my life,” says Bamgboye, “from broadening my horizons, to equipping me with new skills, to providing me with the vocabulary and context to participate in conversations and activities that I am interested in.”
Learning to fly
Andrea Henshall, a retired major in the United States Air Force, credits MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) and MITx for helping her achieve academic success while pursuing her master’s degree and PhD.
“My trajectory would be so different if MITx and OCW didn’t exist, and I feel that’s true for so many thousands of other students,” Henshall says. “So many other institutions have copied the model, but MIT was the first and it’s still the best.”
Stepping into a new world of learning with MIT OpenCourseWare
Since 2013, Emmanuel Kasigazi has been charting his own learning journey through MIT’s OpenCourseWare on YouTube, educating himself on subjects as diverse as psychology and artificial intelligence. For Kasigazi, the channel became a gateway to other open education resources, including the OpenCourseWare website and MITx courses, both part of MIT Open Learning.
“I always had the questions — I grew up on science cartoons like ‘Dexter’s Laboratory’ and ‘Pinky and the Brain’ — so I would go on YouTube to try to find answers to these questions, and I found this whole other world,” he says.
Turning aspirations into actions
From Ethiopia to community college to MIT, Mussie Demisse ’21 is on a mission to use his love of learning to solve big problems.
“I think professors at MIT have this way of highlighting how hundreds of years of knowledge was built out — this focus on intuition — in order for students to project into the future, for students to be the next discoverers,” Demisse says. “And in OCW I saw this. I began to grasp the importance of knowing more than just the facts. Coming to MIT, this was fostered so much more.”
Becoming “the boy genius of Ulan Bator”
Battushig Myanganbayar became one of 340 students out of 150,000 to earn a perfect score in Circuits and Electronics, a sophomore-level class from MIT’s catalog of Massive Online Open Courses (MOOCs). Dubbed “the boy genius of Ulan Bator” by the New York Times, Battushig’s success showed that schools could use MOOCs to find exceptional students all over the globe.
“I can’t compare it to a regular class,” Myanganbayar says. “I had never done that kind of thing before. It was really a watershed moment for me.”
Myanganbayer later went on to earn his bachelors in electrical engineering from MIT, as well as a masters in mechanical engineering and artificial intelligence at MIT.
Learning from MIT, learning from the field
Robert Rains MS ’19 earned his master’s without putting on hold his important work of improving safety and quality of life for struggling communities in Africa. Rains earned his master’s degree in supply chain management from MIT, despite his limited time and challenging location, by first earning an MITx MicroMasters credential online.
“The online program was very helpful in making sure that I could complete the bulk of that course work on my own schedule, which was very hectic,” Rains says. “Not only was I based in Africa at the time, but I moved countries almost every week. I had to study around different time zones and shifting work schedules.”
Paving a road with open learning
Samip Jain, a former graduate student in the Integrated Design and Management program, says he has been learning through MIT’s open education courses and programs since he was a young high school student. He credits the open education programs for some of his success.
“I was asking my senior classmates, ‘can you teach me this stuff?’ and one of them told me about online videos from MIT,” Jain says. “It helped me to learn the concepts. I thought, at least I can learn from what they are putting online. At the time, I never thought that I’d end up here.”
Pursuing research, education, and connection in the face of war
Tetiana Herasymova registered for her MITx program’s final exams just days prior to moving into a bomb shelter. Despite war all around her, Herasymova remained determined to complete her goal — she passed all of her exams in May 2023, the final step to earning her MITx MicroMasters certificate in statistics and data science.
“It was a hard decision, but I had to allow myself to try,” Herasymova says. “For all people in Ukraine, when you don’t know if you’re going to live or die, you try to live in the now. You have to appreciate every moment and what life brings to you. You don’t say, ‘Someday’ — you do it today or tomorrow.”
Ukrainian Catholic University offered Herasymova a position teaching mathematics and programming. She took MITx’s Introduction to Computer Science and Programming Using Python to prepare.
Using calculus learned through MITx to better understand cancer treatment
High schooler Dustin Liang estimated his blood cell counts by applying knowledge from an MITx course and talking to doctors.
“I was always pretty interested in the science field. Then I got cancer, and I got even more interested in it,” says Liang, who became an MITx learner when he began chemotherapy treatment. “I want to research it, find ways to help people get rid of their cancer, and better patients’ treatment.”
Liang is still undergoing treatment and has aspirations to one day become a doctor.
Coding the future with MIT OpenCourseWare
Chansa Kabwe, a machine learning engineer and MIT OpenCourseWare learner from Zambia, is a shining example of how to forge — or perhaps code — one’s own future. A go-getter from the start, Kabwe cites his father as a driving force behind his early love of math and science. “My education has always been an important part of my life,” Kabwe recounts.
During his freshman year of college, Kabwe had free and unrestricted access to the internet for the first time and that’s when he discovered MIT. “I saw that for engineering, ever since they had started ranking, MIT had always been number one,” he recalls. “And I was like, okay — they are doing something. Let me check them out.”
This is a snapshot of learners who have used MIT Open Learning. Open education programs are supported in part by generous donors. With your support, you can help us reimagine education and continue to open learning.
About MIT Open Learning: MIT Open Learning works to transform teaching and learning at MIT and around the globe through the innovative use of digital technologies. MIT OpenCourseWare, part of MIT Open Learning, offers free, online, open educational resources from more than 2,500 courses that span the MIT undergraduate and graduate curriculum. MITx, also part of MIT Open Learning, offers hundreds of high-quality massive open online courses adapted from the MIT classroom for learners worldwide.
Ten inspiring learner stories from MIT Open Learning was originally published in MIT Open Learning on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.