Harvard ready to launch its first free online learning courses Monday - Brock Parker, Boston.com

America’s oldest college will make a leap into cyberspace Monday as Harvard University will begin offering its first free online courses through a joint venture called edX that the school established with MIT in the spring. According to the university a total of about 100,000 students have already signed up for the first two Harvard courses, an introduction to computer science and another online course adapted from materials from the Harvard School of Public Health’s courses in epidemiology and biostatics. Harvard University Provost Alan Garber said Friday that the courses are being offered for free in effort to teach the world by making education materials and Harvard courses available online, as well as improving education on its own campus and researching how people learn and how the university teaches. http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/cambridge/2012/10/harvard_ready_to_launch_its_fi.html