For six months, starting on May 1, Microsoft will cover tuition on the edX´s introductory Computer Science Professional Certificate course. In addition, the company will offer 500 coupons in any Microsoft-developed course. “By providing students and Massachusetts citizens with the necessary skills to bridge gaps in the tech industry, it helps them open new opportunities and be successful in their careers,” Chris Roy, a senior director at Microsoft, said. GE will offer an interview for either an internship or full-time position to any Massachusetts resident who completes and passes edX's MicroMasters programs in Supply Chain Management, Cloud Computing, Cybersecurity, or Artificial Intelligence.
Edraak.org, the Queen Rania Foundation's educational site, has announced its expansion into K-12, in order to meet the needs of school-aged children across the Arab world. The project has been powered by a $3 million grant from Google.org as well as support from Google employees on product design. These open educational resources will be designed to align with national curricula in the MENA region, which accounts more than 15 million children out of school as a result of armed conflicts and displacement. The platform, based on Open edX software, will also offer tools and resources for parents and educators, empowering them to guide children’s learning journey. Edraak CEO Shireen Yacoub stated that “the new platform builds on the success of Edraak’s existing platform for adult learners, which has reached over 1.5 million learners across the Arab world since its launch in 2014”.
This solution allows for an easy installation for non-professional deployments in the cloud. This is the download address.
The Linux Foundation has just passed the one million mark for people trained at edX.org, disclosed Clyde Seepersad, General Manager at this organization. “For example, over 65,000 folks registered for our Blockchain course within the first 100 days. There's clearly a huge appetite for materials on critical open source projects and we're committed to continuing to develop courses to help fill the need," he said. Other popular courses are “Introduction to OpenStack (LFS152x), Introduction to Linux and Administering Linux on Azure (LFS205). "The Linux Foundation has been a valued partner since they joined edX in 2014, and we congratulate them on achieving the milestone of reaching 1 million learners," explained Anant Agarwal, CEO of edX.
Before the launch, a major upgrade from Django 1.8 to Django 1.11 is needed. This task will be completed during February. After this, edX will start the packaging of Hawthorn, a process that will last 4 to 6 weeks. Technically speaking, edX won't support Vagrant; Devstack will be based on Docker. Hawthorn will be the eighth release of the Open edX platform, replacing the existing Ginkgo version. • Hawthorn wiki page.
