1,700 free online courses from top universities

There are so many things I wish I had time to learn about. I don't need my learning resources, I need a way to jack in and have them uploaded to my brain.

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#5

Post by mym1990 » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:09 AM UTC

mparnisari wrote: post #2

https://www.openculture.com/free_textbooks - none of the free textbooks that i tried worked? i picked a few from the CompSci category

When you say they didn't work, what does that mean? Opened 10-20 and they all opened as a PDF or a webpage(albeit some don't have HTTPS certificates).

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#6

Post by CalChris » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:13 AM UTC

The Stanford iTunesU classes have been truncated to a few seconds. So Susanna Braund's Aeneid course (which was brilliant) is gone. Same thing with their Hannibal course. I don't know that they're available elsewhere. Apple dropped iTunesU (2021?) and Stanford didn't have a backup.

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#7

Post by helterskelter » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:16 AM UTC

shostack wrote: post #4

There are so many things I wish I had time to learn about. I don't need my learning resources, I need a way to jack in and have them uploaded to my brain.

The book Make It Stick by Brown, Roediger and McDaniel is helpful. tl;dr of it is:

- lots of low-stakes quizzing and practice

- spaced repetition

- reflect on what you've learned and what you could do better next time, and apply these lessons in different contexts

- interleave practice of different but related topics

- try to solve a problem before being taught the solution

- distill the underlying principles to different problems

- remember that if learning is easy, you probably aren't engaging you brain very much

This will help streamline the process, but obviously there's just a limit to what you can take in.

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#8

Post by wodenokoto » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:19 AM UTC

A lot of these are just links to coursera. And quite a few are not from universities (saw a few by PWC)

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#9

Post by ai_slop_hater » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:20 AM UTC

People don't go to universities for courses

Re: 1,700 free online courses from top universities

#10

Post by CaptWorld » Tue, Jun 23, 2026, 3:25 AM UTC

helterskelter wrote: post #7

shostack wrote: post #4

There are so many things I wish I had time to learn about. I don't need my learning resources, I need a way to jack in and have them uploaded to my brain.

The book Make It Stick by Brown, Roediger and McDaniel is helpful. tl;dr of it is: - lots of low-stakes quizzing and practice - spaced repetition - reflect on what you've learned and what you could do better next time, and apply these lessons in different contexts - interleave practice of different but related topics - try to solve a problem before being taught the solution - distill the underlying principles to diff…

Very good tips.. I always mess up when doing spaced repetition since I don't take notes, I try to re-read the whole previous material in the book again and I get demotivated that I have to read all that so that I remember all the previous material. Do you know a way to get out of this habit?