Group Description

Since first MOOCs “Massive Open Online Course” were provided over a decade ago, several MOOC courses and platforms were developed, and the MOOC concept has evolved and became much more widespread all over the world. Such exceptional learning trend has a tremendous potential to reach a large number of online self-learners with various learning objectives and needs. But what about learners with disabilities?
While some MOOC providers have included an accessibility statement generally available online via their platform landing pages, no guarantee is provided whether MOOC education content and services are universally designed and fully accessible for all, which will hinder a large number of learners to access those courses and have equal opportunities to benefit from such a widespread educational trend.
In this regard, Mada has been working in collaboration with partners to be the MOOCA (Massive Open Online Courses Accessibility) provider in Qatar and beyond. Mada offers accordingly various MOOC accessibility services to universities and education institutions in order to produce universally accessible quality MOOCs, in Arabic and English languages, and thus to meet the needs of individual learners with disabilities.

This working group focuses on accessibility issues for MOOCs, and explores and suggests potential appropriate solutions that can be applied to make MOOCs more accessible and used properly by a large spectrum of learners with different abilities, disabilities, and needs.