University of Wisconsin-Madison anthropology professor John Hawks launched a Massive Open Online Course on human evolution last week, according to a university release.
The free eight-week course titled “Human Evolution: Past and Future” teaches 30,000 online students about the science of human origins, as well as the genetic ancestry of ancient and living human populations.
According to the release, the course includes videos, reading materials and online discussions with the instructor and fellow learners. It is the fourth MOOC released at UW-Madison this year.
Hawks said in the release he makes conscious efforts to incorporate the MOOCs into his research.
“I’ve brought along cameras to archaeological sites, showing students what it is like in the field,” he said in the release. “I’ve interviewed experts from many different areas of human evolution to let them describe their own work. Bringing students into the research is the best way to show them how science is done, and we’re doing that on a really massive scale.”
