MIT OpenCourseWare 25th Anniversary Symposium
Good morning, everyone!
And special greetings to the faculty and staff who organized today's symposium, and to all the faculty, learners, educators, and funders who’ll share their experiences and insights today.
Twenty-five years ago, when OCW sprang to life, I lived 600 miles away. But even over all that distance, we heard the reverberations right away – and for a long time afterward.
What a brave, bold, selfless thing MIT had done! So generous, and so generative at the same time! Wow!
More than two decades later, the MIT spirit and values that inspired OCW – the boldness, the instinct for service and the desire for impact – were central what drew me here. So it’s a wonderful honor to join you for this OCW milestone.
Now, though I wasn’t here at the time, I almost feel that I was, because OCW’s founding story is woven deeply in our institutional mythology.
In 2001, the whole world of higher education was talking about “digital learning” – fretting, really. No one knew exactly what to do.
And then the Institute made a big bet, with the full weight of its reputation:
With the announcement of MIT OpenCourseWare, it committed to a ten-year initiative to do something no university of MIT’s stature had ever dared: to open its doors to the world without requiring a key. The idea was to share lecture notes, problem sets, syllabi, exams, and video lectures from thousands of courses: a public website covering the entire MIT curriculum.
At the time, the prevailing wisdom in higher education was to “protect the brand,” to be cautious. But leaders like Charles Vest, Dick Yue, Shigeru Miyagawa and Hal Abelson—along with nearly all of MIT’s 960 faculty members — saw it differently. They believed the “brand” of MIT wasn't something to be hoarded; it was something to be shared.
At its core, OpenCourseWare is a bold digital manifestation of MIT’s fundamental mission: to advance knowledge and educate students in service to the nation and the world. By its very existence, it asserts that the “MIT experience” shouldn't be defined by the walls of our classrooms, but by the reach of our ideas.
Today, this “risky experiment” has evolved into a global cornerstone of educational equity.
OpenCourseWare has cemented MIT’s leadership in open knowledge and access to education. We have proven that when you share excellence, you don't diminish its value—you multiply its impact.
As Curt and Dimitris noted, the numbers are striking. More than 500 million people have learned from MIT materials…thanks to OpenCourseWare. For perspective: that’s more than the population of the United States and Mexico combined.
But the true legacy isn't just in the metrics; it’s in the landscape of education we have fundamentally reshaped. OCW didn’t just open MIT’s doors—it kicked off a global movement. It inspired universities across the world to launch their own open course initiatives, expanding the open education movement far beyond what anyone could have imagined in 2001.
Today, OCW is cited in national education strategies, by nonprofit initiatives, and by international development programs: Proof that openness scales when you lead with vision and courage.
OCW’s legacy is embodied in the teacher in rural Appalachia using OCW to refine their physics curriculum.
It’s in the high school student in Virginia who used OCW to stand in for an AP course not offered at her school – and who found, Yes, she could do the work – and Yes, she could go to college!
And it’s in the lifelong learners living anywhere in the world who, through OCW, found the spark to improve their own knowledge and to change their communities for the better.
That includes learners like Sujood Eldouma from Sudan. Sujood discovered OCW when she was struggling with her university’s programming courses. She went on to complete more than twenty OCW courses, strengthening her skills and ultimately discovering a passion for data science.
Today, she uses that knowledge and passion to tackle real‑world challenges, including responding to the devastating floods in her home country. Her story is a reminder of how open knowledge can transform not only individual learners, but their whole communities too.
As you’ll hear from our panelists today, OpenCourseWare has broadened MIT’s impact to every corner of the globe. It has democratized the tools of discovery and given millions of people the power to change their lives.
We feel its impact here on campus, too. What we often don’t emphasize enough is that OCW didn’t just share MIT’s teaching—it improved MIT’s teaching. Faculty came to see their teaching in a new light. They collaborated across departments. And they embraced digital tools that have shaped how we educate our own students.
In fact, OCW laid the groundwork for every digital learning advance that followed—MITx, MIT Open Learning, MicroMasters, and now MIT Learn. Each new platform stands on the shoulders of this original, brave idea. With MIT Learn – our new online platform – people have access to even more online courses and resources from across the Institute, so they can learn with and from MIT.
In short: The world is different today because of a bold idea that started here.
And I’ll note that much of this progress was made possible by the contributions of thousands of supporters, including early funders – the Hewlett Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and Ab Initio – as well as newer foundations like Arcadia. We’re deeply grateful for all that they do to support open learning at MIT.
Needless to say, OCW would be an empty vessel without the extraordinary intellectual contributions of our faculty, sustained over many years. Thank you!
And I also want to thank the devoted OCW staff and team—past and present—whose perseverance, creativity and quiet excellence have powered this platform every day for
a quarter century. Their work in curating, organizing, digitizing and maintaining thousands of courses is a remarkable act of collective service to the world – the legacy we celebrate today.
We know the work of creating equitable access is unfinished. Barriers to high-quality learning still exist—whether linguistic, economic, geographic, or technological.
MIT remains committed to lowering those barriers, expanding reach and ensuring that knowledge is not a privilege, but a public good.
As we look ahead, let’s continue to imagine boldly. Let’s keep asking what knowledge we can share, what tools we can invent and whose lives we can help change next.
As AI accelerates the way we create, personalize, and deliver knowledge, this mission becomes even more vital. The world needs trusted, rigorous, openly accessible knowledge—and I believe MIT will continue to lead in this next era of learning.
Thank you all for being part of this journey, and the exciting future we are continuing to build.
Sally Kornbluth
President