The Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced Wednesday the creation of an online track for getting a certain type of master’s degree, an experiment with the potential to open up its admissions process to the world as never before. Here’s the idea: Anyone can take a suite of courses in supply chain management designed by MIT through the free online Web site known as edX. Those who do well in that semester of study and pass a set of proctored exams can earn what’s called a “MicroMaster’s” from the online unit of MIT called MITx. Top performers could then apply for a residential slot in a full master’s degree program in supply chain management based in Cambridge. If they get in, they would be only a semester away from finishing a full master’s degree. Ordinarily, the regular master’s program in that field is two semesters. MIT calls this experiment “inverted admission.” It will start in February.

October 7, 2015 ・ From The Washington Post