Peoples-uni Open Access Educational Initiative aims to build public health capacity in low- to middle income countries to improve health outcomes of the local population. Currently sixteen Masters-level Public Health modules are taught by an international volunteer faculty twice a year (2 semesters). Courses are offered on the basis of open access resources and online asynchronous tutor-lead discussions in small groups of approximately 30 students. Fees for LMIC students are thus kept very low; currently a small number of high-income country or sponsored students are accepted at a higher fee to subsidise the infrastructure.
While providing the courses online, Peoples-uni provides the possibility for training for a wide range of students: combine study and work, no commuting or relocation, international environment – learning from each other’s experience.
Our currently 126 volunteer tutors work in more than 20 countries and include public health trainees (post-MPH), specialists and consultants, as well as public health researchers and academics. To date, more than 1000 students from more than 80 countries have registered for courses through Peoples-uni, and 124 of these have enrolled on the MMU MPH programme.
All the learning material, administration process, marketing material and enrolment process are within Peoples-uni. An IT group underpins the delivery of courses through the Moodle platform and has developed the associated automated application, enrolment and student progress spreadsheets for record keeping