Sponsored content disclosure: I'm happy to have had the chance to work with our sponsor Classpert!
Continuous development is something that so many stellar assistants have in common. It can be hard to carve out time for education, however finding self-paced online courses makes it a lot easier.
Here are some fantastic free online options that cover a variety of subjects.
This website has unlimited free courses. You can purchase optional certificates once you have completed a course for a fee.
This website allows you to enroll in a variety of open online courses. The courses allow for continual access to course content after the course end date.
This website lists all of the top 50 free online courses of all time with links to each.
A free online course search engine. Find over 150,000 online courses from more than 30 different online course platforms. Compare prices, watch video previews, and get all relevant information on online courses.
IBM has several different learning paths in this website geared towards learning data science. One neat perk is the ability to earn a badge after completing a path which can be displayed on your LinkedIn profile.
Coursera has over 1,600 free courses the time I last looked. However, if you'd like a course certificate, that does require a fee.
Options on edX range from free courses to paid certifications. They have over 90 global partners and were founded by Harvard University and MIT.
This website offers more than 180 topics, including more than 2,000 lessons, 800+ videos, and more, completely free.
Google has great free courses for those of you interested in exploring the world of digital marketing. There is even an option to earn a certification that can be showcased on your LinkedIn profile once complete.
Harvard has a filter on their website to find their free courses. The link provided takes you right to that section.
If you have an interest in learning about social media marketing, Hootsuite Academy has several free courses to explore.
Merlot has over 5,000 courses that are all free. I recommend using the search area of the website to narrow down the topic of interest and exploring from there.
This link gives access to trainings on all Microsoft products, such as Excel, OneNote, and PowerPoint. They highlight their newest offerings so you can always see the latest lessons that have been added.
These Microsoft training courses are delivered by experts. There are even learning paths that you can follow to help earn MVA badges.
Open Education Database has over 10,000 free online courses from sources such as Udemy to Harvard on a wide variety of subjects. I recommend browsing by subject to help narrow down your search.
There's a section for free courses as well as accredited courses that cost a fee. The entire website, including the free section, covers a wide range of subjects.
OpenCulture has 1,250 free online courses from some of the world's most prestigious universities, such as Stanford, MIT, and Oxford. The courses are downloadable as well.
This website offers free courses but also uses a social media workflow, built-in galleries, wikis and blog pages to encourage collaborative learning.
This website gives access to a selection of introductory courses taught at Yale. All recordings are available in video, audio and text transcript formats.
Vickie Sokol Evans is a fabulous Microsoft, Apple and Google productivity trainer. Her website has links to free resources for assistants as well as paid courses.
This website is geared towards those seeking out nanodegrees, however, they have numerous free courses which the link is directed to. The courses are generally in the engineering and technology arenas.
This by no means is an exhaustive list, however, I hope it gives you plenty of options to start exploring!
Besides courses, I recommend browsing my extensive list of websites geared towards assistants. There are so many wonderful articles and resource lists in those websites, so if you don't feel like committing to a whole course, it's another avenue to explore.
Cheers to the pursuit of knowledge!
What is your favorite go-to for online education? Please share in the comments below!
