Upskill with e-learning courses by Black experts, this Black History Month

In honor of Black History Month, online learning platform, Coursera has curated a selection of courses taught by Black experts that excel in their respective fields:

Marketing Management by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

This free course is taught by Hayden Noel, an Assistant Clinical Professor of Business Administration at the university. The course offers participants a chance to learn how businesses can create value for customers. It examines how the marketing process builds on a thorough understanding of buyer behavior to create value.

The course is ideal for those looking to enhance their understanding of how marketing works in the business world in just 12 hours.

Inclusive Leadership: The Power of Workplace Diversity by the University of Colorado System

Brenda J. Allen, professor emerita of the university is the instructor of this course. The course aims to empower learners to develop inclusive cultures where everyone feels valued and respected. 

In just approximately 21 hours, participants learn how highly inclusive leaders from around the world use processes of social influence to interact effectively with individuals from a wide variety of backgrounds. 

The programme will also deepen an individual’s understanding of the benefits of diversity, and explore a wealth of perspectives and practices to help learners reap those benefits.

Anti-Racism I by the University of Colorado Boulder

PhD graduate Shawn O’Neal is the instructor of this course who will provide an introduction to the topic of race and racism in the United States.

This course is ideal for anyone who is interested in learning about race and racism in the US. It is also ideal for individuals who have never taken a course in critical race or ethnic studies or an affiliated field.

Population Health During A Pandemic: Contact Tracing and Beyond by the University of Houston 

Bettina Beech, associate provost of planning and strategic initiatives as well as professor and associate dean for research in the university’s College of Medicine, teaches this course alongside 23 other instructors.

Together, they provide an overview of the far-reaching impact of COVID-19 and present contact tracing as a tool to mitigate the spread of the disease. This course will take approximately 22 hours to complete.

An Introduction to Programming: the Internet of Things (IoT) Specialisation by the University of California, Irvine

Ian Harris, professor at the Department of Computer Science covers embedded systems, the Raspberry Pi Platform, and the Arduino environment for building devices that can control the physical world.

The six-month programme comes with a Capstone Project, with which participants can apply their new skills by designing, building, and testing a microcontroller-based embedded system, producing a unique final project suitable to showcase to future employers.

An Introduction to American Law by the University of Pennsylvania

Anita L. Allen, an internationally renowned expert on privacy law and ethics, teaches this course alongside five other instructors. It was designed to give participants a glimpse into six different areas of American law: Tort Law, Contract Law, Property, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, and Civil Procedure. In approximately 12 hours, learners will be able to gain insight into the complexities and dilemmas that arise from the application of the law in different settings, and what is distinctive about American approaches.

The Social Context of Mental Health and Illness by the University of Toronto

Associate professor and associate dean academic at the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work, Charmaine Williams, teaches this course which explores how our understanding of mental health and illness has been influenced by social attitudes and social developments in North America and around the world. The 14-hour course begins by situating our contemporary mental health practices in a historical context, then looks at different aspects of mental health, mental illness, and mental health services and their connections to what’s going on in our social environment.