NET 2018 Conference: Designing purposive MOOCs for disease elimination

Trachoma is an avoidable blinding eye disease endemic in 42 countries. The World Health Organisation (WHO) launched ‘GET 2020’ an international initiative to eliminate trachoma. Across many countries training challenges include few educational opportunities lack of trainers and limited or outdated resources. Applying innovations enabled by digital Open Education LSHTM created the first MOOC in ‘Eliminating Trachoma’ aimed at improving access to training equipping and mobilising large numbers of eyecare workers to achieve ‘GET2020’. The innovation was to: bridge the gap in access to knowledge; collate expertise into one course; and develop a learning design relevant for a wide range of practitioners and stakeholders.