OpenCourseWare is one of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) projects which makes all of its academic materials available online to everyone for free. MIT OCW is one of the largest web-based publications in the world.
In 2007, thanks to the Ayb Educational Foundation, thousands of learning materials became available to students and faculty members of 33 universities in Armenia through the MIT OCW mirror site, without the use of the Internet.
In 2007, when the Internet was available to few in Armenia and its quality was poor, the Ayb Educational Foundation made all the academic materials of one of the leading universities in the world—the Massachusetts Institute of Technology—accessible for local universities without the need to go online.
Years later, when the Internet quality and price improved in Armenia, the project lost its relevance as people could use the online version of OCW.
The Ayb Foundation installed the server of the MIT OCW mirror site at Yerevan State University and connected to the university’s internal network (around 2,500 computers). Later the Armenian Research and Educational Networking Association (ARENA) Foundation, incorporating 32 universities in Armenia, joined the network, too. Thus, the materials of the OCW mirror site, including video and audio lectures, publications, presentations, articles, and so on, became available for high school students, young scientists and lecturers in offline mode.