The British Council has announced that through a partnership with the Study UK campaign, GREAT Britain campaign, and itself, learners from developing nations can upgrade their education by studying over 100 online courses and potentially earn free digital certificates.

“A total of 60,000 digital upgrades will be made available for free to eligible students enrolled on over 100 online courses from over 30 UK higher education institutions hosted on FutureLearn: https://www.futurelearn.com/study-uk,” British Council reported.

The free digital upgrades were launched on October 16 and will allow students ongoing access to a course of their choice so they can take it at their own pace.

“In order to qualify, learners must live in countries that are eligible for Official Development Assistance (ODA) from the UK and have completed five steps of the selected course,” the council said.

The project follows a successful Study UK scheme which earlier this year offered 15,000 free certificates to students from ODA countries who completed particular online courses from British universities via the FutureLearn platform.

According to the British Council, the scheme was vastly oversubscribed, receiving more than 100,000 applications from 124 developing nations.

Organisers of this latest scheme hope the larger number of available upgrades will attract hundreds of thousands of potential new students, and raise the profile of British universities and their online courses to international learners.

“Our vision for Study UK is that students worldwide recognise that a UK education will give them the best platform to transform their lives, communities and countries,” said Rob Lynes, British Council Director UK.

He added: “Development work has always been an integral part of the British Council’s mission to create international opportunities and build trust between people around the world. Our work improves relations with other countries by engaging young adults and giving them the knowledge and opportunity to flourish, thrive and grow.”

Simon Nelson, FutureLearn CEO said: “FutureLearn is passionate about helping everyone to fulfil their potential by transforming access to education. To that end, we’re delighted to be playing our part in the Study UK campaign.

“Our UK partners include some of the best universities in the world and we’re proud to be able to showcase their range of credible, flexible courses to learners in areas of the world where access to education and a free digital certificate can go a long way towards helping them to improve their working lives,” she continued.