Academic Partnerships Adds Four Top Specializations Partners

Leading universities and faculty join the company's globalization initiative

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Mar 26, 2015, 08:08 ET

DALLAS, March 26, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Academic Partnerships (AP), a global provider of online services for higher education, today announced the addition of more than 40 new Specializations developed at the Judge Business School and Queens' College at the University of Cambridge, the UCLA Anderson School of Management, the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business, Rice University and Rice University's Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business. This exclusive group of providers will offer their Specializations through a unique university-to-university model.

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AP Specializations are a global credential for international higher education and are designed to expand access to academic programs from the world's best universities to large numbers of global students. They consist of two or more Specialization Certificates, which are derived from courses in degree programs and are taught by distinguished scholars from provider institutions. AP Specializations are distributed through host universities, which are the top schools in countries around the world. Host universities incorporate AP Specializations in their on-campus curriculum or have their students take them concurrently with degree programs, assuring that all enrolled students receive a Specialization Certificate from a premier global brand.

"AP Specializations provide every university with the perfect visiting professor – distinguished, authoritative and inspirational," said Lord John Eatwell, president of Queens' College, University of Cambridge. "Each AP Specialization is designed to complement and enhance the university's own courses, providing support for professors and access for students to receive certification from leading international institutions."

AP's university-to-university distribution model represents the first large-scale collaboration between some of the world's most respected universities. It provides a blended learning experience for students who take AP Specializations online and receive support from the host institution's on-campus faculty, which translates into strong learning outcomes and high completion rates. Students enrolled in AP Specializations are academically qualified, having met the high admissions standards of outstanding host universities.

"The integrity of AP Specializations is based on the indisputable competence and expertise of their course authors, the reputations of the entities that grant them and the content's alignment with the market," said Clayton Christensen, professor at the Harvard Business School. "AP Specializations are designed to optimize time and minimize cost," he added.

The global distribution of AP Specializations is made possible through a new, advanced e-commerce platform, the AP Open Network powered by Canvas, which enables the best universities in the world to serve an unlimited number of students with unrivaled quality. The AP Open Network is the world's first fully integrated enrollment, payment and course delivery system. This unique cloud-based platform delivers content on demand on all devices and in all major languages, and collects payments in local currencies.

The distribution of AP Specializations and the support of host universities are facilitated by 12 global service hubs, which Academic Partnerships has established in Mexico, Colombia, Peru, the U.K., Spain, South Africa, India, Indonesia, Australia, the Philippines, Hong Kong and China.

Additional outstanding provider universities will be announced shortly.

About Academic Partnerships
Academic Partnerships is a leading online service provider for higher education globally. The company assists universities in converting their on-campus degree programs into an online format, recruits qualified students for those programs, and supports enrolled students through graduation. Serving public and private not-for-profit universities in the United States and top international institutions, Academic Partnerships is guided by the principle that the opportunities presented through technology-aided learning make higher education more accessible and achievable. The company was founded by social entrepreneur Randy Best, who has spent nearly 20 years developing innovative learning solutions to improve education. For more information, please visit www.academicpartnerships.com.

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SOURCE Academic Partnerships