National Online Learning Day is Sept. 15, a day that recognizes the potential of technology and the internet to transform educational opportunity. It’s a day that highlights what online learning can do – though also a reminder that digital access and affordability gains often don’t reach the learner. In higher education, technology has done a better job of expanding access to knowledge than in driving down costs or accelerating completion of the credentials that are often what learners seek to earn.

Modern States aspires to address this disconnect by realizing the potential of two tools, massive open online courses (MOOCs) and College Level Examination Program (CLEP) exams, which seem made for each other. Free MOOCs have historically lacked a mechanism for validating learning, with approaches such as awarding badges or completion certificates holding uncertain real-world value. CLEP exams, on the other hand, have been used extensively by members of the U.S. military and their families for almost six decades, and are accepted for credit at nearly 3,000 colleges and universities nationwide, providing an accessible, inexpensive, and credible way for learners to earn free academic credit widely accepted at colleges nationwide. But CLEP has been greatly underutilized because there historically has been no structured curriculum or courses to help students learn CLEP-tested content and prepare for the exams.

So, Modern States partnered with professors from some of the most esteemed universities in the country to produce a free digital public library of world-class courses in the 32 different subject areas covered by CLEP, with the course scope explicitly linked to what students need to know for the exams. Each course includes free instruction, free online textbooks, practice questions, and a practice CLEP exam.

Because our courses are delivered online, we can serve learners at nearly zero marginal cost, while also providing vouchers to those who have demonstrated engagement with the content and likelihood to pass a CLEP exam.

Nearly 750,000 learners have used Modern States. Want to be one of them? Here’s how it works:

• Sign up at  ModernStates.org.
• Choose the courses that interest you and learn for free, at your pace, with courses aligned to CLEP exams.
• Complete quizzes to confirm your learning and readiness for the CLEP exam.
• Request a voucher from Modern States, which covers your CLEP exam fee.
• Take CLEP exams year-round and apply the credit you earned from passing them to your college or university, per its policy.

To us, this is what National Online Learning Day looks like. Not the potential of technology to transform education for learners, but the reality of it. Modern States is where access meets value and where online learning truly shines. Just ask our learners.