Share your skills and life experience with a worldwide community of knowledge
surfers by writing an e-Course! The guidelines on this page will help you
understand our requirements and provide helpful suggestions for creating your
course. After reviewing this page, please use
this form
to submit your course proposal.
About Us: KSURF is a unique online learning community that combines a state-of-the-art virtual university e-learning platform with popular networking features such as user profiles and blogs. We offer affordable online courses to a mainstream audience of all ages and from all walks of life. Our primary audience is Baby Boomers, slightly skewed toward women, but we are also working to develop audiences of Gen X/Y learners as well as home schoolers.
Choosing a Topic: We will consider any course that is well-written and likely to be popular with our students, including: Technology (Web design, Javascript/AJAX, programming, social networking, etc.), Writing classes, Business (entrepreneurship, marketing, sales, management), "Do It Yourself" and "How-To" classes, Health and Wellness, Self-Help/Inspirational topics, and academic subjects with a contemporary flavor (for example, Criminal Psychology, the environment, nutrition, medicine, aging, political science, and so forth.)
Length Requirements: We are currently seeking in-depth courses comprised of at least 10 lessons, and each lesson should thoroughly cover the topics at hand. Remember, you can include a selection of high-quality online resources to give your course added depth and value. In the end, the more comprehensive your course is, the more useful it will be to students.
Textbooks: You may suggest a textbook for your course, but it's important to understand that some learners will not enroll in a course if they have to buy a textbook. Therefore, you may give suggested readings from a textbook for those who want to learn more, but your lessons should cover the topic thoroughly and stand on their own without relying on the text.
How to Begin: You can write your course in plain text, Microsoft Word, or HTML (web pages). Graphic images can be included as you wish. We will format your material for display on the Webversity site, or you can create these pages yourself — just ask our Editorial staff to email you a template with our current page design.
As you begin writing, remember that each lesson of your course should contain:
Learning Objectives: At the start of each lesson, describe what the student will learn
Tutorial/Lecture: The tutorial is the "virtual lecture" component. It is the most important part of a lesson. Wikipedia defines a tutorial as "a presentation of content, usually with examples, often broken up into discrete sections." A tutorial is more in-depth than a lecture and combines a variety of topics which a traditional classroom instructor might cover in a series of lectures. The tutorial must provide a first-hand understanding of the key points being taught and will include examples, explanations, instructions, comparisons, instructor commentary, observations and suggestions, and other useful insights which will advance the student's knowledge and grasp of the subject.
Suggested Reading: Links to useful Web resources and/or a reading assignment from freely available Web content. Rather than just giving a list of links and telling students to click on them, write a short description of each resource explaining what students will find and what they will learn or should look for when they click on each link. These comments not only will be helpful to students but will give more substance to your lessons.
Learning Activities: One or more "homework" exercises encouraging learners to "do something" that will enhance their learning experience: for example, research an assigned topic or write a short essay on some topic discussed in the lesson.
Pop Quiz: At least 10-15 questions drawn from the lesson allowing students to test themselves on the current unit before going on to the next. Questions can be a mix of multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank multiple choice and True/False. Please mark the correct answers on the quiz!
We have provided a sample lesson from one of our popular courses now
running at KSURF. Please take a few minutes to browse
Lesson One
from Personal Finance 101.
As you develop your course, keep in mind our policies on copyright
infringement and plagiarism. Laws may vary from one country to another, but we
are headquartered in the United States and all content that we publish must
strictly comply with the policies described in
this FAQ.
Submitting your first lesson: When you finish writing the first lesson of your course, submit this material for our review. We can usually tell from this early sample whether a course is right for KSURF and, if not, we want to let you know before you spend a lot of time on the idea. We may also be able to offer helpful suggestions you can use to improve your course. If you have already written the course, you may submit the full package rather than just the first lesson. We can accept course materials in plain text, Microsoft Word, or HTML.
Compensation: We offer a sliding scale royalty paid on net enrollment revenues. The royalty percentage is typically in the range of 20-25% for as as long as you teach the class and keep the material up-to-date; however, the percentage varies depending on a number of factors such as the course topic, length, quality, and comprehensiveness of the material. We offer a standard contract and royalty earnings are paid quarterly. If your earnings in any calendar year exceed $600 in non-royalty compensation or $10 in royalty payments, we are required to report your earnings as taxable income and you will receive a Form 1099 for that year.
Join the hundreds of writers and experts around the world who have shared their knowledge
at our global village learning community. To take the first step, please use this form to
submit a course proposal
We look forward to working with you at KSURF!