Today Yale College announced Open Yale Courses, thereby making a collection of Yale courses freely available online. Along with MIT’s recent announcement, this is fantastic news for the open education movement.

“Open Yale Courses,” presents unique access to the full content of a selection of college-level courses and makes them available in various formats, including downloadable and streaming video, audio only and searchable transcripts of each lecture. Syllabi, reading assignments, problem sets and other materials accompany the courses.”

Over the coming years, Yale will work in expanding the open curriculum to include another 30 courses, and will also reach out to music and the arts. With Open Yale Courses, the school has embarked on an international open education campaign, working to build ties with curricula in China, India, Argentina and other countries.

Most of the content on Open Yale Courses is released under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license, enabling users to download, redistribute and remix course materials for noncommercial purposes. Users are encouraged to build upon the content to produce new lectures or other educational tools.

Read the full press release here.