Dr. Michel Girardin, Creator of Top-Rated Business MOOC, Joins ODEM

Dr. Michel Girardin, a consultant and respected lecturer in Macro Economics and Finance at the University of Geneva, is joining On-Demand Education Marketplace, as an educator and strategic advisor.

Dr. Girardin managed an Investment Management course for Coursera that has been followed by more than 250,000 students since 2016. He will advise ODEM on the development of blended-learning academic programs, educator relations, and marketing strategies. In January, Dr. Girardin will be among the first educators to teach a course offered on the ODEM Platform, the company’s blockchain-based education portal.

"I’m excited to advise ODEM on best practices to become a world leader in executive education using state-of-the-art blockchain technology,” Dr. Girardin said. “I also look forward to helping ODEM to set a new standard for more efficiently connecting executives to academic professors."
ODEM’s collaborative Platform empowers students to engage with top academics to create high-quality educational experiences at a reasonable cost. Unlike providers of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCS), ODEM focuses on real-time, in-person and interactive online educational experiences and tutoring services.

"We’re honored and delighted to welcome Dr. Girardin to the ODEM family of educators,” said ODEM CEO Richard Maaghul. “We look forward to gaining his valued perspective on achieving ODEM’s mission of making education more accessible, affordable, transferable, and verifiable."

Dr. Girardin’s Investment Management course has been among the highest-rated business offerings on Coursera, according to a report prepared for the University of Geneva.

"In 2017, this specialization ranked in the top 10 of all specializations at Coursera aimed at boosting one’s professional career and was further classified in the top three courses to build skills in today’s hottest fields, that of becoming a financial advisor,” the report states. “Earlier this year, the program was second in popularity among 980 business offerings on Coursera’s platform."
Dr. Girardin has more than two decades of experience in the Swiss private banking industry as a Chief Economist and Chief Investment Officer. He was attracted to ODEM by the opportunity to explore the use of blockchain technology to address the problem of student dishonesty in online education.

“Existing online providers have done little to make certain that a person who takes an online exam is the same individual who followed the course material,” said Dr. Girardin, who has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Lausanne and a Master of Science in Economics from the London School of Economics.

A solution to exam cheating would boost the value and credibility of online academic program credits and potentially allow them to be recognized by the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System. The ECTS allows university students to transfer credits from one institution to another.

For more information about ODEM please see WWW.ODEM.IO