MOOC Anonymous Chatbot (Helping People Pick Online Courses)

MOOC Anonymous seeks to use the Facebook Messenger Platform through a Chatbot to make online learning accessible to everyone on Facebook by providing an easy way to navigate and pick online courses.

Comment

Inspiration

Online learning is no longer a luxury. In the current fast changing world of work, continuous learning is essential to keep being relevant in numerous fields. Online learning is the most convenient way to keep up with continuous learning. Unfortunately, there's a plethora of courses online and it can be overwhelming to navigate which courses to take whether as a newcomer or veteran of online learning. As a result, utilizing the power of social media, MOOC Anonymous is a platform that seeks to make online learning more accessible to more users. It is a chatbot that aggregates both free and paid courses across multiple online learning courses sorted into various categories and skill level to ensure everyone on Facebook can take advantage of the power of online learning to change careers, advance their studies or explore their interests all in the Facebook Messenger Platform.

What it does

It is simple and easily navigable Messenger Chatbot where users can find the right courses from multiple online learning courses like Coursera, Udacity, edX, Khan Academy and even YouTube. Users click through the bot picking category and skill level to find recommended courses with links that open right in the chatbot without the need to ever leave the Facebook Messenger app.

How I built it

  • Built the prototype in Google DialogFlow with the Facebook Messenger ChatBot integration.
  • Ported the Chatbot to Chatfuel which provided a great UI.
  • Scrapped data of the courses using Python and Selenium.

Challenges I ran into

  • Scrapping the data and cleansing the data of the courses.
  • Vetting the courses to ensure diversity in the price range and skill level so everyone can take advantage of the platform.
  • Learning DialogFlow on Google Cloud and it's integration with Facebook Messenger.
  • Marketing to the right audience to grow users for feedback to make the product better.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

  • Built a Google Action to accompany the Messenger Chatbot
  • Helping 130 users new to online learning find the right courses for them with 20 of them completing their first online course which they found on the platform.

What I learned

  • Sometimes it's better to use already established technologies than creating a solution from scratch.
  • Social media is a great platform that can be used as an educational tool.

What's next for MOOC Anonymous

  • Helping 1,000 users upskill themselves through the right courses on the platform.
  • Adding new and diverse content to cover a wider range of subjects including life skills.
  • Add a recommendation engine to show users courses based on courses they clicked on.
  • Add a classification that classifies users based on how they answer questions.

Built With

Share this project:

Updates