Athabasca University was North America’s first online university. Its open and flexible environment is built on leveraging technology to enable learning. Athabasca University, Canada’s Open University, is dedicated to the removal of barriers that restrict access to and success in university-level study and to increasing equality of educational opportunity for adult learners worldwide.  As Canada’s only digital learning university, created by Alberta innovators, Athabasca University’s classrooms, collaboration spaces, and student hubs are not bricks and mortar, but Cloud & Code.

Like the river with which it shares a name and a surging spirit, Athabasca University, Canada’s Open University erodes obstacles. It dismantles the barrier between the student and their ambition — their best future. Some of Canada’s finest professors and leaders choose Athabasca University for the same reason students’ study with them. Athabasca is for the leader who wants to build their community without leaving it. It is for the learner who could study on any campus or maybe already does but craves flexibility and control of their time.

Athabasca University provides learning for life. Through the achievements of its students, faculty and staff, AU stands out as a provider of high quality post-secondary education.

• AU serves over 40,000 students (over 7,800 full-load equivalents).
• AU offers over 850 courses in more than 55 undergraduate and graduate programs in a range of arts, science and professional disciplines.
• AU has a $160 million annual operating budget.
• AU employs over 1,000 faculty and staff members on four Alberta, Canada, campuses located in Athabasca, St. Albert, Edmonton and Calgary.
• AU maintains over 350 collaborative agreements with other Canadian and international post-secondary institutions, with professional associations and employer groups and with First Nations institutions and communities.

AU ‘s IMAGINE Strategic Plan

Athabasca University’s 5-year strategic plan “Imagine” is in year two of operation. It is focused around 4 key strategic themes and 5 key values at their foundation:

Moving Beyond Place: Transforming communities through belonging and relationships.

Moving Beyond Open: Bridging open and inclusion.

Moving Beyond the Now: Supporting transformative and incremental change through agility and adaptability.

Moving Beyond the Norm: Adopting innovative ideas, taking calculated risks.

AU’s “I-Care” Values

Integrity:  We are guided by ethics, honesty, and fairness in all our actions, engendering trust within our University community.

Community:  We are one University. We achieve more together. We embrace collaboration and connectivity among our diverse individual community members and teams.

Adaptability: We are flexible.  We respond to the changing needs of our University and its learners with courage and continuous improvement.

Respect:  We foster respect by contributing to an environment in which every individual is valued.

Excellence:  We ask bold questions, provoke new ways of thinking, and focus on those things at which we can excel to enhance the quality of all that we do.

For further information on Athabasca University, please visit their website at www.athabascau.ca.