( CNN ) -- Almost exactly a year ago , Stanford University took a bold step . It opened up an online version of three of its most popular Computer Science classes to everyone around the world , for free . Within weeks , close to 100,000 students or more were enrolled in each of these courses . Cumulatively , tens of thousands of students completed these courses and received a statement of accomplishment from the instructor . This was a real course experience . It started on a given day , and the students would watch videos weekly and do homework assignments . These were real homework assignments for a real grade , with a real deadline . One of those classes was taught by my co-founder , Andrew Ng . In his on-campus Stanford class , he reaches 400 students a year . It would have taken him 250 years to reach the number of students he reached through that one online course . The Stanford endeavor showed what is possible . It showed that it is possible to produce a high quality learning experience from some of the top instructors in the world at a very low cost . At the same time as this project was being run , it had become clear that changes in higher education were desperately necessary . A high-quality education is now a critical need for most people who aspire to a better life , while it continues to be out of reach for many . TED.com : The 100,000 student classroom . In many parts of the world , including large parts of Africa , Asia and South America , good education is often not available because of lack of capacity . Even in the United States , where education is arguably there to be had , it may not be within reach . Since 1985 , tuition costs have gone up 559 % , almost double the rate of the escalating costs of health care . This Stanford project led to the founding in early 2012 of Coursera , a social entrepreneurship company that hosts around 200 free courses from 33 of the world 's best universities , including Princeton , Stanford , Penn , Michigan , Caltech , Duke , Illinois , Washington and others . The courses span a spectrum of topics : physics , biology , computer science , engineering , medicine , literature , sociology , poetry , business and many more . The courses are full courses complete with short video lectures , quizzes and assignments . For some courses , papers or projects are assessed through a peer grading system . They serve a rich community of learners from all over the world , crossing geographic , ethnic and language boundaries . More than 1.4 million students have enrolled to take these great courses , opening new intellectual horizons as well as opportunities . TED.com : Let 's use video to reinvent education . One of the greatest opportunities of this technology , one that is yet untapped , is the window that it opens into understanding human learning . The data that one can measure is unprecedented in both the level of detail and in its scale . Thus , we can apply data analytics in entirely new ways to understand what works and what does n't , ranging from general educational strategies to specific design choices for a given course . This transformation from a hypothesis-driven to a data-driven mode has revolutionized other disciplines , such as biology , and may now allow us to systematically improve the quality of education . This paradigm , which combines meaningful work that can be graded at scale with peer-teaching among students , allows us to offer some of our best educational content to students around the world , at a negligible marginal cost of pennies per student . It therefore makes feasible the notion of universal education , with the potential of some remarkable consequence . TED.com : Teach statistics before calculus . First , it allows us to establish education as a basic human right , so that anyone with the motivation and the ability would have the opportunity to get the skills that they need to make a better life for themselves , their families and their communities . Second , it enables lifelong learning . For many of us , learning stops when we finish our formal education . With the availability of these amazing courses , we would always have the opportunity to explore new directions , whether to expand our minds or to make a change in our lives . Finally , it opens the door to a wave of innovation . Because talent can be found everywhere . Maybe the next Albert Einstein or the next Steve Jobs is living in some remote village in Africa . With access to education , he or she can come up with the next big idea and help make the world a better place for all of us . As Tom Friedman wrote in May , `` Big breakthroughs happen when what is suddenly possible meets what is desperately necessary . '' The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Daphne Koller .
Koller : thousands Caltech computer science courses were opened to all online . She says Three took part , showing the hunger for education around world . Online education could upgrade skills , reach people who could n't afford college , she says . Daphne Koller : Online education enables lifelong learning and promotes innovation .