One of the Most Valuable Learning Resources
The Quantum Dragon (feat. IQT News) Exclusive
Despite its name, a black opal gemstone is not solid black like an onyx gemstone. Its dark body serves as a canvas, like a work of art, supporting the rainbow of vibrant colors found on its surface. Due to their appearance and rarity, they are among the most valuable opals. And like Q-CTRL, they are primarily found in Australia.
Q-CTRL names its products after Australian opals as a nod to the heritage of the company. Interestingly, under a microscope, opals have a crystalline structure that visually resembles atomic structure. The name “Black Opal” has been assigned to its interactive online learning platform, which has been, like its namesake, among the most valuable introductory learning resources for quantum computing for several years. It just got more valuable.
Skills
For the past two years, Black Opal has contained 10 learning modules, called “skills.” Four are at the beginner level, four are at the intermediate level, and two are at the advanced level. Each skill contains a series of interactive lessons and culminates in the awarding of a badge. Progressing through and completing all 10 skills results in the awarding of a digital certificate.
Black Opal is actually older than two years, but the current syllabus with its 10 skills is two years old.
SOMEWHAT NEW! Projects
A year ago, Black Opal started evolving from a self-paced platform for individuals into a platform that is also adaptable for use by enterprises and educators, offering controls for IT and course administrators. There are turnkey solutions that support workforce development starting at zero and culminating in a capstone challenge – this Projects feature.
Black Opal Projects draws from information throughout the course. The scenarios present real-world problems with multiple possible solutions and account for real-world device constraints, so that students are given room to explore optimal solutions. Projects is meant to be less guided than the course itself, with less hand holding.
Projects features automatic grading, so that quantum computing experts don’t need to be on-hand. If they wish to do so, administrators can pull up the students’ solutions in the classroom and use them to discuss the various approaches to finding the solutions. Q-CTRL provides the administrators with the optimal solutions, as well as explanations of why the provided solutions are optimal.
BRAND NEW! Exams
The Exams feature provides a final exam with more-formal content and multiple-choice questions, requiring students to demonstrate an understanding of the entire course. Students may only attempt it once, but there is auto-saving, so there is no risk of data loss due to connectivity issues.
Exams is meant to be simple and accessible for administrators, who can enable or disable the exams as appropriate. Like Projects, the assessments are automatic. If students run out of time, they get credit for what they achieved.
COMING SOON! Learning Management System integration
This pending feature will enable Black Opal to plug into any existing LMS, such as Canvas or Cornerstone, making Black Opal a turnkey, all-in-one solution for enterprise and education. The goal is to reduce administrators’ efforts to zero, requiring no further effort on their part. Direct connections will be possible via learning standards such as xAPI, SCORM, or LTI.
How many students can it handle? Black Opal recently rolled out to a 3,000-student course in India, so everything has to be automatic before expanding to even larger courses in the future. It can adapt to your workforce or classroom.
Conclusion
Many Black Opal customers have a non-negotiable requirement that Projects and Exams be part of a syllabus in order to meet institutional requirements. It must meet students’ expectations of a legitimate course, including a stricter environment. It must include putting knowledge to practical use. You can still self-learn as an individual, but you can also learn within a formal, structured environment that meets these requirements.
"8ct Lightning Ridge Black Opal" by Daniel Mekis is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/?ref=openverse.