BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Educ.
Sec. Digital Education
AVAXX101x: Assessing the first edX course on antivaccination and vaccine hesitancy
Provisionally accepted
- The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia
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Vaccine hesitancy remains a significant global health challenge, yet accessible, systematic courses addressing this issue have been scarce. To fill this gap, the University of Queensland developed and launched "AVAX101x: Antivaccination and Vaccine Hesitancy" on the edX platform in 2021. This was the world's first edX MOOC focused on countering antivaccination claims and addressing vaccine hesitancy. The course aimed to educate healthcare workers, public health professionals, and the general public, offering evidence-based strategies to address vaccination doubts. This paper discusses the course's objectives, content, design, and descriptively examines student demographics and survey responses, along with learner feedback. Findings reveal that AVAXX101x attracted a diverse cohort from 144 countries, including significant representation from UN-identified developing economies and a higher-than-average proportion of female learners. The course achieved respectable completion rates and garnered overwhelmingly positive feedback. Cumulatively, AVAXX101x successfully met its objectives by enhancing students' understanding of vaccines, vaccine safety, and vaccine hesitancy. It further demonstrates how open online courses can be effective tools to equip learners with strategies for addressing vaccine hesitancy, as well as an educational means to sway vaccine hesitant participants.
Keywords: MOOC, Vaccine hesitancy, Antivaccination, EDX, healthcare, Public Health
Received: 26 Feb 2025; Accepted: 12 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Aechtner. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Thomas Aechtner, t.aechtner@uq.edu.au
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