By Dr. Marciene Mattleman

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - A web developer, curious about poetry, and a poet who wanted to learn code teamed up so each could benefit from the other’s expertise. Their lessons took place at Peer2Peer University, known as P2PU, an online institution where students learn together at no charge, using materials from the Web.

Anyone with a passion can organize a course, reports Katherine Mangan in the June 12th Chronicle of Higher Education, describing this unusual institution, grown from word of mouth, where students learn from each other.

Since its inception three years ago, P2PU has 33,000 registered users with 1700 new users joining monthly. Workshops and courses are offered by facilitators, some with little background except love of the field.

Others in the open-course work world are Udacity, started at Stanford, and Coursera taught by Michigan professors. Penn, Princeton, Stanford and MIT have recently joined Harvard in edX.

If you’re looking for a unique learning experience, visit this bursting new online world.