Distance Learning Cuts the Odds Against You

Thanks to the web, education is fast becoming a commodity. Students have never had more opportunity to learn, their way.

Educators continue to identify surprisingly strong growth trends in distance education. There are a number of very good reasons. This rapid increase in long-distance educational gains is no fluke or mystery.

One reason that distance learning is booming is the most obvious— the internet has made higher education infinitely more accessible for working students and those in rural communities. The hours are flexible, the courses plentiful, and the classes never full to capacity.

It’s a fact that our current university structure can’t educate all of the enormous population of coming students, within classrooms on campus. In fact, the largest high school class in history graduated this year, 2009.

US Gov stats predict an ongoing and even rising rate of growth in higher education enrollment. And lifelong learning for adults is becoming the standard, rather than the exception, as jobs shift and markets mutate.

Students need courses that fit their lives and their own unique schedules. Flexibility in distance learning makes this possible. Different learning styles, as well as working while learning, makes distance learning ideal.

Computer-savvy students today want more control over their lives during learning. The fit can help many students excel. Especially those with families, jobs, duties, in rural areas, or with disabilities.

Online students typically earn higher college scores, more A’s, half as many failing grades, as traditional on-campus or commuter students. Online students also are highly literate, having used the web in many cases since first learning to read.

Keeping apace with these trends, faculty in higher education are scrambling to provide the instruction required on such a large scale. As the roles of faculty shift, there is a often new division of labor among instructors, such as “facilitator, teacher, organizer, grader, mentor, role model, counselor, coach, supervisor, problem solver, and liaison,” all designed to assist the student.

For instance, Old Dominion in Virginia offers nationally ranked programs in the sciences, engineering, arts and letters, health sciences, business and education. Their network includes nearly 50 locations throughout Virginia and as far away as Arizona, Georgia, Washington State, the Bahamas. Their distance learning programs even reach U.S. Navy ships and submarines deployed around the globe. More than 3,500 students have graduated from Old Dominion University’s Distance Learning program.

Students can find the courses they need at different distance learning institutions online. There is no penalty for being on campus, when your laptop is your classroom.

So go online, find the career that fits you best, and the program that will serve you best.

Go ahead, shop around— do it your way!

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