Military Personnel

Distance Education Facts

Distance education allows those with time or lifestyle constraints to further their education without having to attend classes at physical campus locations. Distance education allows you to schedule your education around YOU.

No more long-distance commutes to and from campus, no more scheduling conflicts between work and school, no more sacrificing time with family and friends. Distance education is truly flexible.

Traditional courses are adapted for online delivery so that your distance education experience is in no way compromised. In fact, distance education programs often offer a wider variety of classes than traditional schools!

A distance education course is similar to a traditional classroom course in that:

• Students all begin a particular class at the same time
• Students can visit the school's website and log in to find class-related materials like syllabi, assignments, notes and discussion threads.

Generally, distance education classes do not meet at specified times or locations, so students need to be self-motivated to complete their coursework and assignments on time.

Students taking distance education courses have access to and can communicate with trained instructors and other students via email and bulletin board threads. Sometimes, live chat sessions are available. In fact, it is often advantageous for students to schedule regular interactions with their instructors and classmates to maximize the online education experience - it's the closest distance education gets to live classroom interaction.

As you may have guessed by now, the average distance education student is fairly comfortable browsing the web and not intimidated by common distance education course technologies:

• threaded discussion areas
• chat rooms
• file transfer (upload/download) areas

That being said, the average participant in distance education is not a computer genius, and many courses offer a substantial amount of online help.

In the end, distance education is about convenience and flexibility, and in that sense it offers tremendous advantages over traditional classroom education.