Online College Course Forum

I've started to think about the differences of studying online as opposed to studying in a traditional classroom facility. One of the things that strikes me is the need to be able to write well and fluently. Much of the communication between student and tutor is written, in the form of email or messaging.

Actually this is not traditional written communication, to me email and messaging is sort of half way between talking and writing - it's really much more immediate than normal writing, but you have at least a little time to consider it before you send it. On the other hand, reading it is harder - you don't have the face and body language that goes with verbal communication, or voice tone. Very different - I wonder if it really does affect how well we communicate, or marks for an online program?

Interviewing for my support person for online learning reminds me how important it is to keep the people dimension when you are studying online. We have seen 4 people in the last 24 hours, and each person had really great personal skills and qualities, but were so different from each other.

I have been going through the qualities that online students will need, including a shoulder to lean on, and an ear to listen when things are not going well. Really, many tutors offer this in the classroom, but online support is not offered face to face, and therefore they also have to be good at the written word, and have to be particularly sensitive to nuance.

I'm interviewing for a new position in my educational institute, and I had a tremendous response to the advertisement - around 50 candidates. Interestingly there were three candidates who had a degreee that they had gained through online programs, and five that are studying online programs at the moment.

Of the five that I'm interviewing, two are of this online study group - they are articulate, motivated and self-starters, all things that are necessary for most jobs today. Of course, they are likely to be slightly biased for the kind of job I'm advertising - it's to work in an online study unit in my educational establishment.

Online college courses are really beginning to have an impact on the way that people consider education. For some time, the idea of earning and studying has been very problematic, and many students have struggled to be able to earn during their periods of full-time study. Online programs meant that students studied from home, and could study later in their lives while they were working from home.

However, life is changing on the traditional campus, and many colleges and universities are offering the same courses in both traditional and online modes. This means that students can choose how they study individual courses on their program, giving them more flexible options for both study and work. So they don't have to choose to take a life-style sacrifice even though they are effectively studying full time.