They change careers five times. What we do is all about allowing adult learners to have flexibility and convenience. Ms. Gutter, however, thinks online relationships among classmates and professors are better than traditional classes. But I found the rapport and friendships that developed with classmates and professors online were remarkable. I still keep up with some of them.
Skeptics contend that online learning is faddish, an update to the correspondence course.
Others see a fundamental shift toward customized, asynchronous learning geared to a new economy. I don't know of any university of any size that's not looking at scaling delivery of their courses by putting them on the Web. As of 1998, there were more than 54,000 online distance courses, the US Department of Education reports. Near the front of this pack are a gaggle of for-profit online schools like the University of Phoenix, Jones International University, Devry's Keller Graduate School of Management, Cardean University, Capella University, and others. The University of Oregon will this fall offer its first all-online master's in information management.