I did my whole BA at a brick-and-mortar university and my whole MA online. I personally preferred the online format, because it didn’t require me to get up at a certain time to hustle to class–so long as I met my due dates, participated in message board discussions, I was good.
I liked being able to do coursework in my pajamas (though, to be fair, lots of kids go to college classes in PJ’s.)
But I do think that it would have been worse to do the Bachelor’s work online–that’s where you’re ideally learning new material. The Master’s was just expanding on that–application of knowledge, which made it easier, at least to me.
I’m in an online program now, and overall I’d say it has been worthwhile. I think it works better when you have classes and assignments, and I found that working in study groups or project teams, even remotely, made up for some of the missed social aspects of an actual classroom.
On the other hand, in the independent final project stage it has been a maddening, daily aggravation that I don’t have handy an academic library where I can sit down for several hours and work online. AFAIK all colleges and universities limit on-campus wi-fi access to students, faculty, and staff. This didn’t matter in the days when everything was done with typewriters and paper, but now access to the internet become such an integral part of the infrastructure of study and scholarhship. It’s really astonishing how this development has turned the most local library to me, UCLA, from a useful place to get work done to nothing more than a book repository where I mostly just check out novels.
I realize that the primary purpose of a campus library is to serve that community, and in the old days I would use my privileges with consideration, avoiding the library when it was crowded with students and so on. And I do realize that I can’t expect UCLA to serve every Tom, Dick and Harry just because they live near. On the other hand, it was dismaying to learn how little cooperation there is between colleges and universities in California. It’s very much a case of UC having the best resources and preferring to keep CSU students out, beyond occasional book borrowing.
Deal with it. More and more classes are going online, and pretty soon the whole education thing is getting outsourced to China. We just don’t have the money for expensive, lazy American teachers anymore. Plus the Chinese are way better at math.
I did some of my bar courses online. I didn’t like it at all.
I much preferred when we were in face-to-face classes. Feedback was immediate, and questions could be answered on the spot–there was no e-mail delay owing to somebody not being online when a question was sent and an answer was required in order to meet a deadline. Interaction ruled the day, misunderstandings were cleared up immediately, and it was fun to see and speak with the instructors and my fellow students. I think I got more out of the in-person classes than I did the online classes.
I have to agree with all the points made by Sparky. I haven’t taken a purely online class, but before I learned better I took a lot of classes at the University of Phoenix that were essentially hybrid classes, as all the required “group work” gets “done” in “online meetings.” (Probably too many sarcastic quotation marks there…) And I’ve taken two television-based courses where the only class meetings were for orientation and exams… same story. They were all too easy to half-ass my way through, and I didn’t learn very much. I switched from UoP to “real” school even though it’s taking longer because I wanted to receive an education for my money, not just a diploma. Now that I’m within two semesters of graduating, I’m glad I did it, and that I gave up taking classes that don’t push me.
Just my two cents. I’m sure there are students who are able to motivate themselves into putting proper effort into distance-learning classes. But count my hand up as a student who prefers traditional education.
I think they’re quite worthwhile and a godsend to those who otherwise could not attend college. I am, of course, talking about classes from fully-accredited schools, as the OP is.
Having said that, I personally do not like them at all. Only enrolled in one, and wound up dropping it.
It’s a purely personal thing, nothing at all against the online format. Reasons:
Too hard to motivate myself to get in there and do it
Inability to raise my hand and get an immediate answer from the teacher. (I don’t want to wait 2 days for an incomplete response, re-email, get some better clarification, and finally get the light to dawn after 4 or 5 back-and-forths. I want us to get ourselves up to the board, markers in hand, and hash it out.)
The inability to raise my hand and get a quick clarification on whatever when he/she is in the middle of the lecture and thus go on with understanding of the point he or she is making. Online, the lecture is lost to me at this point and I have to clairfy, then go back later and pick it up from that point.
Again, though, this isn’t a rant against the format; it’s just me and my style. I much prefer the interaction of butt-in-seat classes.
I love online classes:
It moves as quickly as I want it to, as opposed to being slowed down by someone else. I dig it, they are trying to learn, and doing their best - I’m not bitching about them. I’m just saying that I absorb and retain information a bit more quickly than some, and I am much happier working at my pace.
I can do it when I have time, instead of being tied down to a fixed schedule.
I believe you get out what you put in. I have not had an inferior learning experience because of a class being online - I have had inferior experiences because I don’t care, but that happened live and online.
I would take every class online if I could. I hate sitting through class, especially when the professor is the type that simply regurgitates what’s in the textbook (which happens often) - makes me feel like I’ve wasted my time by going. But unfortunately, my university does not offer any graduate math/stats courses online.
The online classes I took as an undergrad were awesome, for reasons others have already listed: I could work at my own pace (within reason), at the time of my choosing, etc. I learn much better in an environment like this, jumping in and working problems; watching someone else go through problems on the blackboard doesn’t do much for me.
I find that classes of subjects I’m really interested in, and don’t mind putting the work in, do better online. I find I get more out of them, because I can’t just rely on osmosis like I can in a real class.
I find that the social aspect is not always present in real classes, either. Particularly lecture-only classes, where socializing will keep you from absorbing what the teacher says. I find that it’s only really easy classes that I have time to socialize, and then only if they aren’t something I particularly care about.
I think that covers everything but D, and, if you like having a regular schedule that much, sit down and do your classes at a set time anyway.
I’ve found that the prof matters a great deal. When I’ve taken a class from someone who’s interested in teaching an online course, takes advantage of the software available, and adapts their lesson plans & teaching style to the nature of online learning, they work well.
When it’s someone who seems to think that just because he can’t see the students, he doesn’t have to teach them, the classes are awful.
It’s interesting to hear the different viewpoints.
I’m looking at my book right now and thinking about it. My instructor posts a collection of notes each Sunday night (Sunday night we have a chat session to ask questions for an hour).
So, I get a few pages of notes. He does a good job with this; he makes them fun, condensed and interesting.
But… I scratch my head. Isn’t this just like being out of high school for a month with Mono and having a friend who takes really good notes?
I really think most people need something more than notes and a book to lean. I had a teacher that taught statics in a way that made sense and interested me. No way I would have had the same result by just reading his notes.
I’m thinking of starting another thread to ask if the whole American way of higher education could use an overhaul.
I read much faster than people talk, so I can be efficient in my studying with an online class. I don’t mind them if they’re constructed well. Lots of my continuing education courses are online; my gripe is when they’re put together by someone who feels the need to load them up with links that don’t work, videos that don’t play, and strange linked modules that don’t have a way to get back to the main site. I’d as soon just read text and look at diagrams than try to view a blurry video with garbled sound that doesn’t buffer adequately.
I hate online classes, pretty much along the lines of the OP.
Recently, in my Bar Review course, I had the choice to attend live lectures, or watch videos of the exact same lecturers giving the same lecture. Every time I tried to do a video lecture, it would take literally twice as long to get through it than the classroom hours the lecture took, because my mind would constantly wander (even with notetaking, which is how I normally maintain focus) and I would have to watch sections over and over because I spaced out. And then I wanted to stab myself because a 4-hour lecture took literally all day to complete.
Doing the course online was pretty much an epic fail. I simply need the small amount of social interaction a classroom setting provides. Luckily, I was not limited to the online course, and soon switched to solely attending the live lectures. I definitely feel I would have failed the Bar if online courses were my only option.