why I am passionate about distance education

Distance education,through a variety of modalities, has played a role in my life from high school to today. When I was in high school I lived in rural area that required that I travel 45 miles one way to high school or live in town. My parents and I opted that I live in town, making the trip on occasion. I soon tired of living in town with relatives, high school, and I was the normal impatient teenage anxious to get on with being an adult. I am not sure how I figured it out but I found out about correspondence courses and that the University of South Dakota offered correspondence courses at the high school level. So I urged my parents and the high school that I attended to accept two correspondence courses so that I could graduate from high school a year early. It is apparent, that even at this age I was not engaged in the social scene of high school at all! Well I was and I had some good friends that I am still friends with today but I was eager to get to college and get on with that next phase of adult life.


I went on to college and while there I met my husband and soon afterward got married, this also meant a halt to my college education. I finished out at technical school and we moved to Wyoming. Wyoming is a rural state with one university and seven community colleges. The University of Wyoming is located in one corner of the state and the community colleges are located throughout out the state. After having two kids I enrolled in community college to complete my associates degree. At that point it was fully my intention to complete my associates degree and get a job. Close to completion of my associates degree I learned that I could get a bachelor's degree from the University of Wyoming via a distance. The modalities used at point were face to face with instructors located at the outreach sites, video conferencing and teleconferencing. In addition to this I enrolled in correspondence courses from other universities.


I was able to complete my bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of WY via a distance using these modalities. It wasn't until the late 90's early 2000's that online learning was applied at UWY. Even though I had completed my master's in public administration I decided to take some online business courses from UWY. This was fortuitous it was after this time that I got a job at the local community college and decided to get a Ph. D. I found an online university, Touro College International, which offered an online Ph. D. in Business. I contacted them, worked out the details and started my Ph. D. Touro College International, (TUI now) was a perfect solution to a working parent like me. Accredited, fully online, and an easy to use course management system I quickly found success with this university. Not only that I was able to take advantage of the opportunity to teach online, as a graduate assistant with them. This truly made the experience a rewarding one as I interacted with students and I was able to reduce the costs of my tuition.

This is why I am passionate about online education, the opportunities that it provides to working adults and adults with children who may not otherwise be able to go to college. My experience as student, instructor and administrator in the online education/distance education realm has been a rewarding one. There is room for both avenues of getting an education, face to face or online..and there are students who need to have access to both or one or the other for various reasons. Franky my interactions in an online classroom have been richer in many ways than face to face...much of that depended upon the course design. For students who are pursuing online/distance education today, it should be more than a matter of convenience, it should be a matter of accessing a quality education.