Wheeling Jesuit Sees Growth In Its Online Learning Programs
By Anonymous
Wheeling Jesuit University sees growth potential in its adult and continuing education program, which it says gives individuals with family, home and career commitments the flexibility they need to undertake and complete degree programs.
Rebecca Forney, associate dean of adult and continuing education, said the university already is seeing a big increase in popularity of online learning opportunities.
She said Jesuit has about 400 students now enrolled in its online and evening programs, which meet one night a week.
“We also have a certificate program, an accelerated certification for teachers,” she added. “That program is growing very quickly and it’s also offered online. It’s designed for individuals who want to begin teaching, maybe make a career change and go into a new area, or if they want to be certified in a new area and teach, they have an opportunity to take courses online and do their student teaching in an area near their home. With the shortage of teachers, it’s be come very popular all across the state.”
While most of the students enrolled in the online program hail from the Tri-state area – Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia – she said some are as far away as Alabama and New York. Most are female.
Forney said the college advertises its adult and continuing education programs on various Web sites.
“I think the reason (for their growing popularity) is the individual attention students receive, both from an administrative standpoint when they’re enrolling in the program to the individual attention they receive from faculty members, and the quality of a Jesuit education speaks for itself in terms of being a premier educational institution.”
Online learning programs allow students to fit course work around their busy life schedules. “In an online environment, you don’t have to miss (family events),” she said. “You can fit them in and do your coursework at another time. Students still have weekly deadlines and they have to adhere to those deadlines, but they have a time frame where they know they have to fit it in.”
Jesuit offers traditional and non-traditional programs specially designed to meet the needs of adult learners, including a master of business administration, master of science in accountancy, bachelor of science in accountancy, master of science in nursing (nursing education specialists, family nurse practitioner or nursing administration), RN to BSN and RN to MSN, health care leadership, and the 15-month bachelor of arts in organizational leadership and development, otherwise known as “BOLD.”
Copyright State Journal Corporation Jul 27, 2007
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