The decision to return to graduate school is a big one. The
choice to do so while working full-time is an even more daunting. The number of
colleges and universities offering online courses has grown exponentially, and the
investment in making traditional graduate programs accessible online is only
expected to rise.
Prospective online
students should weigh three major things when considering a program.
Instructor
Accessibility
Students should research who teaches the online courses.
Tenured faculty? Adjunct professors? Are the instructors available for
questions by phone? Email? Skype? At Purdue, faculty open specific office hours
just for the students in the online sections of their courses. Most online
courses also have chat options or forums for current students to connect and
discuss material.
Program Flexibility
The ability to learn from any location at any time is
increasingly enticing to students who want to learn on their own time and enter
a graduate program without sacrificing their career.
Often a work or life circumstance occurs that requires a
student to take time off for a semester and prospective students should
research the possibility of this with any program they are considering. Students
should also be sure to note if a program has any campus residency requirement
at any point in their online program.
Student Services
In any graduate program, it's important to know the services
available as a student. When looking into an online program, be sure to ask
what on-campus services will also be provided as a distance student? Will there
be access to the professional practice office? Disability resource center?
Writing lab?
Purdue strives to make the student service access
for on-campus and online experience as similar as possible in all of these
ways.
Editor's note: This is a sponsored blog post by Purdue Engineering. Purdue delivers six different graduate engineering degrees entirely online. These online graduate degrees are consistently ranked in the top 10 by U.S. News and World Report. Purdue offers more than 74 online courses each year and is one of the largest providers of distance graduate engineering degrees.
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