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What do you think about distance learning courses?

Hi. I am undergraduate freshman in major Computer Science. I take 4 courses, from which 1 is DL. I go to a big university in Chicago, but live in suburbs. I commute to school M, W, F to take 3 courses from 9:40-1:00. Two courses requires lot of reading and so time. Also I have to after school go to fitness center (in my campus) to lost weight, decrease cholesterol (I was on blood test) and increase muscle mass and endurance. I expect to go there after classes for 1 -1:30 hour. I take train at 7:34 to downtown which takes 50 min and then 25 min subway to campus. I have to get up at least 6:30 to get to train station. Because I plan to work on T, Th and Sat to earn needed money for paying bills and buying food, I decided to take the fourth class in my major as distance learning instead on Tu, Th in middle of day in class. There was no class available early morning or evening. And taking class on M, W would be little too lot I think like 4 classes for day incl exercise. Besides there was ... no classes available during these days. Fridays not avaiable too. This class is IT The internet and web. It is basically designing websites and writting java script. easy class. So I took it as distance learning. For this I have not only book but also online connection.

Public Comments

1. I took a class (technical writing) online one semester because it wasn't offered at a time I could take it. I liked it because for the most part I could work on it when I wanted. We did have a few group-work assignments, but those were supposed to be completed online with the other group members, so we just had to agree on a time to all be online at the same time. I only had to go to class twice. Once for the first day of class to get the syllabus, basic first day stuff. Then for the final exam (Our exam was really easy. It was mostly a test of if you were the one who had done your work during the semester. One of the questions was to name the members of your group and state what each one had been responsible for in the group project.) I would take a distance learning class again (in certain subjects). I don't think I would want a math or science class because you depend a lot on the professor working out examples and explaining. English, history, or any class that is basically read the book, write an essay, answer questions about the book, would be pretty easy to do online.
2. I had a situation where I already had my (on-campus) BA and MS degrees, but wanted to go for a degree in a different subject (math). But I had a demanding job, with long hours and extensive travel. And the travel schedule was not predictable. I could never guarantee that I could be in class. So I started taking distance learning courses in math. I ended up taking nine math courses and two computer science courses (C Programming and Cryptography) by distance learning. I was able to get into a good master's program, and have taken several graduate math and engineering courses under thant program. So I am a believer in distance learning, as long as the courses taken are at good universities which also have on-campus programs. I will say that the work can get challenging, and the more technical courses require a lot of self motivation for sucessful distance study. I read a statistic somewhere that one out of every six students in the U.S. has taken at least one on-line course.