July 7, 2006

Be All You Can Be — Online

Colleges that market to military students discover they present new challenges

By Dan Carnevale

Registering for classes is often a hassle. But try doing it while fighting a war.

Bridget I. Ruiz did. Working at a research hospital in Egypt as a petty officer in the U.S. Navy last year, she enrolled in an online degree program in clinical laboratory sciences from the University of Cincinnati. But just as she started registering, she was shipped out to Iraq to conduct research on pathogens that were affecting troops and civilians.

The desert base in Iraq had scant Internet