Monday, March 20, 2000
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Pennsylvania Community Colleges Form Online ConsortiumBy ERIK LORDS
Life just became easier for community-college students in Pennsylvania who want to enroll in distance-education courses at different institutions around the state. Last week, Pennsylvania's 15 community colleges created a consortium that will allow Pennsylvanians to take courses from any member college through Internet and video technology. The Pennsylvania Virtual Community College Consortium gives students more choices in online courses and makes registering for them simpler, organizers say. On its World Wide Web site, the consortium lists approximately 800 courses of the 15 institutions that are offered through the Internet, video, and television. A student could earn an associate degree entirely through distance-learning courses without ever setting foot on a campus, organizers say. However, the consortium itself will not grant degrees or offer courses. That will be left to the individual participating campuses. Online education is not new to Pennsylvania community colleges. Individual two-year institutions have offered distance-learning courses for years. But it has been difficult for a student at one community college to take an online class from another. Previously, such a student had to obtain course catalogs to determine what courses were available elsewhere. Now, for the first time, the consortium's Web site lists the offerings of all 15 schools. Also, in the past an application fee was levied every time a student sought to take a course at another institution. Through the consortium, a student can pay a single application fee to one of the 15 colleges and then take courses at any of the other consortium colleges without paying an additional fee. The application fee averages about $30 at each of the institutions. "Access is really the key word here," says James J. Linksz, the chairman of the consortium's policy board and president of Bucks County Community College, in Newtown, Pa. "This is a marvelous access device." Organizers say the timing of the new consortium's creation is ideal because they expect the number of distance-education students in Pennsylvania to more than double over the next five years. In 1999, about 16,000 college students statewide took nearly 700 distance-learning courses. Consortium organizers estimate that 43,000 students will be taking distance-learning classes by 2004. Other states, including Illinois and Massachusetts, have similar joint efforts. For example, eight Massachusetts community colleges have collaborated with six public four-year institutions to jointly offer distance-education courses. But in Pennsylvania, officials said, the need is more pressing than in other states, because there are so few community colleges. About 4.5 million Pennsylvanians live in the 23 counties that have neither college nor university campuses. In counties with no institution of higher learning, 20 percent fewer high-school students go to college than in counties with campuses, officials said. Students need not own computers to take courses through the consortium, says John Bradley, chairman of the consortium's operating board and an associate dean of library and instructional resources at Bucks County Community College. He says that officials are working to ensure that students who don't have their own computers will be able to use those available at local public libraries.
Background articles from The Chronicle:
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 Bennington College professors resign en masse from contract-review panel Bard College and Rockefeller U. to exchange students and faculty members Wisconsin-Madison chancellor to step down in 2001 3 Bloomsburg U. students die in fraternity-house fire Trinity College student dies after inhaling drug mixture Scholars in Iran and the U.S. hail plan to ease limits on academic exchanges Colleges struggle to train experts in protecting computer systems Pennsylvania community colleges form online consortium |
Copyright © 2000 by The Chronicle of Higher Education