Wednesday, December 13, 2000

Seeking Online Students, Franklin U. Forges Links to Community Colleges By JEFFREY R. YOUNG In hopes of enrolling more two-year graduates in its online bachelor's programs, Franklin University has forged partnerships with more than 90 community colleges in 10 U.S. states and in Canada. Franklin's community-college alliance, as the program is called, allows students to shift seamlessly from local colleges to Franklin's virtual campus. Participating community colleges benefit by drawing larger enrollments for "bridge" courses that they offer to prepare students for four-year programs. Franklin automatically admits graduates of participating institutions who have at least a 2.5 grade-point average, and the university accepts credits from the colleges' courses as part of its degree programs. The university, a nonresidential institution in Columbus, Ohio, has about 500 online students this semester, and about 6,000 students in its traditional courses. "We offer the capstone courses," says Bonnie Smith Quist, executive director of the community-college alliance. "The advantage is the student never has to leave their local community to complete their bachelor's degree." Under the arrangement, students are encouraged to continue to use libraries and other facilities at their local community colleges while they take Franklin's online courses. The partnerships aren't exclusive, and colleges are free to make similar arrangements with other institutions. So far, the university offers six degree programs online: business administration, computer science, health-care management, management information systems, public-safety management, and technical management. The alliance has been in place since 1998, but it continues to grow. "I don't know of any other institution that has a model exactly like ours," says Ms. Quist, though she notes that many institutions have reached some agreements with other colleges, for both online and traditional courses. In many ways, community colleges are turning out to be the most successful "portals" for online education. Students appear comfortable looking to their nearby community colleges for online courses -- or for guidance about which online programs to consider. And many four-year institutions are eagerly linking up with community colleges to promote online courses. For-profit distance-education institutions have been among the most aggressive in working with community colleges. (See an article from The Chronicle, December 8, 2000.) But community-college officials say they are also seeing a growing number of offers from traditional four-year institutions. "The pattern that seems to be evolving is a pattern where an online bachelor's-level university will contact community colleges" to seek a partnership, says Roe Darnell, president of Cerro Coso Community College, in Ridgecrest, Calif. Mr. Darnell says he gets partnership offers from universities about once a month. Dan Steadman, vice president of academic affairs at Jefferson College, says he draws requests for similar partnerships nearly every week. "Sometimes I'll get three or four in a day," he adds. The two-year college, in Hillsboro, Mo., recently joined Franklin's alliance, and Jefferson's administrators hope that the partnership will increase enrollments in its advanced courses. "Many of those courses which would serve as bridge courses tend to have lower enrollments," says Mr. Steadman. The college also hopes to help more students attain four-year degrees, and to prolong the college's relationships with its students. As Franklin's Ms. Quist puts it, "It's a real nice way for community colleges to begin to become the lifelong-learning centers for their community." Background article from The Chronicle: How For-Profit Institutions Chase Community-College Students (12/8/2000) Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

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