Online Classes

I am pursuing a masters in Telecommunications Management at UMUC. It's an online degree. I'm only two semesters in, 4 classes, but I have to say, this isn't a good way to learn.

I went to a four year college, classes everyday, all day, plus labs at night. Then I got an MBA by doing 3 hours of class after work twice a week. When I heard my employer would pay for an additional degree, textbooks included, I thought awesome. I could do homework whenever I had a spare hour and squeak out a degree in two years. How hard could it be?

Well, harder than that. At the beginning of each semester, the instructor posts the syllabus and grading rubics so you know exactly what to expect. The problem is, the syllabus will say to read chapters 2 and 3 and the lecture notes, then answer 3 questions in an online class discussion. It makes it very easy to do the bare minimum. I'll look through the chapters and the notes to get the answers to the questions and that's it.

When the tests roll around, I generally do average. B minus to B plus range. My fault, I know. However the structure of the class is to blame as well. How the blazes was I supposed to know what to focus on? I assume by choosing those three class questions each week, that's the material the instructor wanted us to learn. Not true. He/she actually wanted us to read and learn the entire chapter. Independently, I suppose.

Which is another problem. Even when I do read the chapter (or section) word-for-word, it's difficult to take instruction from a textbook. There might a sentence in there with crucial information, but you read it like any other sentence. Only a person can help you identify what's important to take away from the lesson. And not just to get past to the test, to prepare you in your career field.

Here's a direct quote from one of my instructors this week, "Often there seems to be a difference between what I think you should have learned, and what you really have learned."

There's a lot to be said for the traditional classroom learning. I've had classes that were flipping through the textbook page by page with the teacher going over the important material. I've also had classes where you have 30 minutes of instruction followed by 2 hours of doing problems.  Regardless of how the class is run, you take cues from the teacher on what you really need to know. The teacher also takes cues from students whether they are confused or need extra help in a subject. Or are completely bored by it and should move faster.

With online learning, you don't get that feedback until after you turned in the homework assignment, get a crappy grade, and the solution set is posted. Even then, what's the incentive to go back and learn the material? You already got a crappy grade.

In addition to keeping up with the homework assignments and reading, there is often two projects a semester PER CLASS. If you are taking 2 classes at a time, that's 4 projects a semester. Sometimes they are group projects (which is torture), but other times they are individual (read: time-consuming). You put all this research and effort into a paper, only to get dinged on the score because you didn't stress what the instructor thought were the important parts.

I've learned that an online degree actually takes more of your time than if you just to go to class for 3 hours each week. An online degree does not give you a working understanding of the material. In fact, if I were hiring, I would be leery of a candidate that has mostly online degrees. In my opinion, they are not equal to the classroom learning experience.