Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, August 22, 1995 TAG: 9508230020
SECTION: WELCOME STUDENTS PAGE: WS-22 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: TERRY PADALINO SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
But this summer, students took two classes in their own homes in front of video monitors of their personal computers. It's a trend Tech expects to continue and expand.
Tech officials call their project "Cyberschool." This summer they offered two online courses to students in Blacksburg: one on communication research, the other on the Civil Rights Movement. Other courses are in the works, and Tech hopes eventually to offer those to a wider college audience - across the nation and overseas.
The courses work like this:
At 11:15 most July mornings, Mary Beth Oliver, a professor of communication studies, would get on line for a WebChat with her students. The students could see each other's questions, as well as the responses, if they logged onto their computers at the same time.
"If anything, the [Internet based] class was more hands on than the traditional class," Oliver said.
For instance: Russell Bolish, a student in Oliver's Cyberschool course, said students asked more questions because it was more anonymous. "When we met in the classroom, it was fairly problem-free because the questions had already been answered," he said.
The class met on campus every fifth session; the rest of the time, students checked the Internet for the course outline, class announcements, WebChat and the lecture for the day.
The Web page held all assignments for students to complete and submit to Oliver via email, no handouts were given to the students.
"Overall, I think it went really well," Oliver said. "Some students were a little inhibited initially, but not one of them dropped out of the class."
She cited one problem with her class design: the overwhelming amount of e-mail she received. She had to respond to each piece.
"I view it as a start up cost," she said. "There's always a start up cost when you start something new. [It] was a price worth paying."
Oliver designed her own course, as all Cyberschool professors do with the help of the Cyberschool task force.
"I liked [the class] a lot," said Larand Lancaster, who took Oliver's class this summer. She said she's become more aware of technology and how to find information on the Internet.
Tech students also will gain a competitive advantage over students at other institutions because of the computer skills and knowledge they will learn to take the Internet-based courses, said Thomas Head, director of media services.
Bolish said he was apprehensive about the class design at first, but all his questions were answered the first day of class.
"I learned more because I was able to take my time with the lectures and schedule when I was best suited to study them," Bolish said. "Sometimes your mind is not on studying and you need a break at the normal class time. Normally, you would miss the class and not learn the material, but with this design I was able to find another place in my schedule to read the lecture."
John Moore, director of Educational Technologies, said one reason students responded so positively to the courses was because they became more responsible for their own learning, more so than "passively sitting in lecture which often does not promote interaction with other students."
Some Cyberschool courses use multi-media technology as an educational tool, said Lucinda Roy, associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.
It's hard for the faculty to keep up with the fast pace of educational technologies, Roy said, so they try to pull resources together.
Cyberschool was developed by a group of professors assigned by the College of Arts and Sciences. The project is a by-product of the university's restructuring toward improving the quality of undergraduate learning.
Students were consulted in every aspect of the project.
"Students are often more computer literate than faculty, so they were asked to help develop courses," Roy said.
The Cyberschool project is still in its first phase. The university hopes to begin the second phase - which will involve real online classes to off-campus students - next year.
"The goal is that Cyberschool will pave the way for new kinds of related, relevant, practical and intellectual courses that will be both challenging and rewarding to the faculty and students," Roy said.
But face-to-face interaction, with both faculty and other students, will not fade away completely. Students still want that, Roy said. "I think such provisions need to be written in whatever we decide to do."
by CNB