Online courses open to CAPA only

by Bailey Porter
Staff Writer

Beginning this fall, the Distance Learning Center will no longer be offering on-line courses for traditional undergraduate students at the University of La Verne.

Although the online course program, implemented in 1997, will continue to service those students in the program for Campus Accelerated Program for Adults, traditional undergraduate students will not be accepted into the DLC, said Registrar Marilyn Davies.

In the past, DLC was an automatic opportunity to CAPA students, but only an option for traditional undergraduate students if the dean of the involved school granted approval.

However, according to Title IV of the Social Security Act, integration of on and off-campus students into one online program is prohibited, said Jay Jones, director of the Office of Informational Technology and Research.

Financial aid does not translate if a student's schedule has both on-campus and online courses, because on-campus classes follow a semester schedule while online courses are 10 weeks terms, Davies said. A schedule that pulls from two different calendars makes it impossible to determine a student's full time versus part time status and a student's financial aid.

There is currently discussion about the formation of another online program that will allow traditional undergraduates to freely register for online courses, but a tentative deadline for a new program has not yet been decided, Jones said.

However, the ULV Provost and CAPA will be working over the summer to identify the types of courses that could be offered in a new program, Jones said

The new program would primarily focus on hybrid courses that will make use of on-campus and online driven instruction, Jones said.

Hybrid classes will meet the objective of quality learning, especially as these courses pertain to CAPA students who work all day and take classes in the evenings, Jones said. For example, if a student was to have a four-hour hybrid course, two hours would be spent in the classroom, and the other two hours completed would be via the Internet at a time that is more convenient for the student.

It has only been in the last couple of years that the DLC has really grown to accumulate enough courses to make the online program worthwhile for the students, Davies said.

Now, more time will be needed before a program is set up that can accommodate for traditional undergraduate students interested in making use of on-line classes.

In the past, online classes were not taken advantage of by traditional undergraduates because they did not know enough about this service, Davies said.

"It's a real potential for us to do. I think there will be opportunities for traditional undergraduate students," Davies said about the relatively inevitable new online education program.

ULV will most likely see three different types of courses offered in the long run: traditional on-campus, hybrid and online education.

Although a new program will eventually be offered to traditional undergraduates, online courses are not meant for every student, Davies said.

Students who know they can do the work independently and take part in online discussions on a regular basis will be successful in pursuing online courses, she said.