However everyone be warned, these degrees cannot be earned in 4 weeks, you can't get credit for writing a short story on what you did last summer, yada yada yada... London Launches Virtual Campus Later this year, the University of London will launch the first stage of its new virtual campus, offering on-line student services, information and course materials to thousands of students on key distance learning courses. Over the next few years, the External Programme — the management body responsible for most of the University’s distance-learning provision — intends to provide web-enhanced learning across the entire existing portfolio of more than 80 undergraduate and postgraduate qualifications. New courses are also being developed. These should be available for study, with varying levels of on-line delivery and support, by September 2003. Bachelors’ degrees are planned in History, the Classics, European Studies and Business Administration, while Masters’ degrees range from Financial Law, Information Security, and Educational Management, to Primary Healthcare, Public Health and Human Resource Management. The External Programme already provides a limited on-line service for postgraduate students enrolled on distance programmes. The Virtual Campus Project began development in October 2000 but has made rapid progress: the External Programme has started trialing a new web site which will become the portal for the Virtual Campus; development of courseware is underway; hardware and software are installed and in service; working groups are developing guidelines and standards. For the most part, this has been made possible because of an ability to call on the expertise and skills of a wide-range of University staff: academic, library, technical and administrative. Key players include the University of London Computer Centre (one of the leading suppliers of academic computing services in the UK), the University of London Library (a major research library in the UK), and course development teams from 12 colleges of the University. Numbered amongst the Project team are course teams and researchers who have been pioneers of on-line teaching and learning over the past decade. The University acknowledges that e-learning is a development area subject to uncertainty and rapid change. However, the Project team is confident they are designing a system that will have the flexibility to accommodate future needs and trends.
Ken, I'm assuming you missed my last post to you, so I'll repeat it. When will you post your evidence that the US has the majority of the world's worst schools? Several of us are very interested in seeing this. Bruce
Remarkably good news here, Ken--any idea when London will put the new curriculum requirements, etc. on the web? I know of a lot of folks who would, inter alia, love to do a B.A. in classics inexpensively by exam--and I'm wondering if any master's programs are under development in philosophy, theology, or religious studies (not for me, but for others in the field). Thanks for any leads, and for drawing this to our attention! Cheers, ------------------ Tom Head www.tomhead.net
