Rise in School of Education Online Enrollment Reflects National Trend
ByGreta Petry
The School of Education is well past its enrollment targets due in part to online graduate programs in the Department of Educational Theory and Practice, and in the Department of Reading.

Jennifer Toscano, 29, of Clifton Park, began University at Albany online courses in the master’s program in reading last fall when she was four weeks postpartum. The class spared her from having to find a sitter for her infant son, Cole, and 20-month-old son, Callen, and allowed her to stay home and recover physically from the birth.

Emily DeTraglia’s husband Ramiro had gall bladder surgery on a recent Monday, and she still made it to class a few days later. Once Ramiro came home from the hospital, Emily logged onto her computer to catch up with her class in the Curriculum Development and Instructional Technology (CDIT) program without ever having to leave his side. Emily, 32, lives in Sherburne, N.Y., two hours away from UAlbany.

Stephen Klingaman of Hamilton, N.Y., 42, an assistant professor at SUNY Morrisville, does his homework for Professor Karen Swan’s online class ETAP 526 when he needs a change from lesson plans and grading. Swan, an associate professor of instructional technology, joined UAlbany 15 years ago.

Toscano, DeTraglia, and Klingaman are part of an explosion in enrollment in the School of Education, where the number of courses offered online has jumped from three to 24 since 1997. Enrollment - at 480 students this fall - is more than five times its original 82 students. This fall there are 14 online courses in the Department of Educational Theory and Practice (ETAP), nine in the Department of Reading, and one undergraduate course taught by the Department of Educational Administration and Policy Studies. According to Susan Palmer, assistant director of extended learning on campus and extended learning coordinator for the School of Education, “Many of our schools and departments are offering online classes. The School of Education, however, offers the most (24 out of 31) because they deliver three fully online master’s degree programs.”

Palmer said UAlbany offered the first M.S. program in the SUNY Learning Network. ETAP now offers an M.S. in Curriculum Development and Instructional Technology, while the Department of Reading has three online programs: the M.S. in Reading - Classroom Track, and the Early Childhood and Childhood Education literacy programs.

A study released in October by the U.S. Department of Education showed that “older women with families and jobs were more drawn to undergraduate distance-education programs during the 1999-2000 academic year than were members of other groups,” according to an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

“Older” is a relative term. Nationally, the report found that 9.9 percent of students 24 and older took distance-education courses, compared with 6 percent of those younger than 24.

This trend seems to extend into graduate study as well. The UAlbany students and one alumna randomly interviewed ranged in age from 29 to 50. Five out of the first six to respond were female.

Flexibility ranks high on the list of reasons for taking an online course, for UAlbany online graduate students as well as for students nationally.

Toscano said, “Once I started I was hooked. The time that I would be spending traveling could be spent working. I could ‘be in’ class during the middle of a snowstorm in the comfort of my own home, cozy in my pj’s with a cup of hot chocolate!”

Eric Fredericksen, 41, of the Rochester suburb of Pittsford, is teaching UAlbany’s ETAP 529 online this fall. He is a UAlbany student in the doctoral program in curriculum and instruction as well as a graduate of the master’s program. Fredericksen, who recently accepted a position at Cornell University, is the former assistant provost for advanced learning technology and director of the SUNY Learning Network.

Fredericksen said, “I could not be an on-campus traditional classroom student with job responsibilities that required me to travel, and most importantly, my wife and I have a 5-year-old son (Jack) and a 1-year-old son (Dane), and they are my top priority. Note I started my first on-line ETAP course when Jack was five weeks old, when we lived in Albany about five miles from the UAlbany campus.”

Bernadette Marx, 50, a teacher who completed the reading program in August, said, “I have to stress that for me the best thing about taking a class online was the convenience of not having to travel to a campus to attend a class.” Marx teaches science in grades 6-8 and religion in grade 7 at St. Anthony of Padua School in South Ozone Park, Queens.

While UAlbany’s online programs have included students from as far away as Singapore, a study by the SUNY Learning Network found that 48 percent of online students across the network live within 30 minutes of campus.

“I know the flexibility of online study is a welcome feature, but the students actually want our degree programs and the chance to study with our faculty,” Palmer said. “We are becoming popular all over the state. We are attracting students from places so far away (Messina, Olean, Brooklyn, Long Island) that our programs were never an option until now.”

The programs serve two separate groups of students, according to Palmer. The first is those with provisional teaching certification who are earning a master’s degree for permanent certification. The second is professionals who work in higher education, publishing, and software development.

Charlene Blanchard belongs to the second group. Like Fredericksen, she teaches online. Blanchard, of Fairport, N.Y., a student in Swan’s ETAP 526 course, has taught dental hygiene at Monroe Community College for 25 years. She was asked to teach online when new state laws required that many practicing dental assistants needed to return to school to be licensed.

Blanchard said taking a class via computer has made her a better online teacher. “First, I am learning from the best...Second, I see the pitfalls that my students fall into…teaching online has taught me a lot of patience,” she said.

Many of the online students reported doing their homework early in the morning, late at night, or on weekends. Blanchard sent her e-mail response to the Update at 1 a.m. on a Thursday. The surge in popularity of these online programs has resulted in growing pains for their respective departments.

Swan said, “We started with very few students, but once students found out about the programs the classes closed out. Now we think we can fill anything we offer. One of our classes was full by 1 a.m., one hour after registration opened. Many close in the first week of early registration.”

When the online courses were first offered by ETAP in 1997, only three full-time faculty taught them. Today, to meet the growing demand, nine ETAP faculty have designed courses, many of which are now taught by trained adjunct instructors.

The online reading programs, which came later, are in their third year of development. Two faculty have been added to the Department of Reading, but they still have to rely on adjunct instructors to meet course demands.

“In the current fiscal climate, it’s been a challenge to offer enough classes on campus as well,” said Interim Education Dean Susan D. Phillips. “I’m very proud of ETAP’s and Reading’s success with online graduate study. Our strong online programs give us an additional advantage in riding out the budget crisis and still planning for the future.”