PENN STATE DISTANCE EDUCATION BACHELORÕS DEGREE COMPLETION PROGRAM IN LETTERS, ARTS, AND SCIENCES

Q: you would think that a real school wouldn't have to resort to SPAMMING! What's next: "Come to Harvard Yard & Study with us" ?

A: I wouldn't call this spamming. It was sent to only one group and that group is relevent to the degree/information being offered. Also, they have only posted it once. Around here we usually like to hear about new, legitimate programs, particularly with schools that have name recognition (such as Penn State, for example). I found, on "news.answers" newsgroup, that there is a four-part distance learning FAQ: I skimmed the first two parts (part one is below), FWIW, FYI. I just think this stuff is going to keep on expanding and they are going to eventually cut human staff as much as possible and put the money into lessons stored on hard drives for cheap. And, farm out the "office hours" to Indians who can read and type english, and when old, tenured US faculty retire, they just won't get replaced by new young guys, at least here in the US

A: Threeducks, they're gonna GET you. 3D's definitely got his head in the sand. Just look at Columbia, one of America's leading brand name schools... http://www.cvn.columbia.edu/b/degrees/chemems.htm and they even have a ChemE masters via DL. What'll happen is that they can now get international students w/o even having to deal with the whole visa issue which have hindered American colleges during

the post 911 years. Since most S&E work will be abroad, it looks like Columbia's done the right thing in keeping itself relevant during the next century. These guys have really set the mold since their standards (examination levels) have remained constant despite having students from all over the commonwealth take units during the Imperial days. Once other DL programs adopt London's high examination standards, esp the London School of Economics, then that'll be the new way of doing business in the educational field. The residential colleges will go back to becoming finishing houses for the well off who want to goof off during their early twenties.