Location, location, location

Posted by Jennifer Buchholz on January 2nd, 2009

When I was selecting a school, I did consider whether the school had a local presence or not. In my area, there weren’t a lot of options for PhD programs. I could choose to do a face-to-face program at our public universities - one was close by, the other was about 90 miles away. Neither school had exactly the program I was looking for. The online schools I was considering had no local campus presence anywhere, they were fully online. So my options were somewhat limited, but that made the decision easier.

I know that it can be reassuring to have a local campus nearby. Several of the schools I teach for have online and face-to-face components. The students do feel a benefit from being able to go to a campus, see real people, and get the help they need.

In my situation, that wasn’t the case. That’s not to say that having some resources close by wouldn’t be helpful, but we’re so accustomed to doing correspondence via the phone or the web, that in-person contact seems to be a thing of the past.

I actually treasure the fact that my school is fully online and has no local campuses. It puts everyone on the same playing field. We all have access to the same resources. Knowing what I know now, I would still choose Capella.

Tags: Capella University, phd, teaching

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 2nd, 2009 at 5:00 am and is filed under Local vs. National Online Programs, Student Voices. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.