Many people who need a college degree or postgraduate degree — or who simply need specialized training in any one of many given fields — are discovering distance learning as a practical alternative to standard classroom education. This book gives them that all-important step one to start them off on a good distance-learning study program. A complete catalog of accredited colleges and universities that offer degrees and certifications via distance learning…. More >>
Barron’s Guide to Distance Learning: Degrees, Certificates, Courses
Tags: accredited colleges and universities, barron, Barron's, Certificates, certifications, classroom education, college degree, colleges and universities, Courses, Degrees, Distance, Guide, Learning, postgraduate degree, specialized training
#1 by Martin J. McDermott of TheDistanceLearningExpo.com on April 13, 2010 - 12:22 am
As the President for TheDistanceLearningExpo.com, we have used many different resources to guide the people coming to our website. We found Barron’s guide to be the most up to date.
Rating: 5 / 5
#2 by Anonymous on April 13, 2010 - 3:18 am
If you’re new to Distance Learning, this book will be a good primer. It did help me to save about $2000 by directing me to a junior college that had the classes I wanted, rather than taking classes through the out of state school that granted my degree. However, two years is a long time in the evolution of distance learning, and the information is out of date for many of the programs. A great grad program at NYU was completely overlooked, as was the acquisition of University of Sarasota by Argosy University. Wait for the third ed.
Rating: 3 / 5
#3 by Travel Enthusiast on April 13, 2010 - 4:44 am
There is a more comprehensive book on the topic called Campus Free College Degrees: Thorsons Guide to Accredited College Degrees Through Distance Learning by Marcie K. Thorson.
Rating: 3 / 5
#4 by Robert I. Hedges on April 13, 2010 - 5:02 am
This is the best big-picture overview of distance learning programs available today, and is hugely better than the Bear’s Guide, a popular competitor. The strength of this book is in its comprehensiveness. It lists so many programs that it can be a chore to wade through them all. Fortunately they are indexed in the main text alphabetically, but are cross-referenced in the back by state and program subject.
This book would be a hands-down five star slam dunk if it were more up to date. I realize that colleges change their programs all the time, but to me that strongly argues for less time between editions. This was last published in 2002, and much has happened since then especially where Internet learning is concerned. Despite this weakness, it is still at least as current as its competitors, and is vastly more useful and comprehensive. Another small issue that occurs occasionally are short entries like “See school website” or “Contact school” in response to required data fields. I gather from reading this that the entries here were exclusively based on the information schools sent back to the editors on a standard survey. It would have been nice if the researchers had actually called the schools and asked for the information to complete these data fields. It would have been more time consuming to write (enormously so, in fact), but the finished product would have been unbeatable.
In the end, this is my favorite guide to distance learning available, and despite its weaknesses, I still recommend it to anyone considering a distance learning option at any educational level.
Rating: 4 / 5
#5 by Andrea Stoery on April 13, 2010 - 6:13 am
This book ia a good tool for those interested in learning about distance learning. It included information a what to look for in a school, associations that accredit schools, financial aid information and a dictorary of schools and programs. It is a great resource and information source for those new to distance education and those who are wanting information on schools and programs. Some of the information was not as up to date as it should be. I have been involved with distance education since last year and found that many of the schools I am familiar with were not up-dated in the book.
Rating: 3 / 5