HUCE's Online Programs

Note: The courses in these programs are not offered for credit towards a degree.
Last Updated: Monday 06/09/2008 4:01 PM

HUCE is going online via partnerships, managed by the DLL, with independent vendors who will develop and staff HUCE's online courses in four broad subject areas:

Paralegal | Management | Small Business/Entrepreneurship | Information Technology

Some programs are self-paced, others are instructor-led, but all are managed by highly experienced partners with excellent reputations.

-- Self-paced courses are asynchronous, i.e., they can be started at any time; and students can work at their own speed. Their content is presented via text, photos, charts, images, PowerPoints with audio, video clips, and other media which the student examines at his or her own pace. While enrolled, students can pose questions and receive answers to their questions from subject matter experts, usually within 24 hours.

-- Instructor-led courses are synchronous, i.e., they have specified starting dates, ending dates, and may have scheduled online meetings during which the instructors make presentations and answer students' questions. Assignments have specified due dates. Instructor-led courses are usually more expensive than self-paced courses that cover a similar range of subject matter at comparable depth.

Whenever possible, we will provide alternative formats for the same subject, i.e., a self-paced course AND an instructor-led course.

HUCE welcomes feedback from students while courses are in session, requests extensive course evaluations by students when courses are over, and conducts periodic follow-up surveys of students to determine how useful the courses have proven to be in the students' quests for promotions, raises, and better job opportunities.

Question: Should you consider taking online courses?

Answer: Yes, if you can work in relative isolation for long periods of time. As Aristotle observed, almost twenty-five hundred years ago, man is a social animal. Most people feel a need for frequent interactions with other people, and preferably face-to-face. Distance learning offers the convenience of learning in one's own home or in other comfortable study environments, and usually for a substantially lower tuition than comparable face-to-face courses. But this convenience and lower tuition carries a social cost: loss of face-to-face contact with the instructor and with other students.

So the question becomes: Is the amount of time required to take an online course within your personal isolation limits? Only you can answer that question, and the best way for you to discover your limits is by taking an online course in a subject in which you are really interested. You should note that asynchronous, self-paced courses may be cheaper, but they can be more demanding than synchronous, instructor-led courses in this regard because synchronous courses provide opportunities for you to interact with other students who are currently enrolled in the same classes via email, chat rooms, IM, discussion boards, wikis, blogs, and other Internet-based media.