Internet Learning Volume 1, Number 1, Fall 2012 | Page 53

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Internet Learning

self-directed, disciplined, and does not find it necessary, nor has the desire, to engage in fully
online classes with other students.
Western Governors University (WGU) is a prime example of this through its distanceeducation, competency-based degree offerings. WGU started offering its unique brand of
distance education in 1999 and today has more than 8,000 students with an average age of 38. Its
competency-based model awards degrees based on their students’ ability to pass assessments.
Students earn competency units towards earning a degree after meeting specific learning goals
and passing the appropriate assessments.
Every WGU student is assigned a mentor who is a professional one-on-one academic
counselor that, in addition to providing advisement services and information about WGU
policies and procedures, also provides content-related support as students prepare for their
assessments. To help them with their studies, WGU students are also provided access to
instructor-led online courses from other institutions, independent-study e-learning modules from
various commercial enterprises, the appropriate textbooks through the WGU bookstore, and the
wide and varied number of important information resources available online through the WGU
central library system.
It is interesting to note, however, that the instructor-led online courses are not the primary
study resource for the typically successful student at WGU.
Ironically, the most successful students in the WGU Teachers College, according to Janet
Schnitz, executive director of the Teachers College, are those who work well with accessing and
utilizing the many independent learning resources that WGU provides, not the students who rely
on taking the instructor-led online courses offered by institutional partners.
"We find that the students who rely on online courses are usually the weaker students,
and they also need more guidance and support," says Schnitz. "The students who work with our
independent learning resources and our mentors seem to do much better in the programs we have
to offer." Schnitz adds that many students come into WGU "being field dependent," and, over
time, become "field independent" and more able to basically build their own educational
pathway (Educational Pathways 2007).
Conclusion
As explained throughout this report, there are numerous factors to take under consideration when
attempting to define or pinpoint exactly what makes an online learner satisfied, motivated, and
ultimately successful.
Just like in the traditional face-to-face environment, unique circumstances surround every
learner, every instructor, every course, every department, every program, and every institution.
So, logically speaking, an effective path to take for building any successful online learning
course or program—one in which students are satisfied and do not drop out—requires, at the
very least, a focus on the individual student to a position in which his or her educational needs,
skills, access, and personal circumstances are identified. Then, based on this thorough
identification, the appropriate levels of advisement, content, and interaction must be consistently
applied to the student’s course of study throughout his/her online education experience.
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