Thoughts on graduate level distance education, part 3: time and reward
In part one I talked about the general format and in part two I looked at the technology used during my graduate education experience through distance education. In this part I look at the time I put into it and overall benefits with this style of education.
Time put in matches or exceeds a full-time Msc program
On average I would say that 16 hours a week went into any given course. With eight weeks a course, eight courses, around 1024 hours was spent just on course work. My dissertation required an additional 175 or so dedicated hours I believe (probably the same spent thinking/dreaming about it). That, rounded up to account a little for the conservative time estimate, is around 160 work days which, for the sake of argument, could be considered a normal years worth of dedicated time required in a typical UK Msc program. I completed that in two and a half years. I also worked (35+ hours a week) at a busy job and tried to have a life.
No matter how you look at that it is a crazy amount of time to dedicate to an ‘additional’ something (and I was paying to do it!!!). At first it was a novelty but around the third course in a row (~18 weeks in) I found the time commitment required to get decent marks started to put a strain on everything else in my life. I had to learn how to shape my evenings and weekends to allow for uninterrupted time otherwise assignments would drag out and my grades would suffer.
The pace was intense. If you ever get more than a week behind in a course (the instructors usually allowed that given life circumstances) the catching up became impossible. With the way the program is set up you can’t drop the course after 10 days without having to pay for the make up either. As it ends up, before you get 1/4 of the way in you are locked in (not entirely unusual practice in higher ed).
“Why did I do this to myself and why the f*#k was I paying to do that to myself?” That really hit me around course number four when an arrogant instructor that gave no feedback and was impossible to get a hold of nearly had me dropping out. Laureate (the people managing the program) did nothing to help other than to offer sympathy as well (again no different than any higher education experience I have had). I had to suck it up, focus, and get my stuff done in a way I had not experienced before.
Higher education is about more than specific knowledge gains
Looking back, when things hit that low I believe I gained the most from the experience. Sure I can hammer out 500-750 words with references in half a day, I know more about different internet based technology than I did before, and I found out that I just should never code because I was successfully completing my Java coding assignments but still have no idea how they actually worked. Like with my undergrad, I learned how to research and present it with confidence that I actually do know what I am talking about. But unlike my undergrad, I had to suck it up while sucking up a whole lot more at work and in life then I ever had too in my early 20’s.
I still need to focus to achieve that quality where confidence is well placed but I can call on that focus in much more productive bursts than ever before. I think that I am much more skilled at time/task management, learned how to harness my insane bursts of productivity, and had a good time on the journey.
What would you get out of distance education?
Based on my experience my advice is as follows:
- Expanding your learning skills through formal academic experience is beneficial regardless of level and location.
- It requires a purpose: do not pursue graduate level education unless you really want to… it gets boring, frustrating, and you feel dumb. Then you finish.
- If you can’t afford it today but want to do it, do it. Worst thing that will happen is that you have to drop out… but at least you tried.
I do want to continue on and do research on web technology and how people interact with it. However, I don’t know where I could do that. Three years ago I would have never considered it though, it’s kinda cool my need to learn new things has come back… after a bit of rest this summer I am looking forward to getting into all kinds of crazy things again 
Not sure if this makes sense to anyone but me… just needed to get my thoughts out there. My next post on this should be my dissertation which was on ‘Microformats’ and assessing potential for their application on your home page.
