5 Reasons to Go to College Online
The COVID-19 pandemic has seen a surge in online education for learners of all ages. But going to school online isn’t just for your grade-schooler.
If you’re ready to move forward in your career or change careers, you can earn an accredited degree on your own schedule, online. You can take classes early in the morning, late at night, or whatever time works for you. You can study from anywhere, and go at your own pace — fast or slow. And you’ll save some money on incidental costs like transportation, too.
1) Fit School into Your Schedule
Ease of scheduling is perhaps the biggest perk of online college for most modern students. Even traditional students these days are juggling multiple part-time jobs with their full-time class schedules, and non-traditional learners have it even harder. When you’ve got a full-time job, a house to keep up, maybe a mortgage to pay, and two or three kids, it’s hard to imagine dropping everything to go back to taking classes full-time. But that’s why online schools like the University of Arizona Global Campus offer so many flexible scheduling options for online students.
2) Study from Anywhere
For some people, moving away for college is an opportunity to assert independence, make a clean break from family, or start over afresh in a new community. But for others, the thought of moving far from home to go to school is heartbreaking. Or maybe it’s not an emotional decision for you, but a financial one — you’re at a place in your life when going away to college means much more than just packing all your clothes into your hatchback. You have a whole home and family to move, and that’s complicated and expensive.
Going to school online makes it possible to access schools and programs that you might not otherwise have access to if you limited yourself to only taking classes at schools in your area. There’s no need to move to be closer to campus, with all the attendant expenses of that, and no one needs to be uprooted.
3) Save Money on Incidental School Costs
While plenty of people think that tuition for online classes should be cheaper than for traditional classes, I wouldn’t hold my breath for a smaller bill. However, you will save on many of the incidental costs that come with attending a traditional brick-and-mortar program. For example, you won’t have to buy gas to commute to campus every day or pay for parking, which is where some of the most egregious price-gouging occurs on college campuses. You’ll save on moving costs, as mentioned above, as well as room and board fees, and may even save on related campus fees like rec center fees.
4) Finish Faster with Accelerated Courses
On-campus, all classes take place at pretty much the same pace. But in the online environment, there’s room for accelerated courses. You can complete many accelerated courses in much fewer than the usual 16 weeks, and many accelerated degree programs use condensed four- to six-week courses to award bachelor’s degrees in as little as a year or two. If you want to earn your degree quickly and move forward with your career and life, online learning might be right for you.
5) Learn at Your Own Pace
You can engage with the material in an online course at whatever pace feels right for you, whether that’s grappling with accelerated courses or taking a little more time to digest information in a traditionally paced course. In many brick-and-mortar settings, class sizes and lecture formats make it hard for many students to grasp concepts on the first try. In an online environment, you can take your time with each lecture, adjust your study space to support your best learning, and engage with the material textually as well as visually or aurally.
If you’re considering going back to school to advance your career or change careers, online education could be right for you. It’ll let you keep your full-time job, if you need it, and offers the chance to juggle academics with your other responsibilities as a non-traditional student. Enroll today and you’ll soon learn why so many adult learners are choosing to go to college online.