Distance education is defined as a formal learning activity which occurs when students and instructors are separated by geographic distance or by time, often supported by communications technology such as television, videotape, computers, email, mail, or interactive videoconferencing . Distance education has come to the forefront of our society as a way to provide access to education for students regardless of geographical proximity to an educational institution. The evolution of online courses has significantly changed the opportunities available to students living in rural areas, as well as the expectations that students have of rural community colleges to provide quality education that they might not otherwise have access to. According to Arthur M. Cohen, a clear definition of “rural” does not exist for community colleges. For the purpose of this monograph, a rural college is defined as a public community college located 30 minutes away from a major metropolitan area.

The distinguishing characteristics of a rural community college as opposed to an urban college are: their geographically dispersed service areas, accessibility to resources, and often, access to a pool of qualified personnel. An area that is problematic for rural colleges is the ability to support rural students in the distance environment. Student support is a support system in place at an institution to help ensure student success both academically and socially such as access to advising, counseling, financial aid, admissions, student activities, library services, and student technical support.

People

Personnel required to support students in a distance environment include administrators, faculty, technical support, library services, and student support services.

Distance students tend to differ demographically than traditional college students. In interviews with personnel from several rural community colleges the consensus is that many online students are older females who commute and work more hours than on-site students (Dutton) and often need to obtain more education to enhance job skills or increase hiring or promotion potential. According to David Diaz , online students are willing and able to embrace collaborative teaching styles if instructors make it clear this is expected and gives them guidance for meeting this expectation. Diaz notes that “online students appeared to be driven more by intrinsic motives and clearly not by the reward structure of the class.” This statement indicates that online students not only need instructional support, but also the array of services that traditional on-site students receive.

Institutional commitment is paramount to distance education. Administrative support staff must have an understanding of the requirements necessary to offer quality distance education and the need to support the distance education program and online student support through the budget process.

A distance education committee is helpful to institute and maintain distance education policies. Such committees may be comprised of faculty members with prior online teaching expertise, key administrators, and personnel from student services and information technology.

Some institutions may have separate Distance Education departments. Smaller institutions tend to rely on online teaching faculty to fill this role. The personnel in a distance education department may consist of an administrator, instructional designer, multimedia specialist, technical support, server administrators, as well as other identified needed resources.

Faculty set the tone for the distance environment. In a rural distance environment, the faculty member often has more personal contact with each student because many times classes are smaller, thus leading to openness of the student to participate in online class discussions. Often adjunct faculty members as well as course management tools are utilized. Adequately trained faculty members are able to deliver online classes that are comparable in content to traditional classes. To encourage faculty members to offer online classes, colleges could offer stipends or release time. Training can come from many sources, including technology consortia, regional service centers, vendor training, and in-house training from veteran online faculty members or technology departments.

Technical support is a required component of any distance education program and often one that is left to the faculty member to provide. Larger colleges tend to have technology departments that play a role in the support of the infrastructure and maintenance of servers, computers, computer labs, testing centers, and other key components. Another area of expertise that is required is the instructional technology support for faculty. Larger institutions have the ability to hire more qualified personnel to serve in these roles. Smaller institutions often rely on faculty members to be not only the facilitator of the course but also the instructional technologist and technical support. In addition, faculty members are also training other faculty members as student demand increases the number of online courses needed.

Library services personnel are instrumental in providing necessary resources to distance students. These students require access to full library services, specifically online databases to support their academic research. Online students can make good use of interlibrary loans, interlocal library agreements, and library consortia such as the Harrington Library Consortium for the Texas Panhandle (http://www.hlc-lib.org).
Student support personnel need to be trained and supportive of distance education students. All student support areas should be available through the distance environment. Personnel should be trained to function online and have the necessary resources made available to them to offer comparable services to all students.

Processes

Effectively assessing an institution’s current level of online student support services is critical. This includes all areas of support that are available to the on-site student. Institutions need to be aware of their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities for improvement, and threats from the diminished boundaries of service areas due to online courses. By using this assessment and enrollment figures, they can determine how many students are taking online courses, where they are located geographically, and what services are instrumental in their success. Once a self-evaluation has been completed, appropriate personnel can identify support services that are lacking at the institution and address those issues.

Institutions which establish a distance education vision in their institutional strategic plan are the most successful. A lack of institutional commitment is detrimental to a quality distance program. Key administrators can be knowledgeable on distance education methodologies and can utilize the expertise at their institutions when developing a strategy and vision. Distance education programs are extremely expensive endeavors and require significant budgetary capital outlay, with continuous support throughout the lifespan of the infrastructure. Unreliable equipment and support often translate into low online student retention in a distance program.

Distance education personnel have become a necessity at institutions that provide significant numbers of online courses. The distance education department is perhaps the only department on campus that interfaces with all academic programs at an institution. They are instrumental in helping academic departments move to an online or hybrid environment, as well as provide support for interactive two-way video and telecourses.

Institutional distance education committees are instrumental in setting policies and expectations of quality online class delivery. No decisions concerning distance delivery of courses should be set without the review and oversight of the committee, who provides recommendations to the various departments at the institution.

Having all student services available online makes it possible to support students at a distance. The common support areas include admissions (including online registration), orientation (including traditional and online), financial aid, counseling, advising (including student readiness for online learning), special services, testing, bookstore services, library services, student activities, health assessment, tutoring, mentoring, and student technical support. These personnel and services are critical in ensuring success for the online student, and these services must be comparable to those provided to traditional on-site students. Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District Online provides many useful links such as how online as well as hybrid classes work, hardware and software requirements, tutorials, and online services in a one-step, easy-to-navigate website.

Supporting students at a distance can be most challenging for smaller rural institutions. Several models serve to deliver support services:

1. In-house development
2. Customized products
3. Off-the-shelf products
4. Self-hosted services
5. Outsourcing of services

Some larger rural institutions have technical staff with the expertise to develop in-house online support applications. This is not the norm for smaller institutions; many are required to purchase products from their student information system vendor or other sources to move their traditional support systems to the online environment.

Institutions may work with selected vendors to develop a customized application for their college. This is not always the most cost effective means to develop these resources, but colleges who can do this are more apt to have an application that better meets their needs.

A large number of off-the-shelf, self-hosted applications are available on the market to help institutions support distance students. Examples are Blackboard/WebCT for course management, SmartThinking for online tutoring services, and the Texas Common Application. The necessity of multiple products to support each required support service creates a budgetary burden for community colleges. Colleges are experiencing increased online enrollments and, generally speaking, decreased funding. The costs involved with delivery education online produces a financial burden on the institution, often resulting in an increased cost to the student. Community colleges have always been seen as a low-cost quality education with a high economical value, but that could change with each legislative session.

Support services can be outsourced for institutions that do not have the necessary personnel to support all facets of online education.

Technology

Technology is, of course, a critical component of online classes. Administration, staff, and faculty must all be committed to online student success, and that includes using all resources available to them. Tools to assess student preparedness for online computer classes include in-house assessments or purchased products such as Readi (Readiness for Education at a Distance Indicator) which include diagnostic tools to identify at-risk students. The use of a distance education checklist is most helpful to determine if they are ready for online classes or use the services offered by the college. Panola College incorporates a checklist into its online support system.
Also, student interaction with faculty, administrators, and peers is critical in making students form a sense of community in the educational environment. Student activities such as MySpace pages and blogs support this online learning community and make students feel like they are in a “real” college class at a “real” college. Younger students often seem more comfortable with the blogging aspect of technology, but older students are often more willing to share their experiences honestly and openly.

Another good tool would be a FAQ page which could be set up on the college website specifically for online students to answer common questions such as “How do I register online?” or “Can I pay online?” The web page would need to be updated frequently, and the Institutional Distance Education Committees should review it periodically to ensure that it is still serving the online community adequately.

Conclusion

Rural areas have a bit more of a challenge in the areas of resources, but have advantages in areas of flexibility. Qualified people such as administration, faculty, and staff can set the tone for online classes. Technical support, library services, and student services work in unison to provide online students with services that are comparable to those available to on-site students. A clear-cut vision of how rural community colleges can utilize online student services makes it possible for personnel such as members of an online committee and support staff for online student services to disseminate information and helpful aids to online students. People, processes, and technology all blend together to form an effective, cohesive environment for the online learner, and rural institutions have to get creative to provide these essential services to their rural online students.

Resources

NETnet http://www.netnet.org/students/student%20glossary.htm#D

Arthur M. Cohen http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED165845&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=eric_accno&accno=ED165845

John Dutton and Marily Dutton http://www.amstat.org/publications/jse/v13n3/dutton.html

David Diaz http://home.earthlink.net/~davidpdiaz/LTS/html_docs/grslss.htm

Readi http://www.readi.info/index.cfm?fuseaction=home

Panola College http://www.panola.edu

Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District Online http://www.gcccd.net/online/default.htm