AOL Time Warner Inc. created a service that will allow its 33 million subscribers to take classes without ever leaving their homes.
Launched Dec. 10, AOL’s Online Campus allows subscribers to take online classes through selected universities for accredited degree programs, personal enrichment and career advancement.
The company conducted a survey about one year ago that found 63 percent of its subscribers participating in the survey were interested in taking online courses.
Elizabeth Ward, director of AOL’s Research & Learn Channel, said Western Governors University, the University of California, Berkeley Extension and the University of Phoenix are participating in the service.
“We’re aggregating institutions who are offering (online) courses,” she said. “We’re really trying to offer the best of the best for our members - it should be taken as a serious undertaking.”
She said the service is aimed at a wide age range, but its target audience is working adults looking to advance their education and careers.
AOL spokesman Billy Kenny said when people pay AOL’s monthly fee they are eligible to participate in the service.
“There’s no additional fee to use this,” he said. “If they sign up for the course they have to pay the institution what they charge for credits.”
AOL officials have not discussed the program with MSU, but would be willing to negotiate.
Joan Predko, director of MSU’s Virtual University, said she thinks AOL’s service is a way to market the Internet service and universities.
She said there are some similarities in AOL’s service and MSU’s Virtual University, but that MSU’s program markets itself.
“One of the good things that we do at MSU, that we offer to the students, is this Internet service with the Pilot idea and the merit system and we don’t tax them for it,” she said.
“I think we sell MSU’s name - meaning you’ll have a quality course. I don’t think it will take away from us. Obviously, there are a lot of people in this game. I think there’s a lot of us to go around.”
Marketing junior Ted Edginton, who uses AOL, said he thinks the service lacks the familiarity that MSU’s Virtual University offers to students.
“I don’t think it will compete with the programs that the school is offering now,” he said. “Some people might be turned off because you have to buy the subscription with AOL.”
He said he doesn’t expect the university to shy away from its current virtual classes in favor of an AOL-type service.
“I don’t think we’d be interested,” he said. “I’d stick with the program being used by the college now.”
But Edginton said he sees why some students would like the idea.
“I think it’s giving students the opportunity to become educated without having to sit in the classroom,” he said. “There are probably students who are uncomfortable with sitting in the classroom.”
