Higher education and a full-time job seem like mutually exclusive ideas.
Auburn's distance learning program solves this problem.
Electronically Delivered Graduate Education (EDGE) is offered through the College of Engineering and the College of Business.
The program provides a way for students to earn a master's degree without coming to campus.
Although the program only offers degrees at the master's level, students can also choose to take doctorate courses in order to further their advancement toward a Ph.D.
The program does not offer any courses at the undergraduate level, said Wanda Lambert, marketing director of engineering continuing education and distance graduate education.
"I think the University realized many, many years ago that the requirements at the graduate level are more individual than at the undergraduate level," Lambert said. "So that's the reason it makes it easier to do graduate level courses."
The program caters to full-time professionals who wish to obtain a degree without giving up their jobs.
"The advantages of distance is a professional can obtain the master's level degree without leaving their job, without relocating their family, and they can continue to work on pursuing their professional goals at the same time getting this master's," Lambert said.
Other participants in the distance learning program include international students and members of the military who move too frequently to attend on-campus courses.
Although their degree is earned off-campus, distance students receive the same education as on-campus students.
"People will ask me, 'Wanda, is my diploma gonna say distance education?' The answer's no," Lambert said.
Distance courses are provided by filming regular classes and streaming them online using a technology specifically developed for the purpose by Auburn's distance learning program, said Greg Ruff, director of engineering outreach and continuing education.
"We developed it here because everything we looked at in other places didn't measure up to the kinds of things that we needed," Ruff said.
"One of the best things about it is that computer graphics that are stressed a lot because of engineering look as good from our service as they would if you were sitting in the classroom."
The delivery system has been copyrighted and will be shared with the rest of Auburn free of charge.
However, there are plans to sell the system to other universities.
"We know that three other universities are already interested. Three big ones," Ruff said.
The only potential disadvantage to the program is the problem with communication between professors and students.
"The off-campus people don't, even if they have a question, they don't get the opportunity to interrupt and ask," Hartfield said. "And that can be a problem for the off-campus student, regardless. They'll have to call and ask me a question later."
Hartfield said students must also submit homework and receive grades via e-mail.
However, he said the inconveniences are worth it for students who would not otherwise be able to obtain a degree.
The program is also beneficial to the University as well as the students.
"It benefits our program because we are able to get some high quality students into our program that helps us to build our quality on our program that we wouldn't otherwise be able to get," Hartfield said.
In addition to graduate courses, the distance program also offers courses in continuing education, which is required for most professional engineers.
"There are requirements for continuing education in almost every state, and Auburn's continuing education program is recognized in 41 states. We provide continuing education short courses for license renewals for engineers and land surveyors and now for architects," Ruff said.
"What normally happens is states, for instance like Alabama, will require professional engineers to have 15 clock hours of continuing education every year. And we provide 90 short courses right now, 90 short courses for them to pick from."
Both the master's program and the continuing education program are housed by Auburn, but the programs themselves are otherwise self-sufficient and receive no state funds.
"Everything that we get comes from the sale of courses for continuing education or under credit courses for tuition," Ruff said.
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