Administrators say Global Campus on track

John Silva is a history teacher at Lindblom Math and Science Academy in Chicago. Last January, he enrolled as a student in the University's online degree program, Global Campus.

"I was looking for online programs because of my work schedule, and found Global Campus, and liked it," Silva said.

In the past eight months, Silva has completed four courses within his program, a masters of education with a concentration in e-learning and started a fifth course last week. This track takes a year and a half to complete.

Silva said the coursework is "rigorous" because the traditional 16-week semester course is condensed into eight weeks.

"One of the things (administrators) have been most aware of is the time we're available for course work," Silva said. "We're all working adults, and they have helped us by designing very convenient and flexible schedules."

A professor is in charge of leading each course, and students use basic web tools such as message boards and e-mail to communicate with the professor, other students and to convey information.

Silva said he is happy with the way things are working out in Global Campus.

"Any criticisms I may have had in the beginning have been addressed," Silva said.

Criticism is not new for University administrators overseeing the beginnings of Global Campus.

For the past eight months, since the launch of the University's newest campus, the slow start of the program has been criticized. When the program began in January, less than 15 students were enrolled.

However, administrators are saying they are currently satisfied with the program's growth and remain confident that it will only continue to grow.

Currently, there are 121 students enrolled in the five bachelors and masters programs that are offered, a jump from the 42 who were enrolled in May.

Chet Gardner, special assistant to the president and overseer of Global Campus, said he is pleased with the progress up to this point.

Gardner said for the beginning months of Global Campus, the program did not quite achieve the enrollment numbers administrators would have liked, but financially the program is now on track. Global Campus was behind the projected tuition revenue for fiscal year 2008, but they still managed to end the year $3 million below budget.

"The bottom line is we're under budget and just about at projected levels of enrollment," Gardner said.

At the May meeting of the University of Illinois Board of Trustees, Global Campus officials had their request for an additional $3.4 million loan approved. This request brought the total amount of loans to $9.8 million.

Global Campus will use this money for operation costs, professor salaries and a variety of other costs, Gardner said.

"We need to reach the break even point in three years," Gardner said.

To achieve this, Global Campus must have an enrollment of 750 full-time students within three years.

The projected enrollment for January, the one-year anniversary of Global Campus, is 250 students, and administrators expect enrollment to have reached 400 by May, Gardner said. To achieve these numbers, administrators are concentrating on marketing to reach out to potential students.

Lee Kantz, chief marketing officer for the University of Illinois Global Campus, said the biggest challenge in marketing right now is getting the information to the target audience.

"Our overall strategy is that in each program we take a step back and look at the target audience," Kantz said.

Using this information advertisers are able to determine the most effective means of communicating to that audience. For example, Kantz said in the nursing programs, Global Campus has been working with several hospitals interested in sending their nurses through the program to boost credentials.

He said the program can also track the different ways that people find information on Global Campus to determine which are the most effective.

"We have extreme methods, and we can measure the success to see if we have really done all of the above," Kantz said.

"It's more about putting your information out there where people can see it when they want it," Kantz said.

Targeting groups of people interested in online degrees is a new experience for the University, because the residential campuses are used to receiving far more applicants than they can admit, Gardner said.

With Global Campus, any interested student who meets the requirements for his or her program will be admitted. While these requirements vary from program to program, the average GPA for a Global Campus student is a 3.28 on a 4.0 scale, Gardner said.

"I think some of the concerns about the quality of education are disappearing," Gardner said. "I think that people are seeing that we're maintaining University of

By the Numbers:

As the University of Illinois Global Campus initiative continues to grow, it's international reach is becoming more apparent. These numbers show just how global Global Campus really is:

• 25 percent of Global Campus students are from outside the state
• 4 countries are represented: U.S., Guam, United Kingdom and Japan
• 16 U.S. states are represented by students
• 30 percent of Global Campus students are minorities

Source: Chet Gardner, Global Campus