A Day in the Life of an Online Bachelor

I've been studying online for a BA degree for two years, I've often thought about writing about a typical day of an online student with work and family commitments, I suppose really to make people aware of how well online education works. So here it is, a day in the life of an online student.

It's Tuesday morning, and I'm on my way to college, or rather downstairs in the living room where I have my laptop on the coffee table. I'm attending a class of my online criminal justice degree, but it's not broadcast live but a recording from yesterday, which took place while I was at work.

Fortunately online college staff are very much aware of the demands of the work place as they have professional experience of what they teach or are still working in the criminal justice system.

It's not just the teaching staff at my online college that understand my commitments, but my employer too - in fact they even paid towards my course fees because they can see the benefits of allowing staff to develop their skills and knowledge.

An hour later I make myself breakfast and read a chapter of my book. With the family out of the house during the day it's great to be able to have some quiet time to myself. Then it's off to get the train to work. I read some lecture notes and course material from my laptop on the train.

Just before I get into work I receive a text message reminding me of a web discussion next week with my online BA degree students and a respected academic from our online college.

My boss goes over some recent work with me during an appraisal and notes that she's seen a range of improvements over my skills and productivity since starting the online bachelors degree. I'm having a good day it seems!

The afternoon runs smoothly, I get an email from my tutor, it's a very detail answer regarding a question I asked him this morning, together with some links to further information and learning resources. There's also a link to a previous class held on the subject. I can view these later..

In the station on the way home my train is delayed. Rather than wait around tensely and grumpily I open the laptop and use a nearby WiFi connection to check out those links sent by the college. I save the web class video to watch on the train.

By the time I get off the train I've watched the video, read pages of notes and web articles related to my online BA degree, so I've done more than enough.

Dinners ready for me at home, and so I can truly say there is no more work or study to be done today - and I wonder how it seems I have more free time now than I ever did before starting my BA degree online!

By Sarah Maple