Distance Learning

Distance learning has come a long way since Universities first initiated correspondence courses. At The University of Montana, we’ve perfected “distance education” by working to improve a model that had its beginnings in 1988. Today, we employ the latest technology to deliver our courses primarily as two-way, digital videoconferences linking several major classroom sites across Montana with two distance education classrooms in Missoula.

This distributed learning “network” is comprised of nearly identical classrooms across the State. Each classroom can accommodate between 15 and 30 students. One set of MBA courses presently is delivered from Missoula to Billings, Butte and Kalispell with students from all three communities enrolled with night MBA students in Missoula. Another set, taught from a second distance education classroom in the Gallagher Business Building, goes to Great Falls, Helena and Bozeman at the same time.

As part of their regular teaching assignment, UM professors are asked to travel to each off-campus site at last once while teaching any class. On these evenings, the course “originates” from the off-campus location and is delivered back to Missoula and to the other cities linked with the class. In this manner, students get to know their instructors and are able to experience “in class” lectures on occasion.

Curriculum

The 32-hour Off-Campus MBA curriculum (i.e., the professional program) is identical to that available on campus. For the most part, the same instructors teaching in the daytime MBA also teach in the evening on television. With the exception of MBA 602, most of the classes are 2-cr. hr. and are scheduled one night each week for 10 weeks.

While the entire curriculum is offered each year on campus and allows full-time students to complete the degree in one-year, off-campus students receive one-half of the curriculum each year. Courses delivered by TV to Billings, Butte and Kalispell in one year are delivered to Great Falls, Helena and Bozeman the following year, and vice versa. Thus, off-campus students can complete the professional program in as little as two years.

Many off-campus students, however, will take longer. Since two required courses generally are offered each semester (one on Tuesday evenings and the other on Thursdays), some students will work toward completion of all required courses over four years rather than two. The average time that students spend in the program generally is three years.

Each year, 1-cr. courses are scheduled into the curriculum. These might be delivered one night each week for five weeks on TV, or be scheduled on long weekends from Friday evening through mid-day Sunday. Some of the 1-cr. hr. classes are held in Helena at UM’s College of Technology and others are held in the Gallagher Business Building on the UM campus.

Interactive Video Courses

Most of the professional program courses are delivered through compressed digital video over a public/private telecommunications network across the state. Classes are regularly scheduled on Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM. Students can interact during class with the instructor and with students attending night classes in other communities in a user-friendly, live video environment.

Internet Courses

A foundation program in the fundamentals of business administration is required as a prerequisite to the 600-level professional program. Students with baccalaureate degrees in business from AACSB schools will have completed these prerequisites. However, the majority of students enrolling in the Off-Campus MBA Program have undergraduate degrees in fields other than business. For these individuals, the convenience of asynchronous instruction on the Web affords a time-convenient and cost-effective opportunity to complete this portion of the curriculum.