Virtual university

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The term "virtual university'" characterizes an organization that provides higher education on the Internet. Some of these organizations are truly "virtual", existing only as loosely tied combines of universities, institutes or departments that provide together a number of courses over the Internet. Others are real organizations with a legal framework, yet named virtual because they appear only on the Internet. An example is the Virtual Global University (VGU) in Germany. VGU provides distance education over the Internet, carried by a network of partners that act and interact on the Internet, but on the other hand it exists as a civil law organization as well (http://www.vg-u.de).

The attribute "virtual" in virtual university has two dimensions. One is the organizational dimension, as expressed in terms like virtual organization and virtual enterprise. The other dimension refers to instructional media: "Virtual" is used for a type of higher education where courses are delivered via Internet. It should be noted that studying as such is far from being "virtual". Students taking so-called virtual courses are doing "real" work to get their degrees, and educators preparing and teaching those courses spend plenty of "real" time in doing so.

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[edit] Studying in a virtual university

Studying in a virtual university is different from studying in a brick-and-mortar university. There are no buildings and no campus to go to because students study on the Internet. In most cases, only a personal computer and an Internet connection are needed. Through this connection students access the virtual university and then do the same as other students do: attend classes, solve exercises, discuss cases, take tests, ask questions, etc. Likewise they communicate with lecturers, tutors, administrative staff, etc., but it happens over the Internet.

Some virtual universities give their students plenty of freedom to study whenever they want and as fast or as slowly as they want. This can be advantage, but students may also feel left alone if they are not embedded in a supervised schedule.

To avoid this effect, other virtual universities apply the same type of time management as traditional schools: Programs are divided into semesters, courses are taught in a weekly rhythm, homework assignment is given every week, etc. An example is VGU's graduate program "International Master of Business Informatics" (MBI) – a master program in information technology and management that takes four semesters to complete (full-time students). Each course has a lecture or a virtual class meeting every week. Afterwards, students get a homework assignment; for example, they have to solve an exercise, elaborate on some problem, discuss a case study, or take a test. Lecturers give them immediate feedback, and one week later, the same happens again.

[edit] Teaching modes

Many virtual study programs are mainly based on text documents, but multimedia technologies have become increasingly popular as well. The spectrum of teaching modes in virtual education includes courses based on hypertext, vides, audio, and animated materials (see virtual education or distance education).

[edit] Benefits from a virtual university

Studying in a virtual university is for people who like technology. More virtual programs are found in engineering and science than in arts. The above cited MBI program, for example, addresses students who will later use information technology to solve business problems.

Virtual programs are best suited for people who appreciate flexibility. "Study anywhere at any time" is a popular slogan, yet the flexibility may be restricted by schedules and submission deadlines. Students working full or part time, for example, can study in the evenings or the weekends, without having to go to a campus at specific class hours.

In the public sector, expectations to save money from virtual education and virtual universities were high in the beginning. However, cost savings have not come true to a significant extent. The main reason is that the effort to create virtual courses had been understimated.

[edit] Examples of virtual universities

Many traditional brick-and-mortar universities have established virtual branches or are at least providing virtual courses. The following is a non-exhaustive list of exclusively virtual universities.


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