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According to a research by two online consulting firms, it is said that the average online student is a 33 year old woman, white, and with a full-time profession, who has an income of around $65,000 annually. The research also showed that the woman expected to study business, which is also the most preferred online course for the students Business Management is a very popular degree courses for the learners all around the globe and each year a great number of students get enrolled in this course.
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The authors of the research have said, “Schools simply cannot offer enough business programmes if they want to attract large numbers of online students.” Carol Aslanian, who is also one of the author’s of the study, is of the view that in order to expand the business of an educational institution, it is needed that they start providing their courses online. Online learning has been a great help for many universities and colleges all around the globe in promoting their expertise and popularity.
Those who sponsored this survey have a key role to play in the promotion of online learning. One of them is the Aslanian Market Research, who is also a part of the Education Dynamics and provides the consulting services to the different colleges on incorporating online studies in the curriculum. The other one is the Learning House Inc. which helps the educational institutions in building online programmes for the learners. The survey was carried out by a research contractor based in Denver and it was carried out over 1,500 adults who want to get enrolled in online programmesin the near future.
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The data also provides information about other trends in online learning as well. Women actually dominate the market of online learning as the 70% of the participants in the survey were women. Out of them, 60% were white. Only 20% of them were black and 8% of them were Hispanic. The majority (60%) of the online learners or those who are keen about applying to an online programme had a full-time employment. 20% of them had a part-time profession and around 19% didn’t have a job at all, out of which 12% were looking out for an employment actively.
The survey puts forward the fact that there is an increasing demand of online education among the common men. More than 50% of the respondents in the survey said that they are actually interested in a certificate or a diploma degree online. The chief authors of the study, Aslanian and David Clinefelter, who is the chief academic officer of the Learning House, is of the view that people are ken about having a degree online as it promotes employment for them.
Both of them write in the survey, “As interest in competency-based learning rises, so will the demand for short-term, career-oriented, and compressed certificate study”. Another aspect about the popularity of these online courses among the learners is the fact that apart from being able to take up the course at any point of time, from anywhere, their online universities are also located nearby their residence. About 80% of the participants of the survey lives within the 100 miles of the physical presence of their chosen online programme.
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The survey also includes the traditional college campuses that have their service kiosks located in several other countries. This makes the learners more interested about the course as apart from the fact that the course is fully online, they can always visit the service kiosks as any point of time.
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The participants of the survey have mentioned that while choosing the online programme, first of all they see the reputation of the university which is offering the course. Secondly, they see the course fees and if it is affordable, they do not think twice in applying for the course.