Online learning is web-based. It is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, throughout the year. Anyone in the nursing profession can access it if he completes a simple registration process. Even before registering, some web sites offer demo versions for preview. The nurse who is enrolled in the course [let's call her the 'end-user'] can follow the course at her own pace, unlike in a typical classroom setting. Tutor-student and student-student interaction is possible at highly effective levels, thanks to computer-based facilities like email, messenger, voice mail and mail rings etc. Nursing students and teachers from different parts of the planet can interact with each other and share ideas instantly just at the click of a button. Professional networking has taken on a new turn in the right direction. Technical requirements needed for most online programs are very simple: Just a standard personal computer and internet connection. Most courses don't require more than Adobe Acrobat Reader, Shockwave and Flash. These are free downloadable programs with multimedia capabilities such as animation, digital audio and video. In the past, students had to go to college to get educated. But today the `world wide web' is at our door with just the click of a button. Several universities, including the University of Phoenix, Arizona, the pioneer in online education in the US, offer excellent accredited professional courses on the Net. The American Nurses Association offers excellent Online Continuing Education courses with tests, some of which are free to its members. Their official website, www.nursingworld.org, hosts a free e-newsletter service called `The Nursing Insider' and provides ample information on their current Continuing Education courses. Its homepage has a `Continuing Education Archives' link which takes the user to a short list of Continuing Education modules [hosted from 2001 to 2004] which are no longer offered. However, the user can download the modules as abstracts or full versions and use them for research purposes, according to a notification on the web page. The articles are available as `Full' as well as `Page turner' versions. Besides all these, online learning saves the user's time, money [for instance travel costs to meet with experts], job or family. Hence, it's time for interested parties to `log on'. |
