CGS Program puts Penn online

When Penn math professor Dennis DeTurck gets ready to teach some of his classes, he has to make special preparations to account for the fact that he can't see any of his students.

And he has to remember that he's teaching everyone from high school students to adults who graduated from Penn over 40 years ago.

That, he notes, is just the nature of teaching a class over the Internet.

"We tried to be inventive," he said of preparing an online course.

Thanks to Penn Advance, a program run through the College of General Studies, Penn students can now take a handful of classes completely through the Internet, avoiding early morning lectures, a set exam date and walking down to DRL on cold December mornings.

Initially begun two year ago to offer classes to advanced high school students, the program has since expanded to include CGS students and, for the first time this summer, full-time Penn students.

"We thought it would be a good opportunity for students going home or going to the workplace to take a Penn course and not have to transfer credit," Penn Advance Coordinator Louise Moskowitz said.

Penn Advance -- which offered eight classes this summer -- allows students to watch a real-time videotape of their professor's lecture from the comfort of their own homes. While the professor cannot see the students, all are logged into a chat room during the class, allowing students to send in a question to the professor via the Internet.

Students also submit homework assignments online, and professors log into a chat room for weekly office hours.

Exams are taken open book-style, with students logging in during a 24-hour period and having a set amount of time to complete the test before they are disconnected from the computer.

While some students think that taking a class online automatically translates into an easier courseload, Moskoqitz cautions them against falling for this trap.

"One thing that many students may think is that because a course is online it isn't as difficult," she noted. "That is not the case."

And even though full-time students will be able to take classes in the program again this fall, both Moskowitz and DeTurck warned students against taking all their classes online, or as an easy alternative to classes taught in a classroom.

"If we were giving it as a regular class and you could fit it in your schedule, I don't see the point," DeTurck -- who has taught three Penn Advance course -- said.

Moskowitx added that the program should really only be used by students who work or are very involved in extracurricular activities.

DeTurck did note that the program offered many advantages -- namely, convenience for the students. The online office hours are often held late at night, as are the classes, making it easier for students to log on regularly, he said.

Additionally, he said the program made him re-think his classroom style of teaching, implementing online office hours in some regular classes, or helping him be more rigid in planning his classes.

But he said that sometimes it was frustrating to be taping a lecture without being able to see the faces of his students.

"You don't see them," he said. "That makes things difficult, especially in math, when you can look at people and realize they stopped understanding."

"Online, you can go five or ten extra minutes without knowing people have drifted off," he said.

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