Canada's foremost online college consortium, Contact South, joined forces recently with leading multi-service provider Embanet Corporation. This collaboration will benefit students enrolled in online courses and ensure the growth, development and delivery of distance education to students worldwide.
Currently the Contact South consortium offers 150 courses to at least 2,700 students throughout the world. Embanet Corporation will build, host and maintain the virtual classroom environment required to successfully deliver online programs.
"Distance education is very popular," stated Donna Crawford, director of continuous learning at Durham College. "In 1997 the Contact South consortium consisted of 11 members. Today, almost all the Ontario colleges have joined this consortium. Next year, we anticipate our enrolment to reach several thousand." Embanet will provide technical support to students, instructor development training, Web site design, development and hosting, and co-op marketing 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Contact South's mandate is the shared development and delivery of online courses. Only one Contact South member college can take the lead to develop a course. Once developed and approved, the course can be selected by all member colleges for credit at their own institutions. This system eliminates the need for several colleges to spend time and money developing the same product.
"With around the clock support from Embanet, we can better meet the needs of our students," says Linda Rees, chair, Contact South. "Our students and faculty can focus on their courses rather than learning and troubleshooting software."
Heather Ryan, co-ordinator at Contact South, says, "Embanet has the most current technology available and will continue to update our system as new advances come on the market. Contact South will continue to lead Canadian consortiums by offering today's adult learner more flexibility, accessibility, course selection, higher level of service and quality education."
For more information please contact Cindy Foley at (905) 721-3050 or foley_c@notesmail.durhamc.on.ca.
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