Liberal Studies This Week

Last week, Scott commented to my post:

"I wonder how most of my fellow online students can actually be involved in the extracurricular activities at UIS though, distance aside many of us lead lives that we have to fit schoolwork around, rather than the opposite (as sad as that is sometimes.)"

This is an issue that I have considered many times in the past ten years and I have to say, I don't have an answer. I love the idea that online students would have some way of creating a community. To a large extent, the goal of this blog is to provide a chance for LIS students to post their ideas and to interact with one another in forum that offers more substantial interaction than a microblogging site like Facebook or Twitter. (Remember, if you already have permission, you can create your own posts rather than simply reading and commenting upon my posts If you want permission, just let me know.)

The big question is do online students really want to participate in extracurricular activities at UIS or even to interact on a blog like this?

If I were to over-simplify the population of online students they would fall into two groups: those who live too far from a campus to attend and those whose time commitments make it difficult to attend traditional class meetings. In many cases (maybe most cases) LIS students fall into both categories. So, if one of the benefits of online learning is that it allows students to fit classes into their already busy schedule, will those same students want to further complicate their schedules by adding extracurricular activities?

My limited experience suggests that the answer is no, but what do you think? Would you want to commit time to an activity? If so, what sort of activity would be attractive? Would you want to participate in a formal activity, an actual student organization, or would you prefer less formal interactions like this blog or, Scott's examples, a Second-Life site or an online gaming group?

Please tell me your ideas.

One thing to consider though. Online students don't pay certain fees since we recognize that they can't participate as fully as campus-based students. If online students want to participate in campus groups, this will likely come at a cost.