Congratulations, FastTrack Students!
First Students Will Graduate from the FastTrack
MLIS Program
by Sue Alman
by Sue Alman
The inaugural class of the FastTrack MLIS Program will be graduating on April 27th. Thirty-five students began the program in May 2001, and 34 students have remained with the cohort. SIS Dean Ronald Larsen commented on the University of Pittsburgh’s pioneering online degree program:
The School's Masters program in Library and Information Science has been recognized nationally for excellence. Two years ago, we launched FastTrack to extend the reach of this outstanding program beyond the bounds of the Oakland campus. As the first online degree program at the University of Pittsburgh, this became an experiment in a number of ways, from transforming our instructional delivery, to building a community among students distributed across the country. The first cohort has truly been a community of pioneers, helping us to explore new territory and to design a program that responds to the needs of today's students. Their commitment to the process, as well as ours, has led to a highly successful enterprise for which the demand continues to grow. We owe them a debt of gratitude as well as congratulations on a job well done.
During the past two years the instructors who have taught courses in the FastTrack program have learned much about distance education, instructional design, and electronic course delivery. Professor Christinger Tomer said that developing asynchronous courses has “broadened my perspectives about teaching and learning.” This sentiment has been echoed by other instructors who feel that teaching in the electronic environment causes them to challenge both content and structure of existing courses and that students in the on-campus program have benefited from the instructors’ renewed approaches to teaching.
The program was designed for students who want to pursue a degree in library and information science, but due to career and family obligations are unable to attend a traditional on-campus program. While it is difficult to juggle work, home, and school responsibilities both on-campus and online students have proven to take their academic studies seriously. One distance education student, Jamie Weisenstein Alascia (who began a long-distance dating relationship with Vinny Alascia after they met during the first on-campus visit), wrote to us last year:
I just have to tell you how very much I am enjoying distance learning. I feel that we as students have bonded more than I ever have in a 'real' classroom and in a very short period of time. The discussion boards and virtual classrooms are great. I look forward to each new assignment and I have had some of the best class discussions of my educational career. Thank you for accepting me to the program, and I look forward to each new term!Distance education meets the needs of people who live in areas that don’t have the type of on-campus MLIS program that exists at the University of Pittsburgh. Also, asynchronous distance education fits the life-styles of today--students in the first cohort have been able to remain enrolled in the program and to graduate on schedule even after their jobs caused them to relocate to places like Missoula, Montana and Salt Lake City. The application rate for the FastTrack MLIS Program has more than doubled since 2001, and applicants continue to have excellent academic and professional experiences. The FastTrack MLIS Program has attracted highly qualified people who are motivated to pursue graduate studies as part of an online community of learners.
Publication of the Department of Library &
Information Science
University of Pittsburgh
135 N. Bellefield Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15260
Last updated April 21, 2003