Online education professor receives prestigious teaching award

Online education professor receives prestigious teaching award

Officials at Austin Peay State University (APSU) have recently announced that associate professor of online education Anne Wall has been named innovative professor of the year for 2009 by the APSU center of extended and distance education, according to the Leaf Chronicle.

Wall received the award in November during distance education week, when the school recognizes excellence in online education.

Although Wall has remained humble, her students believe that she is more than deserving of the award. Specifically, students in Wall's online classes mentioned the organized and easily-followed framework of her courses as well as the professor's use of real-world scenarios as her greatest strengths.

"For online, the best practices are undiscovered at this point because it's so new," Wall said, quoted by the news source. "But one thing you can't do is take a 'face-to-face' class and put it online and expect it to be effective. You need to find new and different things for the student to do that take advantage of the internet. Since that's the delivery of online courses, it's all-important," she added.

Online universities that offer online degree programs may be particularly attractive to busy adults who would like to acquire new skills but do not have the time to do it in a traditional setting.