It is a fact that online universities did not come into being until too recently. The Web only came into being in the twentieth century, so that makes sense. However, you would be surprised to know that online universities can be traced back to as early as year 1728.
The idea of getting an education even while not in a physical classroom was long considered ages ago. The pioneer of distance learning was said to be a man who was giving classes on shorthand writing via snailmail. He posted the modules regularly to the members of the course.
Perhaps among the more forward-looking institutions back then was the University of London, which was why it was so quick to get on board the distance learning boat: in fact, it was among the formal pioneers of it. In the United States, the University of Chicago pioneered the concept of correspondence studies in 1892 to promote the education to the public that was implemented by Columbia University. Distance learning was then introduced to Australian shores.
There were some changes in the way the education was provided to distance learners when people invented things like TV. The latter part of the past century saw increasing interest and rapid growth in this sector. Indeed, not even a decade ago, the first accredited institution for this type of schooling came to be.
And as for the MBA, some claim it really began when Dartmouth put up what would be the first graduate business school in the world. Back then, it was referred to by an alternative term, although the program eventually came to take the name we know it by today. At the very beginning of the 20th century, Harvard Uni developed and launched the first true MBA course.
The program was not without detractors: some alleged that it was bad-quality education and had little to do with the true commercial world, just some decades into its existence. Indeed, the program was even lambasted as a useless qualification, making it hardly a qualification at all. It was thus that there were several dark years for the MBA program as a whole.
This was why people in the academe started to mandate the study of even basic subjects in the graduate program. MBAs were suddenly courses amenable to the adoption of a focus of study. This then provided students with a balance of management and subject expertise.
All of a sudden, though, the critics switched gears and started making allegations of over-academic approaches in the discipline. There were allegations of graduates being so theoretically-inclined that they had trouble with the less-than-predictable real world. Because some courses were taught by purely "theoretical business experts", there was further flak thrown at the programs.
The MBA became less desirable to HR officers. Modifications were obviously the order of the day. The schools thus began yet another major modification of their MBA courses.
It is clear that even educational courses have to change to meet the demands of the business arena. Ethics seems to be the next topic of interest to contemporary MBA programs, according to regular as well as
online universities. So you might want to look for a relevant program that includes these three areas into their curriculum.
