College enrollment soars as jobless seek new skills
Though Brian Campbell of Massachusetts calls the present economy an "equal opportunity unemployer," he acknowledges how difficult it is not to take it personally when you're laid off. Because he has savings and his wife's income to hold them steady, he's enrolled in online courses to get his MBA from Western New England College. He feels the MBA will ensure he's in a better position when the economy bounces back, and we at eLearners wholeheartedly agree!
Massachusetts is seeing an upswing across the board in registration for continuing education classes, and Kimberly Tobin, dean of graduate and continuing education at Westfield State College, credits the increase to the recession. At her school, continuing ed enrollments were up about 5 percent in the spring semester. At Western New England College, applications last fall for online graduate courses were up 50 percent, while those for online undergraduate courses were up 40 percent, compared to a year earlier. At University of Massachusetts, online enrollments were up about 28 percent!
"The days of people being able to take a weekend or a night during the week off to go to school are disappearing. So they're studying online when the kids go to bed or when they are on the road on business, sitting in a hotel room at night," says Eric Berkowitz, associate dean of the Isenberg School of Management at UMass in Amherst.
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