Sault Ste. Marie’s Algoma University will soon offer 40 courses online, just in time for its fall semester.
The school announced on June 24 that the move is possible thanks to a partnership with Athabasca University, an Athabasca, AB-based university that specializes in online coursework.
Using Athabasca’s proprietary PowerED programming, Algoma transitioned 20 undergraduate courses to online delivery this past spring, and another 20 courses will now undergo the same treatment.
Courses fall in a range of subject areas including business, computer science, biology and psychology.
Donna Rogers, Algoma’s provost and academic dean, said transitioning to digital learning actually speeds up a pre-COVID-19 plan, which was supposed to start in 2021.
“The partnership goes beyond the COVID pandemic in bringing a long-term solution to address institutional needs for high-quality, pedagogically sound remote course offerings,” Rogers said in a June 24 news release.
The original schedule planned for 184 courses to be moved online over a five-year period.
Algoma said that, while it had a strategy in place to support enhanced e-learning options, the partnership with Athabasca provides the technical infrastructure and internal capacity to allow for the high volume of online program delivery brought on by COVID-19.
More than 2,000 students are enrolled with Algoma University, which has campuses in Sault Ste. Marie, Brampton and Timmins.
