Online English ranking
JOHNSON CITY – East Tennessee State University’s online course offerings in English have been ranked 18th in the nation by TheBestSchools.org.
“Our team at TheBestSchools.org connects prospective students with the best online degree programs available,” wrote Clifford B. Kvidhal of the organization’s Marketing and Communications Outreach division. “This year, we reviewed all accredited online bachelor’s in English degree programs in the U.S. to select the Top 25 programs in the nation. ETSU stands out as one of the best of the best.”
TheBestSchools.org noted that ETSU’s bachelor’s degree in English offers both teaching and non-teaching tracks, and students may take most coursework online, with only occasional visits to campus for collaboration and networking with faculty and classmates.
Dr. Katherine Weiss, chair of ETSU’s Department of Literature and Language, says that while the majority of English majors prefer to take most of their classes on campus, the department offers a significant number of courses for students who need to take nearly all or some of their courses online.
All of the department’s courses that are part of the university’s general education curriculum may be taken online; these include composition and literary survey classes, as well as “Mythology” and “Literature, Value and Ethics.” She pointed out that the department’s general education courses and several of the most popular upper division courses for English majors and minors are offered online year-round, and some online courses are offered during the summer term.
“For me, as department chair, it’s really exciting that we are being recognized for the quality, particularly in the sense that many of us, when we were undergraduates, were very skeptical of technology,” Weiss said. “We’ve realized, ‘This can work,’ and it’s not a replacement for on-ground classes. We’re not teaching fewer on-ground classes, but we’re able to extend that shared knowledge that happens in the classroom with students who either have a situation where they can’t come to campus for a semester or two, or want to seek a degree at ETSU but have not yet made that transition to live here. It provides more flexibility and opportunities for people of this region to have experiences with higher education.”
For more information, visit the ETSU Department of Literature and Language on the
web at https://www.etsu.edu/cas/litlang/ or call 423-439-4347.
Media Contact:
Jennifer Hill
hill@etsu.edu
423-439-4317