What is distance education?
Distance education (D.E.) is any instruction that takes place outside the main campus classroom setting.
University of Houston offers its students the opportunity to supplement their on-campus course work or even take their entire upper-division or graduate-level requirements for selected majors and programs through distance education. Classes offered through D.E. are regular U.H. classes taught by U.H. faculty and have the same pre-requisites and requirements as classes taken on campus.
Most distance education classes at U.H. are upper-division (junior-, senior-, and graduate-level) courses. Some lower-division (freshman- and sophomore-level) classes are also available through distance education, but most of these must still be taken on campus.
(Houston-area community colleges offer all the lower-division courses required by U.H. through distance education. If you decide to complete the requirements at one of these institutions, you can transfer the credits and apply them toward a bachelor's degree that you finish through distance education at U.H.)
Classes are offered in a variety of formats:
- Online
- On television (KUHT Channel 8, HCC-TV and campus-only Cougar Cable)
- Tape purchase (videotape or DVD)
- Face-to-face classes at off-campus teaching centers
- Interactive television at off-campus teaching centers (one- or two-way videoconference class sessions)
Many students enroll in D.E. classes because they cannot spend enough time on campus during the day to complete the courses they need. A typical D.E. student at U.H. might work full-time and almost never come to campus. Or, it might be someone whose work and other demands limit visits to campus each week. In addition, many on-campus students use D.E. classes as an alternative when other classes are full or if they need some flexibility in their course schedule.
U.H. courses taken through distance education satisfy the university’s requirement that the last 30 undergraduate credit hours be completed “on campus.”