Ivy League courses are evolving. Keep checking around and looking at blogs and the school's web site for more information. They may go full swing into the distance learning mode in the near future.

For instance, Yale has announced that beginning in the 2007-08 academic year, they will offer digital video of taped lectures for free online. Again, these are not meant to be used towards a full degree, but you can get the benefit of the class experience.

In keeping with that trend, Harvard has made the same videotaped lectures available online for graduate and undergraduate credit. Not a full degree but a real nice experience nevertheless if you really WANT to try an Ivy League school.

The presidents of both schools have made statements about marrying information technology with education in a distance learning environment.

The long and short of it is that the application requirements will be the same as if you were applying in person, you really will need to have a great portion of your tuition on hand to attend the courses that are there online. Even then, I must emphasize, you will not have the option of taking a full degree online at an Ivy League institution: just the experience of hearing the material.

Yale was the first one to venture into the distance learning arena a couple of years ago. Harvard has followed suit progressively. But there is a twist you need to understand before trying to apply for these courses.

Ivy League colleges have taken the step towards online education, howbeit carefully. You are able to get the benefit of a partial education. However, as of this date, there are NO completely online courses available at these institutions.

What you can get from Harvard or Yale or any Ivy League institution is access to videotaped lectures and even class materials. The catch is that what you learn is not transferable to a degree program. Some schools have added online coursework for undergraduate and graduate credits. This is not a full degree program and probably won't be for some time, so taking a Harvard online course or a Yale online course is not completely what it sounds like.

You can apply as you normally would for any higher education school. If you are serious about taking an Ivy League online course, tuition will be the biggest block. Some schools have payment programs and accept Pell grants and other financial aids. But there is always a portion that you pay out of pocket. For the most part, if you don't have the FULL payment out front, you will not be granted access to Ivy League courses.

My personal background, so that you know, is that I am graduate of a B.A. and an M.A. from a Christian College.  I also taught for six years at a Chrisitan university in the Dallas, Texas area.  So, here are a couple more things you will want to consider when looking at your application to apply to take a course at a Christian college. 

When you start to fill out your application here are some tips that will help you stand out from other applicants.

• Letters of Reference - You may want to consider including with your application letters of reference. Some of the most effective letters come from pastors, church elders or deacons, or perhaps the choir director (if the case warrants it). Having others that confirm and testify to your Christian beliefs can go a long way to help you get accepted.

• Statement of Faith - One item that you will find that many Christian online colleges will require that their secular counterparts will not ask for is a statement of faith. You should have a brief (usually one typed page is adequate) summary of your testimony and what your faith means to you. Keep it simple and genuine as over indulgent testimony just sound corny and insincere.

In a few days or so (as soon as I can get a good list together) I am going to post several Christian colleges and univerisities you may want to check out that have online course offerings, or entire degree programs.  It certainly won't be an exhaustive list, so right now I am looking at a way to narrow the focus in building the list.

• Part 1 - Before you apply
• Part 2 - Your application
• Part 3 - Some specific Christian colleges

If you are a Christian and you have already determined that the best way for you to get a college education is by attending college online then you may be looking for some tips for getting started. Christian online colleges offer the same types of education those other colleges online may offer the biggest difference will be that they actually have the same belief system that you have and incorporate God and Jesus into their curriculum.

There are several factors that you should consider as you begin to narrow down your choose of schools to attend. The application process for any school can be long and tedious when you are filling them out so have all the necessities together before you get started. Here are a few tips to help you with choosing an online college that will meet all your needs.

• Accreditation -The first thing that you need to do is check to make sure that the college you are looking at is fully accredited. It is unfortunately but oftentimes you can run into schools that are not properly accredited and then when you are ready to either transfer to another school or present your diploma you find out that the credits you have earned are non-transferable or not recognized as legitimate credits.

One of the things about some Christian colleges is they are not accredited by one of the nationally recognized, regional acrediting bodies.  Make sure it is.  You don't want to waste any time or money on a course that won't transfer or count for work credit.

• Requiring Help -Another very important thing that you will need to check is if you have problems understand the curriculum or need to reach the professor for any other reason how do you do it. With an online course your professor could have hundreds of students and may be hard to reach so you need to find out what the college's procedures are with regards to needing help.

• Financial Aid - If you are worried about the cost of getting an online degree you may be pleasantly surprised to find out that many online colleges offer financial aid. Check with them first and weigh out all your financial options, they may also be able to send you toward some Christian based scholarships that you may have been unaware of.

Part 2 is coming soon.  We are going to discuss what to do after you apply and some of the things you need to know that might be different on a college application from a Christian collge.

1. The next thing that you will want to look into when selecting an online college is the type of prerequisites that institution has in place for students. If you are interested in joining a particular online college, it is important to know and understand what expectations they have in place for new students. Knowing whether or not you qualify for acceptance is a key component in ensuring that you have made the right educational choice.

2. When selecting an online college, it is important to ensure that all of the coursework that is issued to students is done in a virtual classroom. Many online colleges offer courses in the virtual classroom, as well as the traditional brick and mortar classroom. It is important to know what is expected in this area prior to committing to the university.

3. Last, but not least, you should take into consideration what others think of the online college, as well as any relevant experiences that they have had with the online college. this will give you a good idea of what to expect when you are a student yourself.

As you can see, there are many important considerations to be made when it comes to online colleges. The tips listed here will help you to determine if a particular college is right for you.

1. The most important tip for choosing an online college is to ensure that the educational institution is accredited. Accreditation means that the online school meets and/or exceeds the educational standards for a particular subject, degree, and/or coursework. This can be extremely beneficial to you in many different ways. First, it means that if you ever decide to switch colleges, you will be able to transfer any credits that you received. Furthermore, when it comes to entering your chosen career path, it is essential to have an education that meets certain standards. If you lack this, you may find it difficult to use the skills and talents that you have acquired in the future, and you may find that you literally wasted your money on an education that just does not count.

2. The next tip for considering and selecting an online college is to ensure that the school offers plenty of resources to assist you in your educational career. Examples of resources include an online school library, peer counseling services, tutoring sessions, and technical support specialists.

3. The third tip for choosing an online college is to research the financial aid options that you have. Many schools will offer payment plans, accept Federal Pell Grants, and similar forms of financial aid. If you do not have the money to pay full tuition at an online university, this may be an important consideration.

I will have more tips for you in a few days.

Here is a link where you can go and check out information on several of these schools:

Online Ivy League Schools

How would that look on your resume? Add Cornell University or Boston College as one of the schools on your resume and that could turn a few heads. Is it worth the cost? Probably. I'd check it out. And, if nothing else, it could be one of those conversation pieces among friends trying to one-up the other, win a date, or more importantly, get a promotion over some dweeb who just got his degree from the local community college.

Why Do Online Degree Programs Have to Be Accredited?

While you may be tempted to pay less for schooling at one of the institutions that do not claim to be accredited, do not be fooled. In order for you to have a bachelor's degree that counts, that people will care about, you have to go through an accredited online degree program. They are offered in many web based universities and for many programs, but they do cost more than the average unlicensed program would. You do get what you pay for in this case; paying hardly anything will school will get you a rather cheap, unusable bachelor's degree. Who wants to pay to waste their own time?

The Benefits of an Accredited Online Degree Programs

There are so many benefits to having an accredited online degree under your belt. First of all, unless your potential employer does some serious research they can easily think that you got your bachelor's degree from a traditional four-year university. The degree offered by these online degree programs is the exact same thing; that is what it means to be accredited. It has been evaluated and approved to be equitable with traditional programs.

The only difference is this: you work at your own pace from your own home. You don't have to worry about who is going to watch the baby while you are at school, or how to get there if you don't have a car. None of that matters with this type of degree program and depending on how fast you work, you may be able to get your degree in less than the normal four years.

Is an accredited online degree program right for you? Only time will tell. If you have problems with being a self starter and getting things done unsupervised, a normal college setting may be more beneficial. On the other hand, if you are motivated to get this degree and get your life on track you can certainly benefit from what accredited online degrees have to offer.