No. The course has been designed to be used by all levels of technology users. Over time you will develop new skills.
Your course is copyrighted material. Sharing course material with others is illegal and will affect your course grade.
- You will need regular access to a computer with an Internet connection. The minimum computer requirements for the virtual classroom are:
- Windows 2000/XP/Vista/Windows 7 / Mac OS 9 or better / Linux
- Any current Flash-compliant browser (e.g. Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 3.0)
- 512 MB of RAM, 1 GB or more preferred
- Broadband connection required – courses are heavily video-intensive
- Video display capable of high-color 16-bit display – 1024 x 768 or higher resolution
- A sound card and speakers or headphones
- Current anti-virus software must be installed and kept up to date
Some classes may have specific class requirements for additional software. These requirements will be listed on the course offerings page.
Most home computers purchased within the last 3-4 years meet or surpass these requirements.
- You will need some additional free software for enhanced web browsing. Ensure that you download the free versions of the software.
- Adobe Reader
- Adobe Flash Player
- At a minimum, you must have Microsoft Office 2003 (or newer version) or OpenOffice. Microsoft Office is the standard office productivity software utilized by faculty, students, and staff. Microsoft Word is the standard word processing software, Microsoft Excel is the standard spreadsheet software, and Microsoft PowerPoint is the standard presentation software. Copying and pasting, along with attaching/uploading documents for assignment submission, will also be required.
If you do not have Microsoft Office, you can check with the university bookstore to see if they have any student copies.
Students all benefit when people work together. There will be many opportunities in this degree program to work collaboratively with your colleagues. Group work is determined by the faculty for the course.
Yes. Once you have been officially admitted into the program, you need to set up your university email. All official communication will be sent only to this account.
Email your academic coach with questions about course assignments or content. The faculty and coaches collaborate regularly regarding students' questions, concerns, and performance.
After the course is over, students will have access for an additional two weeks. You should take this opportunity to save any documents you might need in the future.
In Internet Explorer, change the size of the screen by selecting the size in the lower right corner by clicking on the down arrow, as pictured below.
Select one of the options in the list; a selection of 200% or 400% should give you the ability to see the text. Make sure to close the navigation pane on the left side of the screen to give more visibility.
For the PowerPoints within the course, the transcripts are available in the Resources section of the course. They are PDF documents that can be enlarged on the screen as necessary within Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Yes. You will need Internet access to download your individual course and online readings onto your computer and to periodically submit and receive feedback on assignments and assessments as well as participate in online discussions.
Download a free Office-like application called OpenOffice. This allows students to work in Microsoft applications without having Microsoft Office, but without some of the features.
Go to
http://download.openoffice.org/index.html. Click the green arrow. (Your computer may block the site. If so, try to left-click in the gray bar that pops up and choose “download file”.
You may also check with your university’s bookstore.
Discussion posts disappear for two reasons.
- Were you connected to the Internet while you were submitting your post? If not, your post was not sent to the server. You need to update your courseware using the Tools icon.
- Discussion groups were changed after you posted your comments on the Discussion Board. The posts should remain if you remain in the default group. If you suspect your group has changed, contact your Coach.
You need Adobe Flash player to display videos in the Learning Management System. If your video window displays a blank screen and will not display video, ensure you have the latest version of Flash by visiting the
Adobe Flash web site.
Use your cursor to highlight the announcement text. Right-click, select “Copy”, then go to a Word document and right-click and select “Paste”.
Academic Coaches can reopen Progress Monitors for students with the professor’s permission. Contact your Academic Coach and explain the circumstance.
Click on your name in the upper right corner of the course screen.
Then click on “My Account”.
Then change your email address appropriately.
Click the “Save Changes” button.
Click on your name in the upper right corner of the course screen.
Then click on “My Account”.
Then click on the down arrow next to “Change Password”.
Then enter your new password and confirm it.
Then click the “Save Changes” button.
Contact your Academic Coach or faculty member for assistance.
Contact your Academic Coach or faculty member for assistance.
Go to your Academic Partnerships university website to get a course calendar.
Contact your Academic Coach or faculty member if a link is broken in your course.
Contact your faculty member or Academic Coach for more information about course content.
Contact your faculty member for assistance.
Contact your Academic Coach.
You will need to contact that application’s support team or your university support team if it is an application provided by them.
Your username and password will be sent to the email address you provided during registration. You can expect to receive this email on the Thursday before the start of the term. If you register on or after the Thursday before the start of the term, you can expect to receive the email within 24 hours.
You may reset your password by going to the course login screen and clicking on “Forgot Password” link.
Depending on which university you attend, the usernames are created using a variety of methods. Some universities use the University Student ID, or first name.last name (ex: John.Smith), or first initial combined with last name (ex: JSmith), or that combined with a 4 digit number (ex: JSmith9865).
The first step is to check with your university to determine the course you should be enrolled in, work with your Academic Advisor or Registrar to get into the appropriate course.
You should work with your academic advisor or registrar to make sure that the incorrect user ID is deactivated and that you are registered for the course with the correct user profile.
You may receive error messages in the online portal if the computer you are using to access your course does not meet the requirements. Specifically, the computer may not have Windows Media Player 10 (or later) or Adobe Flash Player 9 (or later). These can both be downloaded for free on the requirements page.
Your workplace may have blocked your ability to access your course from your work computer. Check with the IT department for your workplace.
This is determined by the course professor and should be stated in the syllabus.
You can access your grades in two ways. First, you can in the “My Courses” pane of your course on the main course screen.
Click on the “Grades” link.
Alternately, if you are in your course, you can click the “Grades” link in the upper right corner of your course.
First ask your Academic Coach for information. If the information is not complete or you need more information, you can directly email your professor.
Grading issues need to be discussed with your faculty member, contact information for the faculty member is in the course syllabus.
Contact your Academic Coach to see if grades have been released yet.
A virtual classroom makes online discussion between students and instructors an important type of communication. Depending on your instructor, these discussions may be an optional or required part of your class experience.
- Select the desired discussion from the left navigation pane.
The discussion will open in the viewing pane. Notice that posts may be displayed in full, or in a summary view. Click on the arrow inside the post to toggle the view.
- To view the grading criteria for a conversation, click on the Rubric button at the bottom of the screen.
- To view responses to a post, click on the “+” symbol to the left of the post to expand the conversation. Again, the posts may be displayed in summary or complete view. Click on the arrows inside each post to toggle the view.
- To reply to a post, click on “Reply” on the right side of the message window.
A reply window will open where you can enter and format your comments.
When you are finished creating your reply, click “Post”.
- To share a document with other students, either begin a new thread or reply to a previous message and click on “Attach File” at the bottom of the message window.
Click “Browse” to find your file.
Once you have located and attached a file, you can remove it. You can also attach additional files. When you are ready to post the message and the document, click “Post”.
After you have posted, you may edit your comments or attachment by clicking “Edit”.
You will be able to open or remove the attachment, or add additional attachments, as well as edit your comments.
Click on the arrow located to the right of the discussion post so that the arrow point up to expand the threads, as pictured below.
This arrow will toggle the view each time you click it.
If your Academic Coach or faculty member has set up groups in your discussion boards, you will see a drop-down box in the upper right corner of the discussion board (as pictured below).
When you click on the arrow, you will see the groups set up for the discussion board (as pictured below). To see your group posts, click on your group name.
