Virtual University

A virtual university is a university which carries out much of its teaching,perhaps all of it, at a distance from the learner, i.e. virtual universities offer courses of programmes online over Internet. Some of the Virtual Universities are real institutes, the bricks and mortar type provide while others provide courses only on-line.

The goal of Virtual Universities is to provide access to the part of the population who would not be able to attend a physical campus, for reason such as: (1) distance- where students live too far from a physical campus to attend regular classes; (2) need for flexibility- some students need the flexibility to study at home whenever it is convenient for them to do so.

Program delivery in a virtual university is administered through information communication technology such as web pages, e-mail and other networked sources. Students taking so called "virtual" courses are doing "real" work to get their degrees and educators preparing and teaching those courses spend plenty of "real" time in doing so. That is, students meet rigorous academic learning outcomes and evaluations through programs constructed by credible academics according to standard university-level criteria. Many Virtual Universities are accredited in the same way as traditional universities and operate according to the same academic standards. These universities and operate according to the same academic standars. These universities can grant degrees that will be any person who has on-line access to provide learning experiences and training in an ope access format.

The convenience of on-line learning attracts mainly working class adult students who need school to meet their schedules and demands of working, family and social lives.

Providing access to Higher Education for all students, especially adult learners, is made easier by the fact that most virtual universities have no entry requirements for their undergraduate courses. Entry requirement are needed for the courses that are aimed at postgraduates or those who work in the specific jobs.

Studying in a virtual university is different from studying in a brick and mortar university.There are no building and no campus to go to because students study on the internet. In most cases only a personal computer and an Internet connection is needed.




If you are taking courses on-line it means that you will be learning in your own time by reading course material, working on course activities. writing assignments and perhaps working with other students through interactive teleconferences. Online learning can be an isolating experience since the students spends the majority of their time working by themselves but others find this a major stumbling block to successful completion of courses. Course material can include printed material, books audio and video cassettes, TV programmes, CD-ROM/software, and websites.Support is offered to learners from the professor or a tutor online through e-mails if they are having problems with the course.

It is often difficult to maintain the scheduling needed to be successful when learning on-line. That is why some virtual universities apply the same type of time management as traditional schools.Many courses operate to a timetable, which the student receives with his/her course materials. These include the planned activities for each week of the course and the dates for the assignments. if the course has an exam, the students will be informed where they have to go to write it. 
An example of a university that maintains a tight schedule is the Virtual Global University (VGU) in Germany. VGU offers a graduate program "International Master of Business Informatics "- a master program in information technology and management that takes four semesters to complete.Each course has a lecture or a virtual class meeting every week. Afterwards, students get a homework assignment; for example, they have to solve and exercise, elaborate on some problem, discuss a case study,or take a test. Lectures give them immediate feedback,and one week later, the same happens again.

there are a great many skills that students who decide to study through Virtual Universities need in order to be successful. Some of these include:


  • Mastering software tools,
  • developing new study habits,
  • Knowing how to access on line academic resources.
  • Confidence to do well. Students who lack self-confidence, often have poor learning skills and may develop considerable anxiety and fear of failure.
  • Students need to be highly motivated and able to learn on their own without much direction.
  • Need excellent time management skills to ensure that they get the work completed when it is due,
  • Ability to Ask for Help. Services for students often include tutorials between student-tutor, and student-student, help desks, counseling and advising plus technical support.However, just providing these services does not guarantee success

With the rapid expansion in the past ten years of Virtual Universities questions remain about accreditation, assessment and reputation for quality. Not all Virtual Universities are created equal. Accreditation, by a govering body, is needed to assure students that the online institute has certified online instructors who have the expertise andeducational qualifications to be closely monitored in any institution but especially in virtual universities.Without assessment there would be no measure to determine levels of current knowledge or whether the learning objective was accomplished.reputation for quality is important because employers will be more likely to hire a student who  got their degree online from an accredited university with a good name than one has herad of.

Many traditional brick-and-mortar universities have establishes virtual branches or are at least providing virtual courses. the following is a non-exhaustive list of exclusively virtual universities.





In India,none of the universities currently offer programmes in online only fashion. However, IGNOU and some other state-level open universities offer some of their courses and programmes online.
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