By DENISE BALGOBIN Sunday, February 17 2008

Due to an increase in the number of courses being offered through distance learning, thousands of students across the Caribbean are now able to access tertiary education without having to enter a classroom.

The services of UWI’s Distance Education Centre (UWIDEC) is currently used by about 3,500 to 4,000 students in 16 English speaking countries in the region.

However, this large number of students being able to study online has not come without a price.

A group of TT students revealed to Sunday Newsday that they have been experiencing problems and despite sending e-mail queries (as they are supposed to), they have not received any replies from anyone at the institution. They said that grades given for course work handed in during the term did not correspond to their end-of-term course work grade, and also marks for exams conducted last semester has not yet been made available to them.

“We were supposed to get our exam marks at the end of December, but up to now, we still haven’t received the marks, so we don’t know if we passed or failed.”

When Sunday Newsday contacted UWIDEC, an official there admitted the programme is being faced with a number of issues. He requested anonimity.

The official stated that the UWIDEC had been receiving a “lot of queries”, but stated that these are handled on a case by case basis. “We handle queries as they come to us usually written or via e-mail (a service we recently started). The reason the students may not have received a reply as yet could be due to the fact that we have not reached their cases as yet.”

He explained that UWIDEC works with faculties of UWI located on the three campuses in Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, as well as with other organisations, to develop and deliver quality programmes to persons in the Caribbean.

There are centres located in all the English-speaking Caribbean countries that support UWI. Students are taught through an online method, as well as through tele-conferencing. UWIDEC students only need to go to the relevant campus or centre to write exams.

“It’s a lot of students we are talking about. We have a system where we register, collate and verify exam results for accuracy before they are released to students. Due to the semester schedule for last term and this term, there has been an impact on timely delivery of results, but we are working on this.”

He stated that the outstanding results are being released to students as soon as they are ready. “But the logistics of the scheduling is of little or no help.”

The students stated that upon registration, they were given a student identification number and a password to log into a programme called MOODLE, where lectures, assignments and course work are set out, along with weekly deadlines for completion.

“Even this has been causing us some frustration because it is very slow and sometimes you have to start all over.” The official admitted that “we do have problems with the system sometimes, for a variety of reasons and even those we have to deal with it case by case.”