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Meeting Educational Needs through Partnerships and Collaboration (Chapter Five) page 53 ♦ Higher education institutions will work as partners with one another and with other entities whenever appropriate to share resources and deliver programs cooperatively to enhance learning opportunities for Nebraska residents. ♦ Higher education will work effectively with elementary and secondary schools to improve teaching and learning at all levels of education and to facilitate the transition from one level of education to another.

Excerpts Include: Introduction: UNL will continue to build on areas of academic strengths. For many of the degree programs expanded markets are the only way UNL can offer distance education programs to citizens of the state. The greatest growth opportunities are with non-thesis masters programs and graduate certificate programs. Principal Academic Emphasis: The goal is for faculty, departments and administrators to treat distance education responsibilities as part of their normal workload and not as an extra, or adjunct, responsibility, thus allowing UNL to be a stronger and more responsive university. 1. Develop distance education graduate degree and certificate programs for professionals in fields of UNL's special expertise. 2. Develop modules with specific learning outcomes to be used in credit and non-credit programs. When evaluating new distance education degree and certificate programs the following guiding principles will be used: 3. Develop courses, sets of courses or certificates in undergraduate professional programs, i.e. Journalism and Agriculture. 4. Explore the application of instructional technology to support learning of distance education and on-campus students. When evaluating new distance education degree and certificate programs the following guiding principles will be used: 7. Are there collaborative partnerships that expand resources by building relationships with other colleges and universities within the state, region or nation?

Response to Need and Demand: Most of the growth will occur in masters degree programs that have excess capacity and new degree and certificate programs that will be developed in the next four years. To increase enrollments will require aggressive target marketing of individual programs within Nebraska, the nation and the world. Targeting Nebraska alumni living outside the state is an important target audience for some distance education programs. The greatest potential for graduate student growth will be the out-of-state market. Funding Support for Distance Education: In July 2003, the NU Presidents Council adopted a policy giving the chancellors authority to set out-of-state tuition for distance education students at a higher rate than the in-state tuition. This tuition differential (difference between the in-state tuition and out-of-state distance education tuition) is returned to the campus and funds are used to support distance education programs.

Through the summer Study Abroad program, students take classes from UNL faculty in Brazil, France, Italy or China and receive credit for special courses not available during the regular school year, such as Portuguese and the History of Science and Technology. Participants also work on independent study projects related to their majors and spend one week sightseeing and learning the country's culture. They can also take Engineering Technical Electives and get ahead in ther degree.