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Star Tribune highlights new online course

By Kari VanDerVeen
December 6, 2012

"Colleges known for face-to-face instruction are dipping a toe online," the Star Tribune notes in a story about an online calculus course that faculty members from St. Olaf and Macalester plan to offer this summer.

The pilot course, sponsored by the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, will be "extremely personalized," according to Macalester Associate Professor of Mathematics Chad Topaz, who is developing the course alongside St. Olaf Associate Professor of Mathematics Kristina Garrett.

The two will chat one-on-one with students weekly, and enrollment will be capped at about 20.

"Certainly a liberal arts education tends to focus on very intensive, high-quality interactions between students and faculty members," Marci Sortor, provost and dean of the college at St. Olaf, told the Star Tribune. "How that gets manifested in an online setting is an interesting challenge, I think."

Contact Kari VanDerVeen at 507-786-3970 or vanderve@stolaf.edu.