Imagine having the ability to watch again the lectures of one of Columbia’s legendary teachers, like the inspiring Mario Salvadori, explaining a particularly difficult concept. For hundreds of students at the graduate level, this happens on demand. These students are Columbia Video Network students at The Fu Foundation School who may be as far away as Oregon or as near as Wall Street but never need to visit the Morningside Heights campus.

   Columbia Video Network (CVN) was started 13 years ago as a way to bring graduate-level education to the corporate workplace. It meets the needs of industry to provide its employees with opportunities to learn first-hand from out standing researchers who are leaders in their fields. It also provides professionals with a program that is flexible enough to accommodate their demanding work schedules.

Grace Chung checks the desktop monitor where CVN teachers view what the camera sees. Operations Research Prof. Sheldon Weinig appears on the two classroom monitors.

   CVN’s new director, Grace Chung, is very aware of the demands on current professionals and so has tried to make the program as flexible as possible. Any B.S. degree holder in engineering or applied science can sign up for a CVN cour se. "Our program allows the committed student to begin graduate studies immediately and to transfer those credits for a degree program once they are formally admitted."

   Whether a seasoned professional or a recent graduate, CVN meets their needs and appeals to a broad range of students, among them Patrick Doyle and Shamya Ullah. Mr. Doyle is a senior design engineer at Intel in Aloha, Oregon wher e he has worked for 15 years. Ms. Ullah graduated last year from The Fu Foundation School with a B.S. in Operations Research and is a systems analyst at Goldman Sachs in New York City’s financial district.

   Mr. Doyle needs only two more classes to graduate in December 1998 with an M.S. in electrical engineering with a telecommunications concentration. Ms. Ullah is a video special student who is taking courses for credit but has not yet been admitted to the master’s program in operations research.

   CVN encourages students to enroll in a degree program as soon as possible but, depending upon the department, up to 15 credits may be taken prior to acceptance by a department into their degree program.
   Both Mr. Doyle and Ms. Ullah agree that the program is ideal. "Once you leave school," Ms. Ullah said, "it is very difficult to find any sort of accredited program that will accommodate a full-time work schedule. CVN gives that opportunity to potential students by allowing them to build an academic schedule around work."

   "I worked for 12 years in the com-puter/semiconductor industry before starting this degree," said Mr. Doyle. "I knew exactly what I wanted to get out of the curriculum and how the skills and knowledge would apply to my future career. The degree itself means less to me currently than the knowledge obtained."

   There can be several different ways that a student relates to Columbia Video Network coursework. In most cases, many students of the same employer will be taking the same course. Some sites receive live-link transmission while others receive videotaped lectures, with one set of tapes for every three students at a site. Since Ms. Ullah and Mr. Doyle are the only ones from their em-ployers in their courses, they re-ceive their own videotapes.

   Of course, there are differences between watching a video and being in a classroom. "What I notice most," said Ms. Ullah, "is the loss of other students to work with. There’s a certain feeling of being very remov ed, almost like you’re the only one in the class."

   To ease the feeling of remoteness and solitariness, Ms. Chung encourages students to contact the professor during his office hours and to ask questions. "Students should not be at a disadvantage because they are not in the classroom," said Ms. Chung. "My staff and I reach out to students to tell them that no question is irrelevant. We want them to avoid problems before they get to the midterm and try to drop the class. We want our students to be successful,&quo t; she said. In addition to communicating with professors by telephone, e-mail is a quick and effective way of getting information.

   As a veteran of CVN, Mr. Doyle has overcome any feelings of isolation and actually feels the opposite. "I went to the University of Michigan for undergraduate study," he said, "and the classes there were usually l arge and impersonal. I actually have had more close contact with my Columbia professors and TA’s than I did as an undergraduate at a large school." He added that taking one course at a time has allowed him to explore and enjoy the material in a way that he did not have time for as an undergraduate, when he was stressed and overloaded with course work.

   The reality is that CVN makes getting an advanced degree as painless as possible, but it is still not easy. Ms. Ullah said, "It takes an awful lot of discipline to sit down after a long day of work and watch an engineering video." Mr. Doyle echoes that: "There have been a few times when I rewind the tape and listen twice to a section of the lecture but this is also a result of falling asleep since I tend to view them late at night after my kids have gone to bed. " But he offers hope to those just beginning the program, saying, "it gets easier as you go along. The first course was really hard for me, having been out of school for over a decade. I was super rusty at math and basics, but you develop stu dy habits that make it easier.

   "The results are worth the effort. "This is a Columbia University degree with Columbia University standards," said Ms. Chung, "but no one asks a degree holder if he received it via videotape or by attending c lass at Morningside Heights." The CVN classes are taught by the School’s faculty and are taped as they are presented to a classroom of students. Indirectly, graduate students on campus benefit from being in a CVN course. Because the classes are ava ilable on tape, if a student is sick or wants to review, he can see the class via tape. Reviewing classes via tape is so popular that the library had to install four new viewing stations, making a total of seven.

   For CVN students, there is a strict regimen for homework and exam schedules that corresponds to the classes that take place on the campus. All written homework must be shipped via overnight express mail, although some professors prefer electronic submission. For courses with a large enrollment, a site administrator collects the homework and mails it in. In some cases, students who work nearby come to campus to take midterms and final examinations with traditional students.

   CVN has students from many companies, including AT&T, Bellcore, Lucent Technologies, Motorola, Intel, GE and IBM. At the M.S. level, students may receive degrees in computer science, electrical engineering, materials scienc e and metallurgical engineering, mechanical engineering, and operations research.

   The Professional Engineer degree (P.D.), for students who wish to continue their studies beyond the master’s level but are not interested in research, may be earned in computer science, electrical engineering or mechanical engine ering.

   CVN now offers a Certificate of Professional Achievement. "This is an exciting new program to meet the growing needs of professionals who want to participate in life-long learning but do not want to pursue an advanced degre e," said Vice Dean Morton B. Friedman. "It is a formal acknowledgement from Columbia that they have advanced professionally by completing these courses."