The 'Recordable' Situation: Reflections on Creating an Audio-Cassette-Based Course in Communication Studies for an MA Curriculum.

This paper discusses a distance education course directly connected to a fundamental need at Regent University (a graduate-only institution) to equip ill-prepared students for the rigors of the Master of Arts degree in communication. This course was designed to be taken by any student whose undergraduate transcript did not adequately meet the institution's admittance standards. The course surveys the broad discipline of communication and addresses the major thematic challenges of describing, defining, and delineating various sub-disciplines of communication, including rhetoric, interpersonal communication, organization and group communication, intercultural communication, and mass communication. The course was first implemented on-site in Fall 1994, but the need became one of offering a premedial course in a way that did not interfere with the students' ability to move effectively and efficiently through their program. Distance education with audiocassettes was chosen as a viable method on a shoestring budget. The course has been good for Regent financially and as a valuable promotional tool. Advice from the audiocassette course's administrators and Regent's senior distance education producer is also offered, i.e.: do not create a distance education course using an instructor who is offering the onsite version; develop a committed "chain of authority"; be ready to invest appropriate time and money; be sure to think through the administrative timeline for not only producing the course but offering it again with new instructors; remember that the medium offers certain advantages and constraints; and preplan what to tape and what not to tape. Contains 7 references. (NKA)