Two graduates appreciate CSC's online math program

Carol Erion of Winfield, Mo., received a bachelor of science degree and Tonia Vaughn of Oceanside, Calif., earned a master of arts in education degree. Both took all their coursework while working at their computers at home. Vaughn did most of it while she was living on Okinawa.

Both graduates were accompanied by their husbands, who also had not seen the college or heard of it until their wives became CSC students.

Both women are long-time mathematics junkies and used the college’s online program to obtain their degrees. Erion liked the program so much that she’s already signed up to begin taking more courses so she can earn a master’s degree in math.

Their advisor, Dr. Monty Fickel, the architect of CSC’s unique online math program, was proud last weekend as he finally met his protégés in person. He quickly introduced them to their instructors and showed them the college of which they are now alums. Fickel and his wife Gerry also hosted a reception for the two couples.

As far as has been determined, Chadron State remains the only college or university that has all of its undergraduate and graduate math courses online. Approximately 20 who have completed the work online have graduated from the program in the past three years, Fickel said. Vaughn is the first who was not living in the U.S. when she did a bulk of the work.

Erion, 51, began taking the courses in 2004, about the time the youngest of her three daughters, whom she home-schooled, was completing high school.

“My girls were through school and it was my turn to do what I wanted to do,” Erion said.

Erion and her husband, Don, an aerospace engineer, met at Hesston College, a two-year institution, in Kansas in the 1970s. She earned an associate’s degree in nursing, married, worked part-time as a nurse and raised a family.

“I really enjoyed teaching math to my girls,” she recalled. “I decided I’d rather teach math than be a nurse. That’s when I started looking for a way to earn a degree in it.”

The first course Erion signed up for online was through the Western Governor’s University, a conglomerate of colleges and universities that make their courses available online. The course she chose, Discrete Math, was from Chadron State. She liked the way it was designed and from then on took only CSC courses.

“It was the right move,” she said. “Everything went well. I worked very hard, but I didn’t have many problems after I got through Differential Equations. It was kind of a tough course.”

Erion noted that she made good use of the digital recordings of the class sessions that take place at CSC. She downloaded both the Smart Board (an electronic version of a blackboard) materials that the professors placed on them and their audio remarks so she could review what was happening in the classes.

Erion said she usually worked on the courses in the mornings and early afternoons. A couple of years ago, she began a private tutoring service in her home, helping high school students with their assignments.

“I’ve got the perfect world now, as far as I’m concerned,” Erion said. “I can study during the day and tutor in the late afternoons and evenings. I can set my own hours, take time off when I want to and still get paid pretty well for tutoring,” she said.

Besides earning 28 credit hours of math from Chadron State, Erion earned 21 hours in psychology online from the college to complete the requirements for a bachelor’s degree. Her only disappointment was that she didn’t earn enough hours from Chadron State to be listed among the honor graduates or receive a medallion during commencement, even though she received an A in every course except one.

Vaughn, 30, is a native of Jacksonville, Fla., who graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from the University of South Florida in 1999. She then worked for three years as a project engineer for International Paper Co. in Pensacola, where she met her husband, Quentin, a Marine helicopter pilot.

Vaughn had been a math tutor while in college and was a “math motivator,” who assisted co-workers who had problems with math her final two years with International Paper.

About the time she decided to seek a master’s degree in math, her husband was sent to Okinawa and she went along. After a year on the island south of Japan, she landed a job as an administrator in the education center at the base where her husband was stationed. Since there were no programs for a master’s degree in math on Okinawa, she went to Peterson’s Guide, a directory of college offerings, searching for a way to obtain her goal through the internet.

As a resident of Florida, her first choice was Florida State University, but it required that she spend a semester on campus. That wouldn’t work. Since Quentin is a native of Texas, she searched for possibilities there. Texas A&M had its entire master’s degree in math online, but she needed to take two undergraduate courses before she could be admitted to the graduate program. Texas A&M did not have those courses online.

Finally, she discovered that Chadron State had what she needed. CSC had the same requirements to be admitted to the graduate program as Texas A&M, but the two courses she needed, History and Foundations of Math and Modern Algebra, were available online.

Vaughn began her coursework in April 2004, about the same time her husband was sent to Iraq for a 7 ½-month tour of duty. She said the timing was perfect. The challenge of refreshing her math skills and studying kept her occupied so she wasn’t too lonely, and Quentin’s absence gave her more time to “hit the books,” or in this case, the computer.

Vaughn took two courses a semester and also took one in the summers, except last summer, when she took two. She was one of about 25 CSC students who are seeking a master’s degree in math. All but two are taking the courses online.

When Quentin was reassigned to Camp Pendleton in southern California in January, Tonia had completed the coursework, but still needed to write the thesis to earn her degree.

That wasn’t easy, she admits. “Quentin ate a lot of cereal because I was too busy to cook,” she said with a grin. “I was on the phone a couple times a week to Dr. Fickel, but we made it work.”

The thesis contains 55 pages, with 86 more pages of references, online lessons and notes.

The capstone activity for any master’s degree is the “orals,” where members of the college’s graduate faculty quiz the applicant about the work. That also was accomplished through telecommunications, or interactive television. She passed, prompting the Vaughns to make flight reservations so Tonia could participate in commencement on Saturday.

The degree has helped Vaughn land a new job at Camp Pendleton. She’s the campus center director for Park University, a Missouri-based institution that specializes in providing courses for military personnel on bases across the country.