Online Education that is Cutting-Edge, Going Green and World-Friendly

The World Class Online site currently offers 300+ courses and has an English and Spanish version of the site.

(PORTLAND, Ore.) - Live classes in Gaelic, video credit repair, mortgage EBooks millionaire mentoring, and over 1,000+ courses offered in Spanish and international languages as well as English?...this online educational provider has plans to bring an extensive menu of offerings to people all over the world.

When Dezra Lehr-Guthrie formed World Class Educational Services (a limited liability company registered in Oregon) in 2007, it was her goal to dish up a smorgasboard variety of online offerings, and make them available in every major language world-wide. "The United States has a large and fast-growing, Spanish-speaking population, of which need and want online education. Our country is a melting pot comprised of many strong communities of intelligent people seeking education in their non-English speaking native tongues, while they are also trying to learn English. I wanted to create a site that could serve them all -- and not stop with just the U.S., but to provide access to online education world-wide."

Ms. Lehr-Guthrie, CEO and President of World Class Educational Services, LLC (see: go2worldclass.com), is an advocate of alternative channels of education, having done her own undergraduate degree through an at-a-distance program through Eastern Oregon University and graduate studies through an extended campus option at California State University at Dominguez Hills and the prestigious Saybrook University in San Francisco, CA. "People learn in different ways - the important thing is that they have the opportunity to learn," states Lehr-Guthrie, who has taught students online for the last eight years. "I took a workshop on developing online courses in 1999 at the community college where I was teaching at the time. After that, I developed one of the first online writing courses at the college, which received a strong response. From there, I went on to develop and teach online courses for several colleges and a variety of online educational service providers.

Since the 90's, colleges and universities across the U.S. and other countries, have utilized software delivery platforms, such as Blackboard and WebCT for an increasing number of academic online courses and programs. Adult Education, Small Business and Vocational Education departments offering mostly non-academic education have turned to online educational service providers like ed2go, Coursebridge, JERGroup and Universal Class, of which World Class Educational Services, LLC could be considered one of, to provide their students with online options for learning. Basically, these departments get a wholesale price on these online service providers' courses, and then sell them to their students for a retail price.

Still, even though there are some other online educational providers, World Class is unique. "What makes us different from the others is our market and product scope," says Lehr-Guthrie. "Unlike our competition, we aren't merely selling online courses, but rather, our core product is actually information that we are aiming to provide to both English-speaking and non-English speaking world-wide markets -- and we intend on doing so through many channels. Education is primarily just a format and focused delivery of information - how we educate people IS by informing them."

And statistics show that internet users do want to be informed --over 71% of all internet users have taken an online course, researched information for their own academic or self-educating purposes, or intend to take an online course at some point in the future.

But, what type of courses do online educational service providers like World Class offer?

"It depends on where they are at in life. Most retired students seek life enrichment and hobby courses, whereas those in their 40's seek training for new careers or ambitions, those in their 20's and 30's seek college and job exam prep and courses to establish them in an occupation. Teen age and younger students tend to seek high school completion and home schooling type of courses. And we are hoping to serve traveling and day care families with our development of an online, interactive pre-school program. The possibilities for educating and informing an extensive age range of students is very exciting," says Lehr-Guthrie.

"The go2worldclass.com website currently offers courses from "a to z" -- of which animal care, stained glass making, getting business credit, an entire business management program, dissertation writing, power point presentation, mortgage loan officer and processor, home inspector, tile installation, catering, script-writing, beekeeping, history of ancient Egypt, legal billing and coding, survival English, assertive communication, relationship encounter, auto body and paint technician are all a part of the long list. "Our list leans more towards money-making (career training, professional development, recertification, licensure prep) and quality of life (personal growth and life enrichment). Money-making related courses tend to be most popular world-wide," states Lehr-Guthrie.

"We aim to provide professionally developed and guided, affordable courses that have been stream-lined -- edited with time-consciousness in mind. We know that people who opt for taking a course online are doing so mostly for convenience, comfort and freedom. They want education that works for them -- education they can get anywhere, on their time schedule, and as much or as little as they want. Regarding affordability, the average World Class course costs $49.00.

"Considering the fact that a well-educated, professional puts in approx. 80-100 hours developing each course and also offers time scoring and making themselves available for emails, that's a pretty meager fee for all the time that has gone into delivering the course to the student," says Lehr-Guthrie.

But how credible is online learning? "Our courses are expert-developed and directed. They can be rigorous in their assessments: quizzes, exercises, assignments that rely upon comprehension of the lessons covered. Yet, students can re-read their lessons as many times as they want and can take most exams over until they master the course entirely. The emphasis is on learning, not on criticizing the student for not understanding everything the first time." Certificates of participation and merit are earned on the basis of scoring -- students must earn the equivalent of a C grade in order to pass a course and be eligible for the minimal certificate.

Still, not all online courses will meet a student's objective due to accreditation issues. Online educational providers are not regionally accredited due to the criterion required of them. Yet, accredited learning is expensive and not required by most employers, occupational licensing authorities, or vocational programs. "Our academic courses can support one's accredited educational goals however. For example, they are great for students who want to strengthen or refresh their skills without worrying about having to get a good grade and it affecting their college grade point average. Also, they can take exam prep courses to better their chances of scoring higher on academic placement and entrance exams. We even have courses that prepare students to challenge college courses and to take credit-awarding exams like CLEP. College students can have an edge in their accredited educations by taking our courses," remarks Lehr-Guthrie.

Currently, the World Class online site currently offers 300+ courses and has an English and Spanish version of the site, offers new career and new student workshops, and has chat boards/forums. But, the World Class founder has much bigger plans. "The go2worldclass.com site intends to grow to 1,000 offerings by the end of the year. And right now, our developer is working on features that will allow us to offer live classes, video instruction, EBooks newsletters, and guest speakers, lecturers, facilitated workshops, and mentoring. Also, there are plans in the works to create versions of the World Class site for most countries -- in their cultural flavor and language. We are really wanting to highlight the word "World" with "Class," concludes Lehr-Guthrie.