Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Is there any value to online education? Is education just better in person, or has online education made such improvements that it's just as good as in person education? Historically, a lot of people have had critiques about online education, whether it's just a subpar education overall or especially in Bible education, the lack of discipleship or mentorship that happens. Well, today we have on Doctor JJ Routley here from Emmaus on the podcast once again to discuss the benefits of online education. JJ has a lot of experience, both as an online education student as well as a professor for the Emmaus Global campus. Remember, the concerning him podcast is brought to you by Emmaus Bible College. Here at Emmaus, it's our desire to impact the world for Christ in everything we do, whether that's educating and equipping learners in the classroom or through ministries like concerning him. If you're interested in listening to more podcasts like this one, browsing through hundreds of articles, or listening to hundreds of Bible centered sermons, please visit concerninghim.com.
welcome, JJ.
Glad to have you back on the podcast.
[00:01:10] Speaker B: Thank you. I'm excited to be back on with you.
[00:01:14] Speaker A: How are you doing?
[00:01:16] Speaker B: Yeah, things are going well. We're getting down to the end of the semester here, trying to get rid of the seniors, and we just had senior chapel today, so a very fun time of celebrating their accomplishments, very excited for their next steps for the future.
[00:01:32] Speaker A: And we're recording this in the last day of classes, is that correct?
[00:01:34] Speaker B: That's right. Yeah. There's a lot of both excitement, but also nervous anticipation for finals next week.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: Do you have difficult finals for your students?
[00:01:45] Speaker B: A lot of mine are projects and they're coming to an end, so I just have one that I'm giving next week.
[00:01:51] Speaker A: Okay, very nice. Well, today you're here because you sent me a text a couple weeks ago and you said, I want to talk about online education. Yeah, that's a fascinating conversation. There's a lot of strong opinions about online education and benefits or disadvantages to it.
So maybe just start with your experience with online education, both as a student and as a professor.
[00:02:20] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. So this is a topic that I have a lot of passion about because all of my graduate education was done through distance learning and online education in various formats. So I graduated with my bachelor's degree from Wheaton College back in 2003 and came back to Dubuque to pay off school bills and got started working at our local chapel here with the youth group and began doing some itinerant preaching.
And through doing that, I came to the conclusion through questions that were asked after the messages that I gave, responses that people had, that I did not have enough biblical knowledge to really adequately present the text and answer questions that were given to me. And so I felt a pull to go back and do additional education.
But for me, it was kind of a two sided thing because I did not want to leave the ministry that I felt the Lord had so clearly directed me to at our baroques Bible chapel here in Dubuque with the youth group. So I was looking for something. And back then, there was not a lot in the way of distance or online education.
I did not want to leave and relocate and start over somewhere and talk to a lot of different mentors at that time, expressed my feelings to a lot of people, and it was really very divided. Some people would pretty strongly say, the Lord will honor it if you transplant, make the move somewhere else. And I fully believe that he would have done that. But I felt very tied to the young people that I was working with. And so for that reason, I started looking for opportunities to do education from a distance. There was a school, it's actually one of our competitors, Faith Baptist Theological Seminary. So it was the seminary out in Des Moines that had a one year MA program that they offered through distance. So I would take a class, do a lot of the reading and the work, and then go out and spend one intensive week on campus. I did about 30, 36 credits that way over four years. That was my first experience with distance education, and I loved it. There was still a lot of in person instruction in that, though. So I was doing a lot of reading and assignments on my own, but then also sitting under direct teaching in the classroom.
So that was how I got my first master's degree in theological studies. From there, I wanted to work my way up to a master of theology degree. So I did not go the traditional approach by any means.
A master of divinity is typically the three year program that's at the graduate level. It's a great program. It's usually fairly heavy in ministry and internships. And by that point, in my own experience, I had had quite a bit of ministry opportunities, and I felt like what I would rather spend my time and money on was the knowledge and just taking all the Bible and language classes, theology classes that I could. So I sort of bypassed the master of divinity degree and went toward a master of theology.
I had to take a number of classes to kind of build up enough credits to get into a program like that. So I did those credits through online learning, through Columbia International University, that was my second experience with online learning. It was still fairly early. So this was a little over a decade ago, fairly early in online education. And so a lot of what it was were doing independent work on your own and then responding to forum posts, interacting with students online that way.
I actually took a greek course that way through Columbia International University.
At the same time I took Doctor Stevenson's course here at Emmaus in Greek on campus, which I highly recommend too, for everyone.
But I don't know at the time that the way that the language course was set up, if I would have gotten as much out of it, just taking it through the online course. Languages in particular have some special challenges when taken from a distance or taken online. I don't think that means it's impossible, but let's be real, they do have certain and special challenges with them. So I did that. I was able to get into then a master of theology program through Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon. That was sort of combined. They had some online courses, they had some hybrid courses where I would again go out and sit under the teaching of instructors out there.
But then after completing that degree, my PhD was all through Columbia International University again, and it was entirely online and distance.
So I never, I have never been to South Carolina, I have never been to CIU, but I graduated from CIU, and I am so thankful for that program. It was an excellent program. It was all done remotely, but very personal interaction with the professors there, the instructors there, and with other students. I still have students. I graduated two years ago from that program, and I still have students that I regularly interact with. So I think what that has taught me about online education is, first of all, we need to get rid of the stigma of this is inferior to residential. It does not have to be. I think that stigma is going out the window. I think fewer and fewer people are just sort of flat out presenting that. But maybe in the minds of a lot of people who are still up and coming from junior high, high school, maybe not as familiar with modern approaches, online education, there may still be some of that mentality.
A lot of people, as I travel, are surprised to find out. We now offer at Emmaus Bible College, our entire bachelor of science in biblical studies, the English Bible tract, you can do it entirely online. You don't ever have to come to campus. So if you are in ministry somewhere and you love what you're doing, but you never completed your bachelor's degree, this is a wonderful option, I think, for people to be able to come back and finish up courses and work toward that bachelor's degree.
[00:09:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And you teach for that. That's the Emmaus global campus. You teach for that. What has your experience been like on the other side of things as a professor?
[00:09:55] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question to think through as well.
So I think there are different approaches, different ways that you can think about teaching. And I want to give you a little bit of an analogy here. Okay. So let's think about basketball for, right, basketball players, the best players, I would say, hope, maybe you would say too, are well rounded and can do more than just one thing. Right. If you've got a basketball player that's a really good mid, mid range shooter, that's fantastic. Right. But if they're weak on defense, if they can't really do much from beyond the ark, that limits what they're good at. As an instructor, I need to be careful what I say here, but some instructors are very strong in certain areas. So the lecture. Right. Some instructors can make an excellent lecture, make it engaging, and usually in residential format. In person, they're good with interaction. In person.
Some instructors are maybe more, a little bit better, not in lecture setting, but more of a small group setting with interactions with students, conversationally with online education, because a lot of our content comes from independent reading or pre recorded videos, and that's not all the time, but because those are primary ways of content distribution, I'm less of a lecturer in the online classroom and more of a facilitator. Okay, so I look at my Steve Nash. Yes, we're still using the basketball imagery.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: Right.
[00:11:56] Speaker B: I look at my role in the online classroom slightly differently than I look at it in the residential classroom. I'm not there to primarily distribute content knowledge, awareness, those types of things, but to assist, pardon me, to assist more in the learning of the student. So within instruction and pedagogy, there are a couple different ways to kind of describe this, but one of the key phrases in online education has been you're less of a sage on the stage and more of a guide on the side.
And I think that's good to recognize and realize. So a lot of what I do in the online classroom is an attempt to guide students, to assist them, help them along in the journey. I kind of view myself more in terms of like a co learner, reading through the content, viewing the content along with them, and then participating in online forum postings.
Another way that I attempt to really engage with students in the online classroom is through feedback and assessments.
So because the online courses are typically much shorter, they're usually eight weeks at least here at Emmaus, rather than the full semester. You get a lot in a short amount of time. And because of that, teachers have really got to do a good job of being timely in their responses and in their feedback.
If I take several weeks to grade through something that's been submitted, that's going to be entirely unhelpful to the students. They really need feedback that's within 24 hours, 48 hours, relatively very quickly. That puts a time crunch on me as the instructor, where it might be a little different than what is in the residential classroom. And that's why I'm kind of using this basketball analogy, right, because some instructors really love the lecture but are not as strong, let's be honest, in the timely response and feedback sort of aspect of it. So for me, that's a very long way of saying I think online instruction has changed, challenged me to be more rounded in some areas, I suppose, and also to change the way that I view myself as an instructor. I try to see myself neither as really the sage on the stage or even a guide on the side, but something more as like a servant at the feet of those who are learning. And I think it's really helpful for me to think through how can I assist these students? How can I serve them best?
Timely responses, I think responses that are substantial and helpful. Now we have a lot of rubrics and things built in like that, but even going above and beyond that to provide clear instruction and direction for the students, how can I improve? What am I doing wrong here? How can I be better? All of that sort of thing.
[00:15:18] Speaker A: I feel like a lot of the times when you talk to somebody who's done some sort of online education and not enjoyed it, they've said, I just spent the whole time forum posting, responding to other people's posts, you know, getting one critique and one thing they did well or whatever, you know what I mean? All that type of stuff, and it drives them crazy.
Is there benefit to that type of stuff? Why do a lot of online programs do it that way?
[00:15:45] Speaker B: Yeah, the reason is many online programs attempt to be asynchronous, meaning they want learners to be able to sit down and access course content and get involved at any time of the day. So this is a big difference between online education and residential education. Residential, I go and sit in a classroom or stand and instruct from, you know, 01:00 to 145 or something like that. There's a set time with online learning, at least in the current format that we use. There's no set time that you have to be in the classroom, so to speak, so I can access it any time that works for me. And this is really geared then toward adult learners who may have full time jobs, part time jobs, but they have some time, maybe in the evenings or weekends, that they can devote to reading and participation forum postings. Then I think I've seen ways that they can be done very well and ways that they can be done not so well. Forum postings and engagements, when they're done really well, generate a lot of good discussion between students. And depending on personality type, I would say can actually be even more effective than in person, face to face conversation. So let me take myself as an example.
I am sort of, I don't know if this is good to admit on camera or not, but sometimes I'm kind of slow on the draw. So I would be less comfortable in like a debate with someone. If someone was going to ask me a question and put me on the spot, I'm a little more contemplated theological.
I like to think about something before I respond to it. Well, you can see an online forum gives me a great opportunity to do that. I can read through the course material, read what the question is, take some time to think about it for myself. Whereas if I'm in a classroom setting and the instructor asks a question to the entire classroom, I've got to think quickly and respond on the spot. Now, there's value to that too, but for a number of individuals, I mean, personality types, learning types, it could be very valuable for them to have a little more time to be able to think through a well formulated response and then present it, and then be able to read what other people are saying about it and respond where it's not done well is frequently when you will have discussion posts or forum posts that are not really thought through very clearly, so that the responses that are prompted are sort of these simple or superficial responses. And that's really where it's up to, like the course designer and instructors for the courses to generate questions that are really going to cause people to respond substantively rather than just superficially.
So that's one way, I think, that forums can be done well and sort of the reason behind why we do it in that format.
And I think there is, there can be great value to that type of thing.
Another aspect of online learning that I think is not thought about as frequently is this. So when we are in a semester at Emmaus here on campus, typically students are taking four courses, five courses, maybe even six courses at a time. That's a lot of subject matter to be reading and processing all at once. Now, you may have, you know, the way we have it set up, we have Monday, Wednesday, Friday classes, Tuesday, Thursday classes. So there's a little bit of a natural break between, between the different courses, but that's still a lot of topics that you're studying all at the same time and reading about all at the same time. I have found for myself, I think one of the reasons that I felt like I thrived in my online graduate studies was to be able to focus in on just one or two topics at a time and read exclusively for those things and just think more exclusively on those things.
For me, it was very helpful to isolate some of those topics and not go off into more broad areas, more broad categories.
[00:20:37] Speaker A: So then what about discipleship, right? Especially if I'm thinking about online education in biblical studies or in master's level, master's divinity, master of theology, all of those types of things. A lot of benefits of going to a Bible college and being on campus, going to a seminary and being on campus is the relationships that you build with your professors. Not only are they giving you reading and grading your tests and giving you papers and lecturing you, but you have the option to stop by their office and chat and get guided help in life and figure, you know, work through things together. And maybe even it's a after class, you're both leaving the classroom at the same time and you're walking down the hallway. All those types of things you lose out on. I think that there's been a pushback within kind of christian higher education among some people to say, don't do online education because you lose a discipleship aspect of it. And what are your thoughts there?
[00:21:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I think one of the lessons that we learned from COVID was just that. Right? So a lot of churches when we were spring and into summer of 2020 were sort of forced to go remote for some amount of time. And the question becomes, can you continue to disciple individuals from a distance? Let me take you back up for just a moment and say, I think we have biblical precedent for how this was done in the New Testament, in the life of Paul, of all people. Right? I mean, he started so many different congregations, local churches all across the Mediterranean, had a wonderful heart for all of those people, was very personal with all of those, but just did not have the capacity to be in all of those locations at all the time. So what did he do? He wrote letters. I mean, that's a very simple type of distance education. And even discipleship format. When he's stuck in prison in Rome, he doesn't throw his hands up and say, well, discipleship's out the window now. Can't do anything with it. No, he uses the abilities that he has, the formats that he has to be able to communicate as possible as he's able. I would be the first one to say I think discipleship in a lot of ways is best in person.
A lot has been talked about in recent years about incarnational ministry. And the whole concept is, as Jesus came and became a man, the eternal son of God took on flesh and actually walked with those twelve disciples for about three and a half years, lived with them. It's a wonderful format for being able to see not just what someone teaches and what someone says, but how they actually live. That's fantastic. But there are other times, like in the life of Paul, where for one reason or another, that's not possible. And so that's what I'm saying. I think with online education, it's not, it's not even that we should view it as well since it's not possible. This is the second best sort of option. But the Lord may have an individual in a certain career or vocation already in a certain ministry and using them very effective for his glory within that ministry.
This sort of online distance education format then can build on that and use that and really enable students right where they're at to learn and continue to utilize the relationships that are already in place within their local church, within their community.
So we have our SLT program on campus. It's servant leader training. It's what used to be our christian service program. Every semester, students do about 30 hours of service in the local church or community or any combination of those things. We require that for our global campus also. So students do that at a distance in their own communities and in their own local churches. So we're not saying, you know, hunker down in your cellar by yourself with your bible and your computer and don't ever talk to anybody. We're saying, we understand that sometimes your life circumstance might be such that you are not feasibly able to relocate or for one reason or another, you don't feel that the Lord is calling you to relocate. How can we help and support you in the ways that will empower you and advance and even build upon what you're already doing? The other thing that I would say about discipleship is a lot of it then falls on the instructors and on the global campus program staff to really think about how can we do this? Well, and I'm not going to say we've got it all figured out at this point. There's been a lot of development in the past ten years. We've seen a lot of change. I believe our global campus started somewhere around 2015 or 16, somewhere in there.
A lot of the very early courses and some of the ways that they were designed were very independent minded. We are reworking some of those, rebuilding some of those to include more interactive concepts. Technology has changed in the past ten years, right? Ten years ago, nobody even knew what Zoom was. I mean, a few people, perhaps, but 2020 came and all of a sudden, wow, we can do video conferencing and it doesn't glitch and it's not weird. Yeah, we can do that now. So there are more maybe formats and more reliable methods of doing some of that content through online education.
And we're still learning and we're still developing, and I think it's only going to improve and continue to get better. Again, I'm not saying that it's for everyone, and I'm certainly not saying if you're considering coming to Emmaus residentially, that you should forget about it and just go online.
What I'm saying is for those who are not able to come through life circumstances, through calling, career, vocation, ministry, whatever it might be, but you have a desire to know the word of God and grow in your faith and in your spiritual life, this is a great avenue for doing this, and it's really not. Don't think of it as subpar. I really want to get that out there. We need to get rid of the stigma that online education, global campuses are sort of second best.
They do this because they can't do the other one. We want to. We really have a heart and strive to deliver the same kind of quality education that you would get here on campus, in our global campus, to all students, across any modalities that we offer. And even beyond that, something that we talk about frequently is the Emmaus experience.
Right. The personal types of connections that professors will make with, and not only faculty, but staff as well, will make with students. We want to strive to see that on our global campus as well.
Next week, we have our graduation ceremony, and we have our first online bachelor of science in biblical studies graduate next week. And what's been wonderful is this graduate has not only been involved with the global campus since its inception, but she has also sought to employ what she's learned in her local church and also been able to, at times even visit campus and participate in some of the activities. So it's just been wonderful to see how the Lord has done this in her life, and her situation was she was simply not able to leave her home and come here on campus.
[00:29:33] Speaker A: Well, thank you. I think this has been really good and it's been really helpful, especially for me, to hear your thoughts on the forums and how those can work well and kind of the purpose to them.
I appreciate it, and I agree. Currently I'm working on a master's degree 100% online. My school's actually in Northern Ireland. I've never been on campus.
Maybe one day I'll get there, but we'll see.
I've had a great experience and it's through great guidance from my professor who works with me very well, and I appreciate that. So, yes, it can be done. It can be done well, and that's, I think, what we're striving to do here.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: Absolutely, absolutely.
[00:30:15] Speaker A: Well, thank you for coming on, JJ. I appreciate it.
[00:30:17] Speaker B: Thanks a lot, Eric.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: Thank you for listening to concerning him an EMEA's podcast. Ministries like concerning him are possible because of the generous contributions from our partners around the world. For more information about partnering with us, please visit emmaus.edu partner.
