By Whitney Archibald
HOW many times have you looked into the night sky and wondered where to find something besides the Big Dipper? Have you ever wished for practical tips for your family history research?
BYU‘s Personal Enrichment Courses, offered through Independent Study, give you the chance to take the classes you always wanted to take but couldn’t fit into your student schedule—along with classes you didn’t know you wanted to take.
Personal Enrichment Courses cost $20 each, and, as the title suggests, are for personal benefit and not university credit. They are offered on an open-enrollment basis, which means anyone can take them. The class subjects range from swimming to personal finance to the Book of Mormon. Nearly 40 different family history classes allow students to gain general research skills and learn techniques for doing research in other countries.
The classes are offered in print form, and an Internet-based option is available for about 30 classes. The number of online courses is growing, and even for those not yet offered online, assignments can be submitted through the Internet with the Speedback program, which grades assignments automatically and offers feedback for wrong answers. This feedback, written by the same professors who write the courses, adds a personal touch to the classes.
To reach more people, several Personal Enrichment Courses are being translated from English into other languages, such as Spanish and Portuguese. Noting the program’s role in the university’s goal to encourage lifelong learning, R. Dwight Laws, ’85, director of Independent Study, says, “It is our goal to reach as many people as we can—more people than are fortunate enough to come on campus.”
INFO: For more information call 801-378-2868 or 1-800-914-8931.
