I teach four online courses at Elgin Community College via the Internet for which you can earn fully transferable college credit.
This 2 credit course concentrates on the nuts and bolts of HTML, XHTML, CSS, WML (Wireless Markup Language), and an introduction to XML. After an introduction to HTML, we concentrate on writing valid XHTML code that will best fit future technologies and on separating the content (XHTML) from the formatting (CSS, Cascading Style Sheets). Cost: $161 / $191.
This 3 credit course covers database design, mostly using relational databases, and with a very heavy emphasis on SQL (Structured Query Language). As an "Internet bonus", we learn to use PHP to create web pages for our database front end. We use a database server running MySQL. Cost $241.50 / $286.50
This 2 credit course dissects digital multimedia technologies, looking at various media formats and methods to capture, edit, and deploy media, with an emphasis on Internet delivery. The course is roughly divided into four units: images, animated images and panoramas, audio, and video. Cost: $161 / $191.
This 4 credit course concentrates on using Javascript and PHP to create interactive websites. Javascript is used for client-side programming (in the browser) and PHP for server-side programming and saving and retrieving data. Then we make them work together for the best of both worlds. Cost $322 / $382.
These courses are available to you anywhere in the world (or beyond, I suppose, if you have an Internet connection...), as long as you pay the tuition. The first amount listed after each course above is the in-district cost (if you reside or work in the ECC district) and the second amount is for all others.
In addition, if this is the first time you enroll at ECC, there is a one-time fee of $20 for admission to the college (for ALL students).
Our semesters at ECC start in August and January. A very critical aspect of these courses is creating an "online classroom" so that you are not just interacting one-on-one with me, but instead you are part of a small classroom group (at most 20 students) who interact with each other also. I've found that students learn more from each other's questions and support than from me alone. "Hearing" other students questions, problems, situations, and solutions gives a much broader perspective on what you're learning than if you were listening to just me, and it's been extremely valuable to past students.
So it has been important to start "classes" together, which is why we limit the starts to our regular Fall and Spring semesters. If there is enough demand, we may be able to start full sections at other times, so if it's not August or January, drop me an e-mail anyway and we'll see if we can put together enough to start extra classes.
Among the links below is the ECC link for online registration. If you are a new student at ECC, it is a two-step process (applying for admission, then enrolling for the course after you are "accepted"). You may use the online registration, but if you have any questions or would prefer for me to walk the forms through the registration office in person at ECC just send me an e-mail and we'll get it worked out. I'll do whatever I can to make the registration process as easy as possible for you.
- Mark Pelczarski
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mpelczarski@elgin.edu
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