{"id":17978,"date":"2013-04-12T15:10:56","date_gmt":"2013-04-12T19:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/?p=17978"},"modified":"2013-04-12T15:11:07","modified_gmt":"2013-04-12T19:11:07","slug":"legislature-approves-creation-of-an-institute-for-online-degrees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2013\/04\/12\/legislature-approves-creation-of-an-institute-for-online-degrees\/","title":{"rendered":"Legislature Approves Creation Of An Institute For Online Degrees"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_17979\"  class=\"wp-caption module image left\" style=\"max-width: 298px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2013\/04\/12\/legislature-approves-creation-of-an-institute-for-online-degrees\/virtualclass\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-17979\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-17979\" title=\"virtualclass\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/04\/virtualclass.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"298\" height=\"292\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/04\/virtualclass.jpg 298w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/04\/virtualclass-60x60.jpg 60w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 298px) 100vw, 298px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">ConnectionsAcademy\/flickr<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Florida Legislature has approved a bill to create an online institute through one of the state universities. The Board of Governors will choose the university.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The Florida House has<a href=\"http:\/\/www.flsenate.gov\/Session\/Bill\/2013\/1076\"> unanimously passed a bill<\/a> to create an online-only institute at an existing Florida university.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Florida is leading the charge on the digital revolution in higher education,&#8221;\u00a0said House Speaker Will Weatherford. &#8220;We are taking the necessary steps to ensure our students will be ready to compete in the global marketplace.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2013\/03\/25\/florida-house-speaker-uses-his-unique-upbringing-to-craft-education-policy\/\">Weatherford had been pushing for a university that&#8217;s online only<\/a>. This move essentially gives him the next best thing.<\/p>\n<p>The bill requires the state&#8217;s top research university to create an institute for online education. It also sets requirements for daily operations and tuition.<\/p>\n<p>Once the institute is in place, students will be able to enroll and complete a four-year undergraduate program without ever visiting the campus.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The legislation also creates <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2013\/03\/27\/house-committee-approves-bill-creating-three-high-school-diploma-options\/\">flexibility for Florida high school students<\/a> to pursue career education or industry certification courses. It adds diploma distinctions that enable students to choose courses closely aligned with their interests and career goals.<\/p>\n<p>Digital and financial literacy will be emphasized, too.<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Marlene O&#8217;Toole, R-Lady Lake, said the legislation will give students a significant competitive advantage.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt takes the additional step of establishing opportunities to tie our high school students&#8217; career goals directly to their education,\u201d O&#8217;Toole said. \u201cThis will better prepare Florida&#8217;s students for a successful, independent life after graduation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2013\/02\/22\/florida-board-of-governors-will-choose-a-university-to-lead-online-education-efforts\/\">Board of Governors will designate a Florida university<\/a> to establish the institute.<\/p>\n<p>Weatherford&#8217;s staff says the move will make Florida home to the first accredited, public research university to offer a wide array of fully online, four-year baccalaureate programs.<\/p>\n<p>The bill already passed the Senate and will now go to Gov. Rick Scott&#8217;s desk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Florida House has unanimously passed a bill to create an online-only institute at an existing Florida university. &#8220;Florida is leading the charge on the digital revolution in higher education,&#8221;\u00a0said House Speaker Will Weatherford. &#8220;We are taking the necessary steps to ensure our students will be ready to compete in the global marketplace.&#8221; Weatherford had [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[785,1089,798,403],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17978"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17978"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17991,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17978\/revisions\/17991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}