I was pleased when learner support became the focus of DESIEN Pleased because support has not received the attention it deserves considering the importance, and pleased personally because of the timing of this discussion. You see, I just completed my MS degree and thesis from UW Madison Continuing and Vocational Education (CAVE) in May. The rather long title of my thesis is "Learner Support Experienced by Registered Nurses in their First Semester of a Collaborative Distance RN-BSN Program: A Phenomenological Study".

As educators we typically visualize learner support as the support provided by the institutions of learning. The formal support structure of our educational institutions hopefully provides orientation, advising, counseling, site support, and library support to mention just some of the formal support elements. Not often discussed are the informal student supports that play a significant role in the lives of the distance learner. Under the category of informal support are supports such as the support of family and friends, peer support, workplace support, support by mentors, and self-support.

I always need to remind myself that support can be both positive and negative and support has an associated intensity. For example I may complain about my supervisor's negative or lukewarm support for my proposal to attend a January conference in Hawaii.

We probably all have come to realize that persistence by the adult learner in an educational program may have more to do with support received by family and friends than the quality of our program. And yes, negative support by the family may in some cases cause the learner to persist to effect the changes the learner seeks. However, positive support by the family is the focus here. Adults have multiple roles in today's society and the role of learner is but one of the many roles. As educators and program planners we can help families to be supportive. How can we be family friendly? We can be friendly by providing information about the educational program that family members can understand. We can develop brochures, videos, websites and host open houses to help family members understand what mom is doing on Wednesday night when she goes to class or why she spends so much time at home in front of the computer.

When an instructor is not on-site, learners often turn to their peers for support. We need to recognize the importance of peer support for the distance learner. We can foster and develop peer support by making class e-mail and telephone lists (with student's permission) available. We can encourage e-mail between learner to learner and learner to instructor and provide class time for collaborative projects to help learners work together. Providing adequate break-times for learners to socialize is one way to facilitate learners getting acquainted. In my study I learned that sites with only one participant can be lonely places. The learners expressed a sense of being disconnected, the need to talk to peers is important.

The learner's workplace can be an important source of emotional, financial, and educational support. We can encourage learners to talk with their coworkers and supervisors about their learning, and if applicable, have learners discuss and write about learning issues as applied to their work situation. Nurses in my study talked about coworkers asking how their classes were going and then volunteering to swap shifts to cover for them when the crunch of exams came.

An interesting paradox, I found employers were providing tuition reimbursements on the one hand while their supervisors were sabotaging the learner with unfriendly work schedules. Of course, the reverse was also true where the supervisors were providing positive support and the work institution's policies were negative, while all along still providing tuition reimbursement. Here again, the brochures, videos, web sites and open houses can be used to help inform those at the learner's workplace to hopefully improve the support.

It seems to me, especially where we provide educational opportunities for adults in business, engineering, health care, education and other professions, we as educators need to collaborate and actively work with the work place institutions for our mutual benefit and ultimately for the support of the learner.

A positive find from my study was the benefit of using mentors from the community. The Health Assessment course given by the UW Collaborative Nursing Program required that learners have a volunteer mentor. The mentor, a health professional watched and reviewed health assessment procedures performed by the learner at their local location. The nurses in my study report their mentor provided more than the eyes and ears for the instructor. The mentor was someone the nurses could talk to and get professional, emotional and moral support. I bet many programs and learners besides nursing could benefit from using volunteer mentors. Have you given any thought to using mentors in your programs?

Lastly, the learners still are the ones responsible for reading, writing papers and taking the exams. Much has been said in the adult learning arena about the self direction of adult learners. I think we know some learners are self directed and some are not; a lot depends on the context of the learning. I may be a terrific self directed learner in computer programming but learning statistics may be another story. The point is, we as educators need to encourage self support in our learners but realize support from us and others is a necessity. Informal supports, often overlooked can play an important role in the life of the learner, I know because sixteen nurses graciously gave their time to tell me about the support they received.