Correspondence education

Institutions or individual instructors send printed lessons, readings, and assignments; students complete the work and return it for grading and feedback. Some programs also used phonograph records, later cassette tapes, or scheduled radio/TV supplements, but the core loop was paper in the mail.

Documented practice in the United States begins in the 18th century with individual teachers advertising lessons by post. In the mid-19th century the University of London created an External Programme that allowed students outside the capital to earn degrees through examinations after studying materials sent by mail. U.S. universities, especially land-grant institutions and extension divisions, expanded correspondence offerings in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Private correspondence schools also scaled large enrollments by the early 1900s.

The model served working adults, rural residents, military personnel, and others who could not attend campus. Feedback cycles were measured in weeks rather than days. Interaction among students was minimal or nonexistent. Accreditation and degree recognition varied; some programs were university-sponsored and regionally accredited, others were commercial and less rigorously evaluated.

The internet largely replaced pure correspondence for degree programs. Materials that once traveled by mail now sit in a learning management system; the slow postal loop became discussion boards and email. Some institutions still use print packets or hybrid models, but pure mail-based degree programs are rare in higher education.

Example: a student in the 1920s enrolled in a University of Wisconsin extension course, received a packet of readings and assignments, studied at home, and mailed completed work back for grading. The same institution later offered online versions of many of those courses.

It is the pre-electronic form of distance education. Online degrees keep the separation of learner and campus but replace mail with networked computers and platforms. Radio and television courses are related media-based forms but are not correspondence education unless mail is the primary instructional channel.