Online Astronomy Degrees

[loopy]

G'Day All,

I've noticed in a few of the recent S&S and AusS&T mags that there are a few ads going around for different postgraduate degrees in Astronomy. What are peoples opinion on these? I'd love to enrol in one, but it's hard to tell what's a mickey mouse degree and what's the real thing.
So far the two I have been looking at are offered by Swinburne Uni and JCU. I spoke to a lady named Merran Hunt, who ran the Swinburne one, and she was very helpfull - every time I wrote, she sent back a detailed reply relatively quickly. I asked if there was anything I could do between now and enrolling (which I plan to do mid next year if possible). She recommended becomming known on their private forum, which I've tried to do, but with limited success (the spam post about the Russian Lady got more hits than my question... ).
Now I've found that JCU offers a similar thing, but they also have to option to do not just a masters, but a PhD, if you're good enough. I'm just about to send off an email to them, and ask for more details, but JCU would suit me better if I ever have to visit them, because they have a campus in Cairns, about an hour and a half from my folks home.
Anyways, enough rambling from me, what are peoples thoughts on this? Maybe someone who has some actual post-graduate qualifications in Astronomy can comment?

Cheers,


Brad

[silvinator]

howdy brad. I too have been thinking about getting an online degree in astronomy as well and those two institutions you mentioned were the ones I most interested in. I think they are very legitimate courses, especially swinburne seeing as it has it's own campus right here in melbourne (not sure where JCU is based, is that also in australia?) But from various people I've spoken to, these kinds of degrees will help you get a foot in the door to tertiary education but will not help you get a research career in the field of astronomy itself. At least, that is true for the Swinburne degrees. Again, I can't be too sure about the JCU degrees but it would probably be a similar outcome. To get into professional astronomy research, you would definitely need a PhD. The problem also with these courses is that you have to pay outright, there is no hecs scheme that covers them so for me, enrolling is out of the question for now. If you are going to enrol Brad, do it as soon as possible to avoid not getting a place.

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Hi loopy and silvinator,

Maybe we need to contact Dave from Aust Sky and Space. He mentioned in another post that he teaches astronomy at college. http://www.iceinspace.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=245
I ask him about it in the post but didn't get a reply. Maybe a more direct approach (like ringing him at AS&S) might be the go. Or maybe he may know which of the two you've ben looking at is the way to go.

If you read this Dave "Sorry for putting you in"

Clear skies
Paul

[loopy]

Hey Silvie,

JCU is James Cook Uni - they have campuses in Townsville and Cairns, so for me, that's close to family. They offer both Masters as well as PhD levels, available online, which again is another plus for me. I'm still waiting to hear from them, but I think they've pretty much shut down for the year.
For me, it wasn't really a case of getting a foot in the door for work as a professional astronomer, but more so that I could undergo a structured course, with someone to assess how much I actually knew, and how much i was talking out my.... er "hot air bag" I've also got dreams of NASA, so hopefully a degree like that would help me down the track
As for the cost, I'm not sure who told you that? The course doesn't fall under HECS, but it does fall under some other government scheme that is almost identical. In the end, yes, you do have to pay for it yourself, but then again, you have to pay for your own bachelor degree as well. I liked the payment/coursework idea for the Swinburne course, in that you could spread it out over as much as 6 years or as little as 1.5 (the JCU course is a fixed 3 years), but in the end, they cost about the same.

Cheers,


Brad

[silvinator]

Thanks for the info Paul. Doesn't he live near the central coast? That's a bit far for me at the moment but I will get in contact with David anyway just to find out more about what he teaches.
Brad, for your goals, these courses sound like a great thing for you so I think you should enrol. But yeah, all the institutions would be pretty much in holiday mode right now!
lol, I tend to be a bit of a windbag when it comes to astrofacts too. Sometimes I get asked questions by workmates that I simply do not know the answer to, so it would be nice to do a course that would improve one's knowledge of the heavens. For example, at my work's christmas party trivia, one question was, "What is the densest planet in the solar system" and at first I wrote Earth. Then for some reason, I remembered a silly joke that asked the same question and I somehow thought Pluto was the answer to that joke and so crossed out my initial answer and wrote that. Should have trusted my gut astronomer's instinct eh!? Needless to say, I didn't win
Ah yes, working for NASA would be a dream, even if I was just the coffee girl. But I have an even better idea - Australia should setup it's own version of NASA and then all the skilled astronomers wouldn't have to go overseas. But good old JH would never go for that...
Anyway, about the costs, I read it on the Swinburne website. I think the other payment scheme wouldn't apply to me from what i remember. I know we have to pay for university studies as well but I didn't pay it outright, I went through HECS so it makes it a bit easier to pay off. It's the upfront fees that those online courses incur that I would have trouble with paying. I wasn't aware that you could spread out the payments so I'm glad you told me. I might have to go back and look at these courses again, especially the JCU now that I know it's an Aussie thing.

[loopy]

Good stuff - let me know how you go

I agree with Australia setting up their own space agaency, but I wouldn't hold your breath... we just don't have the population to support anything like that. Incidently, I have a mate that works as a senior engineer for the ESA and he seems to think that Australia is a part of that? On their website, it doesn't mention it, but I know over near Perth the ESA has tracking stations at Gnangara and New Norcia...

Cheers,


Brad

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Isn't it strange that we don't have our own space agency, considering we were the third nation to put a satellite into orbit.