Avoid These Tech Mistakes as an Online Student

Michelle Hook Dewey jokes that when she started her online master's degree with the University of Illinois in 2011, all of her homework was organized in paper folders.

These days, Dewey, who is now the reference librarian and assistant professor of library service for the school's College of Law, does everything electronically.

"Technology can be your best friend," says Dewey, who completed her degree in library and information science in 2012. Still, she admits technology can be a big hurdle to overcome, especially for online learners who tend to be older and less familiar with newer tools.

"A lot of things seem foreign, but if you can pause and step back it can be less intimating," Dewey says. "And you can find new ways to approach technology."

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Below are 10 technology mistakes many online students make when starting school.

1. Not backing up your data: "If I had a nickel for every time a student came to me crying to me, I wouldn't have to teach," says Margaret Reneau, an instructor in St. Xavier University's online graduate nursing program. Reneau recommends using the online file storage service Dropbox, which offers free accounts of at least two gigabytes. "Use it to back-up information and then your homework is accessible at work, at home or your mother-in-law's," she said. Other options include regular back-ups to an external hard drive or uploading homework to cloud-based Google Docs.

2. Not knowing what type of software your school recommends: All courses have different technology requirements, so it's important for students to investigate specific requirements of their program, says Robert Schudy, director of Boston University's online master's of science in computer information systems program. If you use a Mac, make sure it's new enough that you can run Microsoft Office and other Windows-based programs you might need for PC-based courses.

3. Not using a Skype account: While there are plenty of other online tools, " students should always have a Skype account," Reneau says. "It's a great way to meet with their professors face-to-face. Once they get out in the real world, a lot of interviews are done via Skype." Just make sure to pick a professional name, not something like "honeybunny102."

4. Not asking what browser is recommended for your program and courses: Check if your browser is compatible with the learning management system that your program uses and with the technical features in your courses.

Schudy says his program recommends Firefox. "It's the only one which supports all of the features of our courses," he says.

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5. Not investing in the latest technology: "Don't try to go to school with a computer that is more than four years old," Reneau says. That's because technology has advanced so much, she says, that certain drivers and programs won't load or run correctly.

Make sure a Windows computer has Windows 7 operating system or higher. "A modern PC should have at least four gigabytes of RAM to run a mixture of applications," says Schudy with Boston University.

6. Not checking your email: Don't just rely on school email, make sure you have a personal account, too, says Dewey, the former online master's student. Check your school email regularly for important announcements or forward your school emails to your personal account if that's the account you rely on.

7. Not testing your Internet connection: Dewey says students shouldn't assume they have a good Internet connection. "Especially if you are taking it in synchronous mode, where everything is in real time, you really need your Internet connection to be great," she says.

That means if all you've done before is check email and Facebook, there may be issues with sound cutting out or a lecture freezing. One way to test is to stream a video from the Internet to test your bandwidth.

8. Not using apps: If your school offers an app, download it. "It helps you to be more efficient, so if you are waiting around in line in the grocery store you can be looking at discussions or homework," Reneau says. Other apps such as Evernote can help with managing class work deadlines and projects.

9. Not downloading a free reference manager: Free academic software programs like Zotero and Mendeley help students save, manage and cite research resources. This can save students a lot of time by making it easier to collect, organize and share research, Dewey says.

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10. Not using technology to manage your class work: To keep on top of news relevant to her discussion boards, Dewey started using Feedly, an RSS reader for all of her favorite news sites. Another option is setting up a Google Alert, which will send emails about phrases and people based on the words used in an alert search.

If you can't figure out how to use a new technology, don't forget to use a little common sense. "Just Google it," Reneau says. "Or go to YouTube and find a video. Let the technology work for you."

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