Maia Legge is an Arizona State University graduate who earned her bachelor’s of liberal studies (BLS) degree online. Working full time at an accounting firm and earning a college degree at the same time wasn’t a problem for this student who graduated in May of 2008 with her degree. Legge answered a few questions recently about how the online program worked for her and how students can best succeed while working toward a degree online:

• ASU: How did you find out about ASU’s online program?
• Maia: I went to ASU right out of high school and then stopped for five or six years. I started back at Mesa Community College and decided to transfer to ASU. During orientation, I met with an advisor...I asked her what other programs were out there and she told me about the BLS degree.
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• ASU: When did you start taking online classes at ASU?
• Maia: I started taking online classes in spring of 2007.
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• ASU: What is your major?
• Maia: I’m graduating and my major is a bachelor’s of liberal studies.
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• ASU:What attracted you to the BLS degree?
• Maia: I selected it for the convenience of being online since I work full time. I didn’t have an area that I wanted to focus on in particular so it was nice to take classes of different types.
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• ASU: What do you hope to do after graduation?
• Maia: I’ll probably stay with my company but hopefully move into a different position. I currently support five executives within our public accounting firm. I would like to do something in knowledge management or perhaps operations.
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• ASU: How did online learning work for you?
• Maia: It worked great…It was very convenient. Most of the teachers were very understanding because we worked and went to school at the same time. Basically, it was a big convenience to be able to go to school and be able to work at the same time.
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• ASU: What attracted you to the online BLS program?
• Maia: Convenience and variety.
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• ASU: Did you talk to an ASU advisor before signing up for classes?
• Maia: I talked to an advisor on transfer day at the Tempe campus. They had a day for transfer students and some of the advisors came in.
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• ASU: What recommendations would you give others who are interested in online learning at ASU?
• Maia: In order to succeed, you have to be very disciplined. Make sure that you pick classes that you are interested in because you have to be able to study and learn on your own. I found that the more you are involved with class discussions, the better you do overall in the class. I think that a lot of people who are coming back to school probably don’t know much about the program, so hopefully the word can be spread. The Web site and the advisors are very helpful once you know about the program. I would recommend the BLS program to anyone who is returning to school and is working full time.
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Mike Dellner first heard about Arizona State University’s online program when he was working in downtown Phoenix in 2005. Three years later, he graduated with his Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies degree from ASU.

Dellner was already established in his information technology career when he began taking classes, but he wanted to complete his degree. Taking classes online gave him the perfect opportunity to do exactly that.

“It worked exceptionally well. It was excellent. When I started college in 1989, there was no such thing as online learning,” Dellner says. “It allowed me to go to school on my own time. I don’t think I could have finished without it.”

By conferring with an ASU advisor and the interdisciplinary program, Dellner was able to apply many of his credit hours from other schools to ASU.

“My biggest concern coming to ASU was that I had earned a lot of credits already over the years. I had this giant mixed bag of credits. By working with the advisor and the interdisciplinary program, they were able to apply a lot of those credits. Basically they made it possible for me to earn my degree,” he says.