NSU, CSC to cooperatively offer two bachelor's degrees

With the start of the Fall 2010 term, students at Connors State College can take all required courses within the Health Care Administration and Criminal Justice majors from Northeastern State University in CSC's facilities at NSU-Muskogee.

The two institutions have issued a memorandum of understanding allowing NSU to deliver the courses at CSC through multiple mediums. HCA and CJ classes will be offered as eight-week accelerated courses.

The agreement was officially signed Sept. 8 during a ceremony in the commons area of the NSU Administration Building in Muskogee.

The format is an accelerated eight-week program with six more credit hours being offered each summer term. The classes are a combination of blended and online courses. The holder of an associate's degree can earn 12 hours per semester and six more each summer and finish the program in two years.

NSU provides all funding for the courses and sends a recruiter-adviser for the program to CSC at least once a week. Those enrolled in the classes are counted as students at NSU, which provides financial aid services and collects tuition and fees.

NSU also has degree completion agreements with Northeastern Oklahoma A&M, Eastern Oklahoma State, Tulsa Community College and Kiamichi Technology Center. The programs are offered through NSU's Off Campus Degree Programs initiative. Such arrangements operate successfully in other states, but Northeastern's understandings with NEO, EOSC, CSC, TCC and KTC are the first of their kind in Oklahoma.