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Sloan Consortium Recognizes Western Governors University with Award for Excellence in Online Education

SALT LAKE CITY, Sept. 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Western Governors University, www.wgu.edu, the nation's only non-profit, fully online university, has received the 2010 Ralph E. Gomory Award for Quality Online Education from the Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C). Sloan-C, an association of institutions and organizations of higher education engaged in online learning, annually presents this award to an institution that has demonstrated its commitment to assessing and improving the quality of its online education programs.

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Since 2002, Sloan-C has presented annual awards to recognize outstanding effective practices in each of five pillar areas: access, learning effectiveness, cost effectiveness, student satisfaction, and faculty satisfaction. WGU was selected for the award for the university's innovative approach to using quantitative metrics to assess quality as well as demonstrating continuous quality improvement based on these metrics.

"Our watchwords of quality, scale, and breadth are epitomized by the institutions we honor this year," said Bruce Chaloux, President of Sloan-C. "The 2010 recipients have demonstrated exceptional leadership and real success in advancing online education," added Awards Committee Chair Burks Oakley II.

Since its founding in 1997 by a bi-partisan group of U.S. governors, WGU has grown to become a national university with more than 20,000 students in all 50 states. The only online university in the U.S. offering competency-based degree programs, Western Governors University is designed to make a quality college education accessible and affordable for working adults. Fully accredited, the university offers 50 degree programs in high demand career fields such as Teacher Education, Business, Information Technology, and Healthcare Professions, including Nursing. For more information, call 1.866.225.5948 or visit the WGU website, www.wgu.edu.

About Western Governors University (WGU)

"[WGU is] the best relatively cheap university you've never heard of."- TIME magazine

Featured on the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, WGU is the only university in the U.S. offering competency-based degree programs and the only non-profit, fully online university in the country. WGU offers degree programs in Teacher Education, Business, Information Technology, and Healthcare Professions, including Nursing. Since its inception in 1997, WGU has grown into a national institution, serving more than 20,000 students in all 50 states. WGU is self-sustaining on tuition, and does not rely on state or national support to fund its operations.

WGU is regionally accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities and nationally accredited by the Distance Education and Training Council (DETC). WGU nursing programs have been accredited by the Commission for Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE). WGU's Teachers College is the first and only exclusively online provider of teacher education to receive accreditation from the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE).

The university has earned the support of more than 20 leading corporations and foundations. They include institutions such as AT&T, Dell, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Lumina Foundation, Hewlett-Packard, HCA, Microsoft, Oracle, Qwest, SunGard Higher Education, the Eli Lilly Foundation, American Express, and Zions Bank. More information is available at www.wgu.edu.

About the Sloan Consortium

The Sloan Consortium is an institutional and professional leadership organization dedicated to integrating online education into the mainstream of higher education, helping institutions and individual educators improve the quality, scale, and breadth of education. www.sloanconsortium.org.

    Contact for enrollment information:
    866-225-5948
    www.wgu.edu

    Contact for media inquiries:
    Joan Mitchell - Director of PR
    801-428-5463
    jmitchell@wgu.edu

SOURCE Western Governors University