The University of Phoenix Online is unique in being the first university to offer older, already employed people an opportunity to earn a college degree without having to give up one’s job. Established in 1976 it is the oldest and largest university or college in the United Sates that offers online degrees in a large variety of subjects.

It is one of the first to recognize the importance of electronic communications and how the advances made in communications technology could be used to offer an unique opportunity to working adults to get an university degree without having to give up their jobs.

It pioneered the technological model that many other universities and colleges have subsequently adopted to offer online programs to working adults. Even today a highly innovative and iconoclastic approach to education makes University of Phoenix stand out as a unique organization.

It is also unique in being the first higher learning institution to challenge the notion of seat time and the concept of tenure and to introduce online teaching material and text books.

Today many of the innovations first launched by the University of Phoenix have been adopted even by the traditional institutions of higher learning, the very same people who had initially looked down upon the efforts of the university. For example, take the concept of seat time – that is, the amount of time that students must spend face to face with their instructors. When UoP fist launched their model many said that the model was inappropriate for higher learning and that it would erode educational standards. Today not only have very many for profit proprietary organizations accepted this model but increasingly even public and state run universities – the very bastion of higher learning – are moving towards online degrees and online education giving the concept of seat time a go by. A clear victory for UoP!

Similarly, consider the concept of tenure. The standard measure of the quality of education provided by any university is the number of tenured professors and teachers it has on its rolls for any particular department. UoP was one of the first educational institutions which had emphasized the importance of practical real-life experience and on instructors and teachers who, even if not tenured, had oodles of experience in the particular field which he or she was teaching. The idea was to make education more relevant to industry and job needs. Today, even the very best traditional schools of higher learning are recognizing the importance of curricula and teachers that can arm students with knowledge that would be more relevant to the workplace rather than knowledge that is relevant only within the four walls of the university classroom. UoP is unique in being the first educational institution to challenge the concept of “ivory tower” learning..

The University of Phoenix is a pioneer in the field of online and distance education so that almost all that we see today in various models of online and distance education can be traced back in one or another to the University of Phoenix. When it comes to online education, UoP is certainly a pioneering and innovative institution and there are many things that make it a unique school offering online degrees in criminal justice and many other subjects.