#3 Questions to Ask Before Choosing an Online MBA Program

Prospective students should ask questions about flexibility and opportunities for engagement.

Be it a salary boost, larger network or expanded skill set, school officials are quick to rattle off the benefits of MBA programs.

And MBA graduates share the enthusiasm. Nearly 90 percent of business school graduates in the class of 2014 thought their graduate management education was a great value, according to a report by the Graduate Management Admission Council.

Prospective students who want the benefits of an MBA, but who don't have the flexibility to earn a business degree on campus. can now enroll in a growing number of online MBA programs. But with so many options available, it can be hard to home in on the right one.

Fortunately, experts say students can easily separate the quality programs from the less-impressive alternatives by asking the questions below.

1. How flexible is the program? Jason Butz, who graduated from Lehigh University's online MBA program in December 2014, says it's important for students to look into how long they have to complete their degree. Ideally, he says, students should be able to take a break from the program or scale back their courses if something comes up.

If you are a distance student and you are taking one class a semester or two, and something happens – you get married or you change jobs – you don't want those two years you put into it to be gone, says Butz, a senior IT manager for a national Catholic health system. Lehigh gives students six years to finish the program. Butz went through in three, instead of the five allowed at the time.

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Best MBA Programs for Online Students

Students should also look into the day-to-day​ flexibility of the program, says Bob Monroe, director of the online hybrid MBA program at the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University.​ They should know how much of the program is synchronous. requiring students to log in at a specific time, and how much of it is asynchronous, allowing students to access the material at their own pace.

Another component to consider is whether students can easily move between the online and on-campus portion of the program, he says. At Carnegie Mellon, he says, MBA ​students can attend online and on-campus courses as they choose.

2. What chances do students get to interact with faculty and peers? One of the big values of the MBA program is not just the technical content you get and knowledge from the program, it's also the learning you get from classmates and the networks you develop within the program, says Andrew Ward, associate dean for graduate programs at Lehigh. Unfortunately, he says, that engagement can sometimes be lost in online programs.

One way some programs create connections is by having short residency requirements that require students to meet on campus or elsewhere for learning and networking opportunities. At the online MBA program at Indiana University. for example, students come to school at the start of each school year​ and also have the chance to travel abroad for immersion experiences. At Carnegie Mellon, students are required to meet with each other every six weeks for a few days in Silicon Valley, New York City or Pittsburgh.

Another way online MBA programs can create engagement is through synchronous learning, in which students use video conferencing technology to interact with their instructor and classmates.

Butz, the Lehigh graduate, says he liked the fact that his program allowed him to join an on-campus class in real time, pressing buttons when he wanted to ask a question or contribute. In class discussions, he heard from students working in a variety of fields. In an asynchronous class, he says, students don't hear those kinds of insights from peers.

Students can also connect with others by joining online clubs or organizations, says John York, a second-year student in Indiana University's online MBA program and CEO of a medical communications and consulting firm. York, who started a club for students interested in health care, says the group created a strong community through regular conference calls and even arranging a weekend trip to learn about a Florida hospital's business operations.

3. Do you have the same resources as the on-campus program? You don’t want to be part of a business school where the online MBA program is a second-class​ program, says Phil ​Powell, ​chairman of Indiana University's online business school programs.

To be sure that's not the case, he says students should make sure they have every opportunity available to on-campus students: access to the same recruiters, the chance to take classes with the same faculty and ​use of career services, among other benefits.

One red flag, Powell says, is discovering a program outsources any of its ​services.

This comes back to 'H​ow to do they see their online MBA program?' he says. Online education is the future, right? If it's the future, why are you going to outsource it? You owe it to yourself to go to a school where the online business school is as important as the on-campus program.

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