NIU offers classes for students off the DeKalb campus.

Anne Kaplan, vice president of Administration and University Outreach, said NIU has campuses in Naperville, Hoffman Estates and Rockford.

The classes at the off-campus sites are held mostly at night and on weekends. They are aimed toward those who are employed or alumni who want to continue their education, she said.

“For the adult working population,” she said, “they feel as if they have to go back to school to continue their education.”

Kaplan said before these campuses were built, NIU borrowed space from hotels and high schools to use as classrooms in the 1960s and 1970s.

In the 1990s, the campuses were built.

Kaplan said the first center to be built was in Hoffman Estates in 1990.

The people in Rockford wanted an education opportunity in their community, so in 1995 the Rockford campus was built, she said.

“We requested for state support to build in Rockford,” Kaplan said.

In 1999, the campus in Naperville was constructed for the alumni in the western suburbs.

Kaplan said most undergraduate and graduate courses that are offered on the DeKalb campus are offered at the off-sites. Professors also teach at both locations.

Katherine Wright, director of the college of Liberal Arts and Sciences external programming and visiting assistant professor of English, has taught and is currently teaching at the three locations. She uses the blended online format to teach her courses.

“It’s a very powerful way to teach and to learn,” Wright said. “In our society and our culture is going through a transfer through technology, and technology is part of our world so it should be part of our education.”

Freshman nursing major Roxanne Smith said she might use the off-sites if she did not get accepted into her program.

“I would [use it] because it’s still close to home,” Smith said.

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