Watercourses Online
Support for the water industry
Introduction

Online training

Top up your knowledge about the ecology of Australian river systems and how they are affected by catchment land-use and other human activities.

Gather the skills and understanding of ecology, chemistry or assessment needed for such tasks as State-of-the-Environment reporting, and applying the national guidelines for water quality and water-quality monitoring.

How? Watercourses Online would be a good choice.

Watercourses Online is a growing set of online training courses, designed primarily to support personnel in water management, natural resources management, environmental education and ecological consulting.

Three individual courses are available now:

  • Ecology and river function
  • Waterway assessment
  • Catchments: their character, waters & chemical composition.

Watercourses Online are offered by the eWater CRC through the University of Canberra, and run by Richard Norris, William Maher and Sue Nichols. This team already runs the very successful AUSRIVAS Online modular courses for water industry personnel.

For more details, use the menu at the top of this page to look at course descriptions, find out contact details or request more information and apply online. To find out more about how to enrol, course requirements and to read our FAQ, go to the enrolment page or click here.

What is online training?

"Online training" is a general term used to describe any education or training that occurs online (i.e. over the Internet). The following definition (taken from "What Every Student Should Know About Online Learning" by John E. Reid, Jr.) describes the type of online training you can expect in Watercourses Online:
"Online training" is the study of courses from world-wide remote sites that are neither bound by time or physical location. In essence, a student hooks up with other students and an instructor in both real and virtual time. Whether in a plane comfortably cruising at 33,000 feet, or at home, at any given moment a student can log into a virtual classroom. From desktop or laptop, e-mail assignments can be sent and received. Study, research, discovery and new knowledge are at a student’s fingertips.

This statement highlights the flexibility of online learning: you can study where and when you want and pace yourself for maximum learning. It also highlights the fact that online learning is more than just the dissemination of information via the Internet. The virtual classroom does provide ready access to information, but it also provides places to interact with other students and with staff, forums for discussion on various topics, methods for asking staff questions, easy methods for submitting assignments and more. Online course designers can identify what is better delivered online and what learning needs to be done face-to-face and (if needed) combine these learning modes to provide an enhanced learning environment.

To find out if online learning is suited to you, complete our questionnaire "Are you ready for online learning?" and get immediate feedback:


Alternatively, follow the link below to find out more about online learning: