• W.E. Manning Memorial Scholarship Recipient •

Distance Doesn’t Matter to an Online Learner, Just Ask Connie Robbins

Meet Connie Robbins. Originally from Clarksville, an hour’s drive east of Fort Smith, this soon-to-be graduate of the U of A’s Executive Master of Business Administration program has lived in various places around the world but, in the end, she still calls Arkansas home.

When Robbins, currently a resident of Prairie Grove, decided to further her business education, it seemed natural to turn to Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas. The EMBA degree is designed for working managers or executives—people like Robbins—who want to improve their leadership and management skills, as well as advance in their chosen careers. The EMBA is a hybrid program with both online courses and a once-a-month class on the Fayetteville campus.

Robbins elected to follow the Business Analytics track and expects to receive her degree in May 2025.

“You don't have to quit your job to take online classes,” Robbins said. “You can continue to work the 40 hours a week or more and take classes and perhaps get yourself promoted or move to another job if you're interested in a new career path. With an EMBA, there are no limits to the things people can do—they can move into supply chain, retail, marketing, finance, innovation and entrepreneurship, or whatever. If you’re looking for a launchpad to go somewhere, an EMBA is for you.”

This degree will be particularly helpful to Robbins, who works as the associate director of accounting at Walton College of Business. She has held this position for close to three years and hopes this degree will help her in her work at the U of A so that she can best support her department, her college, and the university as a whole. Working full-time and attending online classes gives Robbins the perfect balance of work, life and school, where she works during the week and tends to her studies mostly on weekends.

“I do things in the accounting center to try to keep things rolling,” she said. “My supervisor has been very supportive in this, and her supervisor, also. The staff of the MBA program are very supportive, as well. Being a U of A employee, I could have taken classes on campus, but because of job responsibilities, I took the opportunity to learn online. I wanted to keep my job while I was going to class, so that was the option I chose.”

In addition to the ability to continue her full-time work without interruption, Robbins also appreciates the flexibility offered by an option that allows her to choose when and how she studies.

“Online provides a flexibility for me to study on my own time,” she said. “I can do things whenever I want and not be locked into a specific date and time for an in-person class. Online studying is great. It doesn’t matter if you’re local or distant. You can take online classes and not have to come into the university. You can live in another state or you can live overseas. Even in the EMBA program, we have people who live in other states. We have someone from Mississippi, a couple in Texas, some in Missouri, and they come in once a month for that Saturday class. So that's a doable thing.”

Robbins, who has a master’s degree from another university, wanted something more, something that would give her that extra boost of knowledge, skill and experience that would elevate her chosen career path. She found what she wanted in the EMBA program.

“While living in Mississippi, I started thinking, ‘I really would like to get an MBA, and where would I like to get that?’” Robbins said. “I was looking at various places. Of course, I looked at Ole Miss and Mississippi State, and it was like, ‘No, not really.’ I really liked the University of Arkansas, the MBA program here, so I thought if I ever got back to Arkansas, that's what I'm going to do. I actually started looking at it while I was still in Mississippi, going on the website and learning about the program. So, of course, I’m at the U of A and in the program. I'm excited to be on the finishing part of closing out on the degree now.”

Robbins has no qualms about recommending online learning to anyone who may be considering this educational option. Whether the EMBA degree or any other online opportunity, Robbins heartily encourages prospective students to research the available offerings.

“Learning online—it's a doable thing,” Robbins said. “Even though you're working full-time, you can do it. You just have to keep up with it. If you start falling behind, then you're in trouble, but as long as you stay current on your assignments, you'll be fine. And the course content is so relevant to what I do. I've already applied some of the things I've learned straight into my daily work. I've reached the point where it applies more to what I'm doing, specifically, so that's exciting.”

Her current educational schedule is not Robbins’ first brush with online learning. She received a Master of Accounting from another U.S. university while living in England. There were some similarities, but Robbins noted one significant difference between the two experiences.

“The main difference between the two degrees is that the U of A students (in the EMBA program) actually meet once a month here on campus and have a classroom session,” she said. “We have personal contact with other students and professors. At my other school, it was totally online. The similarities were that assignments were due weekly, or you had weekly things to do, whether it was watch videos or complete group projects. The main difference is coming into the campus one Saturday a month to meet with everyone and have a class there. You have the camaraderie with other students and with the professors on those Saturdays.”

In addition to communication with each other during the monthly in-person sessions, the students in Robbins’ cohort use various social media and communication platforms to coordinate projects and assignments.

“We have a WhatsApp channel so we can communicate through that, as well as through Teams,” she said. “We also use Teams to share files that we all work on together. With professors, it's generally through Teams or through Zoom. Some of them do several Zoom meetings with whoever wants to come in and join and ask questions or just have different topics to talk about. And e-mail, of course. We can always e-mail professors. They're open to that.”

Robbins is a recipient of the W.E. Manning Memorial Scholarship for online U of A students for the 2024-2025 academic year. The scholarship began with small gifts from many people who passionately believe in the transformative power of education. It was created in 2018 to financially assist students who are enrolled in undergraduate and graduate online degree programs.

“I’m very grateful for receiving this scholarship,” she said. “It will help me as far as having less to pay on my college bills, so I'm very grateful for that. I am in the Executive MBA program, so it is helping me to gain the skills that I was hoping to get to help me in my position at the university.”