By JACKIE BARKER
Chronicle correspondent
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
May 1, 2003
Beverly Schulz has a job that would be the envy of many a working mom. She can be home with a sick child, take a vacation or visit her parents in California, and at the same time be available to teach her students.
"About seven years ago, I had the good fortune of having the birth of my son Drew coincide with the advent of the Internet, and I was able to take my career online and be home with my son," Schulz said.
A Ph.D. with some heavy credentials to her credit, Schulz has taught a variety of subjects on the college level.
The Woodlands resident started teaching online with the now-defunct America Online's campus.
"At that time an online class was a true novelty," she said. "We lived on a sailboat in Hawaii then and with a little work, I was able to convert some traditional classes I had been teaching for the University of Hawaii to online courses, sold them to a few other schools around the country and went from there."
She and her husband Barry left Hawaii and spent a couple of years traveling in a motor home. She continued building her collection of classes while she was on the road.
"One of my largest online class bases is through `Education to Go,' which acts as a liaison between over 1,200 colleges and universities around the world and a group of independent teachers," Schulz said.
She teaches `Discover Digital Photography' and `Secrets of Better Photography' for them, with more than 1,500 students annually.
"I am in the process of preparing a third class, `Photoshop Elements for the Absolute Beginner,' which should be available by this summer for fall," she said.
The educator is also adjunct faculty with the University of San Francisco, teaching `Sacred Arts of the World.'
"It has been wonderful to teach both the continuing education and credit courses in an online format," Schulz said.
Schulz, 44, has a bachelor's degree in legal studies from the University of California at Berkeley, a master's in adult and continuing education from the University of Phoenix, and a doctorate in curriculum and instruction from Lacrosse University. Her articles and photographs have been published in a number of magazines.
She has developed a curriculum on getting organized for the self-employed, executives and writers. She also teaches courses entitled `Write and Sell the Short Stuff' and `Introduction to Travel Writing.'
In addition to teaching online, Schulz does some free-lance photography in The Woodlands and teaches in the Christ Church United Methodist Fine Arts Academy in The Woodlands.