ICS Learn, also known as ICS and International Correspondence Schools Ltd, is a provider of online learning courses in the UK. It was founded in 1890 in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The UK branch was set up in 1904, and it now serves around 10,000 students per year, 88% of whom are from the UK.
It has a large share of the market in CIPD courses and online GCSEs and A Levels. It also provides courses on Accountancy and Business Management, among other subjects.
Accreditation
ICS Learn courses are accredited by a number of awarding bodies, including:
- Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT)
- AQA
- Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD)
- Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM)
- Chartered Institute of Purchasing & Supply (CIPS)
- Edexcel
- Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM)
History
ICS Learn was founded in 1890 in Scranton, Pennsylvania by journalist and editor of the Mining Herald*, Thomas J. Foster. Alarmed by frequent mine accidents, Foster advocated better working conditions and stricter safety regulations, which led to Pennsylvania’s adoption of the Mine Safety Act of 1885 and the requirement for miners to pass a safety exam. In order to help workers pass the new test, Foster began an advice column in the Mining Herald answering mine safety questions.
Unsatisfied with this solution, in 1890 he founded the Colliery Engineer School of Mines, the first distance learning institution in America. The organisation changed names several times, finally settling on International Correspondence Schools of Scranton.
The mission of the school was to ‘provide practical men with a technical education, and technical men with a practical education.’ To achieve its goal, ICS did not instruct its students by standard textbooks, which it believed often contained extraneous amounts of material and "demand[ed] too great a knowledge of mathematics and other subjects." Instead, ICS created its own specially prepared, leather-bound "Instruction and Question Papers," which provided exactly the information the student needed and questioned him only on that material.
It enrolled 2500 new students in 1894 and matriculated 72,000 new students in 1895. By 1900, one in 27 Americans had taken a correspondence course with ICS. The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography states that it is ‘by far the largest single educational institution in America’s history’.
Foster remained the president of ICS until his death in 1936 at age 93.
The organisation expanded to the UK in 1904. The US branch is now known as Penn Foster Career School.
· *This publication was also named The Colliery Engineer and Colliery Engineer and Metal Miner.
References
External links
- ICS Learn homepage (UK)
- Penn Foster Career School (US)
- The ICS Archive. Lists of ICS materials, short history, copyright information, and selected course materials.
- International Correspondence Schools of Scranton, History 1891 to the Present
- International Correspondence Schools of Scranton, Pennsylvania: History, 1891 to the Present
