More and more in our fast-changing world, it’s obvious that the education people acquire by their 20s usually isn’t enough to last them into their 50s or even 40s.

A career move, a move to a new town or any of a host of other circumstances can create a need or desire for someone to seek more education. But as people get a little older, they have family and other responsibilities that make it more difficult to pack up and move to a university campus.

Recognizing the need to take more educational opportunities to the less-populated areas of Kansas is the driving force behind the Western Kansas Access Initiative, a consortium of Emporia State, Fort Hays State and Kansas State universities and Dodge City, Garden City, Colby, Seward County, Pratt County and Barton County community colleges. The group is working to offer more degrees to students in western Kansas.

The target audience is people who would have difficulty finishing a degree on a university campus. Often these are older, nontraditional students who live too far from a university campus or whose family or work responsibilities make it difficult to make that commute.

In some cases, professors may travel to different locations. The wonders of technology also open up other opportunities for classes to be offered over the Internet or via two-way satellite television. Fort Hays State University already is active in offering Internet classes not only to individual students across the United States but also to military personnel stationed abroad. The university also is expanding its classes into China, where there is more demand for higher education than China’s universities can supply. The class content and teachers are the same as those for students on the Fort Hays campus.

One of the challenges is to build respect for the degrees students earn through distance learning channels. The Kansas consortium must make sure that the courses and degrees people complete in this nontraditional way carry the same value and relevance as degrees completed on campus. If that is accomplished, the distance learning strategies being explored could be a huge boon for western Kansas.

The consortium plans to target its first efforts at courses in teacher education, allied health and business. All of these have been identified as growing needs in western Kansas and all have a direct value to the area’s economic well-being. Less-populated areas must maintain their public schools, their health care systems and their business vitality if they are going to avoid extinction.

It’s disappointing that Kansas University is taking a wait-and-see approach to the western Kansas effort. Perhaps that strategy is valid, but KU also should be interested in participating in an effort to serve a statewide need for higher education. KU too often is viewed as being removed from the needs of Kansans, which hurts its support across the state.

The western Kansan consortium is to be congratulated for trying to think outside the box to provide educational opportunities that will revitalize many rural parts of the state. It’s a worthwhile service as well as a good opportunity to strengthen ties between the state’s institutions of higher education.