It's not unusual for 42-year-old Carey Gibson of Turlock to be wearing pajamas and slippers when she goes to class at Modesto Junior College.

She often attends at 3 a.m. by logging online.

"Mostly the flexibility is what I love about it," said the aspiring English professor and mother of two.

"It would take me twice as long to finish college if it wasn't for online classes," added Gibson, in between waiting tables at her full-time job at Lyons restaurant.

Teachers like the flexibility, too.

Gibson's instructor, Shelly Watkins-Fichtenkort, has used the summer to see what it would be like to teach three online sections of Psychology 101 at MJC. She's switching to all-online in the fall because she's having a baby.

"I'm actually really enjoying it. I like being able to select the time of day that I'm going to be online," she said. "I try to keep them all straight, which is a little bit challenging, but I participate in discussions in each section."

More students are turning to distance education programs, from online classes to televised lectures, according to a new report by the U.S. Department of Education.

Enrollment in distance education courses has nearly doubled since 1995, with more than half, or 56 percent of colleges and universities nationwide, offering distance education courses in 2000-01, the report found.

Keeping with this trend, students are flocking to online courses at MJC and Delta College in Stockton where more online classes are on the schedule. Course offerings grew at MJC from 31 in 1999 to 217 this year. Likewise, at Delta, online offerings jumped from seven in 1999 to 278 this year.

"Online classes are some of the first to fill, indicating a strong market demand for this educational option," MJC spokeswoman Linda Hoile said.

"It's exciting," said Kathy Hart, interim dean of planning, research and regional education at Delta. "We seem to be able to put just about anything out there and they want to take it."

This fall, 13 percent of courses at Delta can be taken online, she said.

Merced, Stanislaus lag

At smaller Merced College, the handful of online offerings has held steady the last five years, said John Spevak, vice president of instruction. Online courses also do not have a strong presence on the California State University, Stanislaus campus.

More instructors are adding an online instructional component to their classes at Stanislaus, though fully online courses are rare.

"We're years behind. Years," Norm Wagner told The Bee two years ago when Stanislaus was offering one or two classes that fall. The same is true this year.

Wagner, director of mediated and distance learning, said people are not clamoring for them. Plus, lower division courses lend themselves better to the online medium, and most students at Stanislaus are juniors and seniors.

The number of Stanislaus State course sections with some online feature more than doubled in the past year, from 193 to 444, he said.

At other colleges, the classes are hugely popular among students juggling family, careers and school. Some students, too shy to speak up in class, find it easier to interact with instructors and students.

"People think online is a cold medium," said Eva Mo, an instructor at MJC. "It's not. Students are forced to speak up. I monitor each student. They can't just sit at home and be passive. They're forced to engage in the material."

Instructors use what's called a threaded discussion. They give students a question or two. Students must answer, read all posted responses, and respond to another student. The instructor knows where each student has been and for how long.

"In many ways, there's greater interaction between students and teachers than there is in a face to face class, which on the surface seems ridiculous," Hart said.

Students are drawn to the courses for any number of reasons.

Kendy Paxia, a 24-year-old from Modesto, likes that she can carefully go over the material.

"Since I suffer from a learning disability, I often need to reread and write things a few times to understand the points given," said Paxia, who is enrolled in Psychology 101 as well as History 105. "In a 'real' class I would not have that option."

Students say people think online classes are easier, but that's just not the case.

"The flip side is you tend to have more work," Gibson said.

Exams in her Psych 101 class, for example, have 100 questions and students get 90 minutes to complete them. After that, the exam shuts off.

"That's not even a minute a question," she said.

On the other hand, she said, test results are instantaneous. Students submit tests and a minute later, they learn what questions they got right.

Tough on instructors, too

The classes are no easier for instructors, either, who must prepare online lectures and assignments, and respond to multiple student inquiries.

"It's easier in a sense that it provides me with a great deal of flexibility," Mo said. "But it takes five to 10 times longer to prepare."

In a classroom, she might answer the same question a few times. Online, when questions come in one at a time, she may copy and paste the same answer 40 times.

Delta will be adding hybrid online classes this fall. Hybrid courses have proved popular on other campuses, such as MJC.

Students have set office hours during which they have face-to-face contacts with their instructor and other students.

Hart said she thinks the number of online course offerings will continue to expand, though they would never replace traditional lectures and labs.

"It's not for everybody," she said, adding that self-motivated students are best suited for this mode of learning.