Before moving to Mexico, I worried unnecessarily about how I would continue with my education without knowing Spanish. At that time the Internet was immature and the Lakeside area had not yet burgeoned with the thousands of American and Canadian retirees who reside here today. However, the first writing classes offered on the Internet had not yet figured out how to charge for them, so I benefited from many free courses and free critique groups as I embarked on my new writing career.

Today, many years later, Lakeside residents are blessed with a proliferation of classes from getting and staying in physical, mental and emotional shape, to diverse arts and crafts lessons, dancing, cooking, writing, photography, computers, acting, singing, dancing, golf, tennis, bridge and scores more. Many are free, and others are reasonably priced.

The Lake Chapala Society in Ajijic is a non-profit organization which hosts many of these educational opportunities. The society was established nearly 60 years ago and is probably unique in the world.  With more than 3,000 members (mostly expats) the 1-1/2 acre grounds are beautifully landscaped and the Society is run primarily by volunteers. Its purpose is to provide educational and social opportunities for both the expat and Mexican communities.  To that end, there are facilities for both small and large classes, they have English and Spanish libraries, a coffee shop and a host of other facilities.  LCS is open six days a week from 10 am to 2 p.m.

And today there are a world of online classes,  sometimes referred to as distance learning or e-learning. You’d think they had us expats in mind when they developed these technologies. Recently I visited AARP’s site for another matter and discovered that their continuing education program was just the ticket for folks like me who wished to continue learning without the cost of earning college credits or certificates.  We don’t have local English colleges, but we can take most any class online by auditing it—free!

These classes are provided by such prestigious educational institutions as MIT, Stanford, Princeton and UC Berkeley.  Of course, students can take courses for credit, but they can also choose to audit the classes for free. There are literally thousands of courses available in most every subject. Most of us living in Mexico’s retirement communities no longer need additional degrees or certificates, we’re just interested in improving our knowledge.

At the AARP site, in the Life Reimagined section, you can click on “learn” in the navigation bar and then select courses either by subject or institution.  I’ve just signed up for the “Science of Happiness” course offered by UC Berkeley.  It begins in September.

While writing this post on e-learning, I discovered scores of other online options now available to us. Here are some of the most exciting ones:

• iTunes U – Apple’s online university with over 100,000 educational video and audio files
• Academic Earth – Thousands of video lectures from top scholars worldwide
• YouTubeEDU – An educational channel with videos from top educational institutions
• Research Channel – More than 3,500 videos produced by academic and leading research institutions
• Videolectures.Net – Lecture videos by scientists and distinguished scholars
• Learning Center – From Hewlett-Packard’s online skill classes
• WonderHowTo – Instructional videos handpicked from more than 1,700 websites
• HowCast – These include thousands of how-tovideo shorts
• Videojug – A British site with thousands of how-to and ask-the-expert videos
• TEDTalks – 18-minute videos from some of the top doers and thinkers in the world
• Nobel Prize Winners – Video interviews and lectures by some of the smartest people in the world.
• Forum National Network – Webcasts of on-demand and live lectures by many of the world’s foremost authors, scientists, policymakers, artists and community leaders.
• Big Ideas – Produced by TVO, Canada’s largest educational broadcaster, this site presents videos on a variety of thought-provoking topics.

Today, the technology has made moving to Mexico a much easier decision than it was 15 years ago. We can continue with our education online and stay in touch with our loved ones via video on Skype, OoVoo, Tango and others. We can shop on-line. The only thing I can imagine that would be better is if we could master the “Beam me up, Scottie” technology so we could avoid airports.