The essence of distance learning is that you can do it anywhere at any time. For Seamus O'Connell this meant retiring to his cabin to study while his colleagues on board the Western Endeavour were relaxing after a hard day's fishing.

As the trawler could be at sea for months at a time O'Connell had to make arrangements to mail his assignments from wherever the trawler pulled in during its tour of duty. Sometimes this was Scotland, sometimes Denmark, sometimes Norway. On one occasion his employers flew him home from Norway to sit his exams.

O'Connell started his distance learning BA programme five years ago. He opted to register with an Irish-based institution (the National Distance Learning Centre at DCU) because he wanted to study History and he felt he wanted an Irish perspective on the subject.

Born in Westport, Co Mayo, O'Connell went into his family's wholesale grocery business straight from school. He spent six years as a salesman for the business travelling all around the West. At the age of 23 he decided to move to Killybegs to try his hand at fishing.

"I got into fishing by accident," he says. "I had gone on a trip in a boat with a friend and enjoyed it a lot and thought it might be the life for me. So I went up to Killybegs and basically asked one of the trawler owners for a job and got one. Things were a lot more casual in those days. I tried my hand at various aspects of the job and I've been working with the Western Seaboard Fishing company for the past 18 years.

"Cooking is the one thing everyone avoids so anyone who shows any aptitude for it gets landed with the job. That's how I ended up in charge of cooking and responsible for keeping the place neat and tidy," says O'Connell, who has spent his fishing career on the 160-foot Western Viking and more recently on the 213-foot Western Endeavour.

While his colleagues watched videos or read or played cards, O'Connell had taught himself to type, was in his cabin hammering away on his laptop. "I was nothing special in school," he says "but I was always a good reader and I had done various courses down the years, so I didn't find it too difficult to get into studying for the BA.

"I did a mixed degree which involved courses in history, philosophy, English literature and sociology. It took five years from start to finish - including a foundation module which covered things like study skills - and it taught me to be much more disciplined and organised about my reading. Before I started the course I would have read indiscriminately," O'Connell says.

"It's certainly true that your enthusiasm does wear a bit thin at times. You're all fired up to begin with and that does wane as the time goes on. That may have something to do with being on your own all the time and not having the feedback you'd get in a lecture situation. If you have problems or you don't understand something, you either have to work it out for yourself or wait and ask the tutor. You can't turn to someone beside you for help.

"We had very good support from out tutors and they were always at the end of a phone and willing to help. But I suppose my situation was a little bit unusual in that as I was away from home for long periods and found it difficult to attend all of the tutorials. So isolation is a bit of a problem. Being at sea is not the most conducive atmosphere for study as there's a lot of noise and the boat is rolling around all the time."

O'Connell did his final exams last November and will be conferred with his degree this month. He says he was "very pleased and pleasantly surprised", by his marks which were consistently good throughout the course. "I did put in a lot of effort and that obviously paid off," he says.

"I think distance learning is a great idea. It opens up all sorts of opportunities for self-development and you can do it all in one go or bit by bit if that suits you better. I think it's an excellent system."

O'Connell has now left fishing behind and is currently in the throes of a post-graduate business course for non-business graduates. This is a one year part-time programme and he is combining it with working for Musgraves. Both the course and his work are Dublin-based but he continues to live in Killybegs.

"I get home to my wife and family at the weekends and they're used to not seeing very much of me. It's the norm for families in a fishing community," says O'Connell who has a son of 17 and a daughter aged 15. "The sea is a very anti-social way of earning a living when you have a family and it's very tough on your wife and kids. But the money is good and that keeps you there."

O'Connell is not exactly sure where he will end up long-term, but having got fishing out of his system, a career in business is the most likely path for the future.