Online Education: The New Age

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Online Education The New Age

• Vishal Nath

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Educated Online

• Last fall I was struggling with a problem in my
  Circuit Theory class. Despite the textbook and
  lecture notes, I was confused about some
  underlying concepts. So I went online to do a
  search on that concept on the internet and ran
  into MITs open courseware site.
• To my surprise, OCW has MITs course curriculum
  for many courses put online, and in some cases,
  entire courses are online, including multimedia
  lectures. Listening to some lectures cleared the
  issues and I was able to successfully solve the
  circuits.
• Appreciation of internet as classroom grew many
  fold.

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Many others

• Many others have the same sense of appreciation
  for online learning, and in a more organized
  manner than just for quick reference

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Statistics

• 11 of all college students have taken at least
  one online course
• 81 of higher ed. Institutions offer at least one
  online course
• 34 offers full degrees online
• Sizing the Opportunity, The Quality and Extent
  of Online Education in the U.S., 2002 and 2003,
  The Sloan Consortium

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Education Industry

• Beyond a loose concept, Education is one of the
  biggest components of economy today. According to
  EduVentures, an investment banking firm, the
  Education Industry is estimated to be worth
  between 630 and 680 billion in the United
  States.
• Many forms of Education exist, ranging from 1 on
  1 personal tuitions, to large, conventional
  university based programs

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Online Education

• With the growth of the internet over the last 10
  years, has come the usage of the medium as a
  medium for educational outlets to seek out new
  students and revenues and for students, the
  opportunity to get training without leaving their
  homes

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Not New

• First correspondence school at Illinois Wesleyan
  in 1894
• to provide instruction for those, who for social
  and economic reasons, cannot attend its
  classrooms, is a legitimate part of work of every
  university. (William Harper, Univ. of Chicago
  1892)
• Correspondence Programs continued on for 100
  years

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So whats different about Cyber-Ed?

• Unlike correspondence education, which happened
  over the medium and speed of snail mail, online
  education is on the medium of internet, which
  makes the possibility of interaction close to
  real time, and also allows constant access to
  classroom resources for students and faculty

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Who operates Cyber-Ed?

• Typically, most of the Cyber-Ed providers are
  conventional education providers like the
  universities. Though some others include
  for-profit institutions, corporate universities,
  software publishers.

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How it works

• Most forms of online education is carried out
  over the web and email using courseware software

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Courseware

• Courseware is usually internet software which
  allows means of posting syllabus, schedule,
  lectures, hold discussions, conduct exams, and
  finally a means to get feedback
• WebCT, Prometheus (used by UMB), Blackboard,
  Click2Learn, Socrates, Tycho are all courseware
  products

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Organization

• Courses are organized online to be
• Supplementary
• Passive
• Dynamic

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Supplementary Courses

• Web is used as supplement to the actual course,
  which is held in classroom. Supplementary
  readings, course schedule etc. are put up on the
  web for students to keep tabs on (like E-reserves
  at UMB)

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Passive Online Course

• In this set up, all the course contents including
  lecture notes and assignments are put up online
  and students read through them sequentially over
  the semester

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Dynamic Courses

• This type of course is designed for the internet.
  In such a course, all lectures are broadcast live
  and each student accesses the professors lecture
  using video camera at his or her terminal. Real
  time question/answers and/or discussions are
  common and so is testing using courseware software

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Umass Boston

• Umass Boston operates its online courses through
  Prometheus and WebCT based websites. Each
  student has a username/password which is used to
  log in to his course. And the instructor puts up
  relevant course material there

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UMB Prometheus Interface
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Positive Effects

• 24 hour classroom, 365 days a year. Student can
  be in class whenever he or she wants to be
  without instructor being there
• Allows people to learn who otherwise wouldnt
  attend due to home schooling, special needs, or
  due to geographic or work constraints, in the
  case of adults.

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Not so positive

• Online students say they miss interactions of a
  in-person class
• With increased flexibility comes indiscipline
  among some students also
• Lack of monitoring needs to be addressed
• MacGregor, Cynthia J. (2001), A Comparision of
  Student Perceptions in Traditional and Online
  Classes, Academic Exchange 143148

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Net positive

• In general, the response is positive so far from
  universities and students. According to a 2004
  independent report by EduVentures, over 1 million
  students in U.S. will be enrolled in online
  programs, growing by 38.

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Links

• http//ocw.mit.edu (MITs Open Courseware site)
• http//boston.umassonline.net (UMBs cybered
  interface)
• http//www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/coursew
  are/compare.html (Comparision of popular online
  Ed. Products)
• http//www.eduventures.com (Educational
  Investment firm)

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Questions

• Have you taken a course online?
• Would you attend a online course?
• Would you consider getting your degree online?
• Would you hire someone with a degree earned
  online?