Online Education Trends

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Online EducationTrends

• Round Table Discussion,EADL Conference May 14,
  2003.
• Morten Flate Paulsenhttp//home.nettskolen.com/m
  orten
• Director of DevelopmentNKI Distance Education
• www.nki.no

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Seven Important Trends

• The Large-scale Trend
• The Cost-effectiveness Trend
• The Systems Integration Trend
• The M-learning Trend
• The Broadband Trend
• The Standardization Trend
• The Globalization Trend

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Presentation Based on myBooks and Reports

• www.nettskolen.com/in_english/cisaer/
• www.nettskolen.com/in_english/webedusite/
• www.studymentor.com
• www.nettskolen.dk
• www.nkiforlaget.no/forlaget/html/utdrag/nettbasert
  .htm

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NKI Internet College www.nettskolen.com
May 2003

• Operated by NKI Distance Education (www.nki.no)
• Online education since 1987
• Broad specter of subjects from secondary to
  master level
• Presently 4800 online students in at least 34
  countries
• 54 women
• 370 distance education courses online
• You may start whenever you like
• Individual progress plans
• Always room for more students
• Exams at local schools and embassies
• Online students get better grades

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Towards Large-scale Systems
The Large-scale Trend

• The current online education mega trend shows
  clearly a development from small-scale
  experiments to large-scale operation
• The trend has come further in the Nordic
  countries than in other European regions.
• 12 of 20 Nordic institutions offer at least 50
  online courses. Only 3 of 22 surveyed Nordic
  institutions offered more than 50 online courses
  three years ago.
• The Web-edu interviewees talk about LMS systems
  as large-scale systems capable of handling
  thousands of users.

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A Universe of Courses
The Large-scale Trend

• Globally, there are probably much more than
  200.000 online courses available on the Internet
• http//courses.telecampus.edu
• No fewer than 70.000courses are listed onlyin
  the CanadianTeleCampus portal
• There is a steady growthof institutions that
  offeronline courses to studentsin other
  countries.

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Few Online Courses are Cost-effective
The Cost-effectiveness Trend

• Cost-effectiveness becomes more important as
  institutions become large-scale providers.
• It is important to develop sustainable online
  courses, that is courses that will persist.
• Development and operation costs of online courses
  are high.
• Recent price rises have made the commercial LMSs
  a costly investment. Staff time for development
  and maintenance of self-developed systems proves
  to be a costly investment too
• The CISAER analysis revealed few, if any,
  examples of institutions with substantial income
  from student fees
• Few institutions can claim that provision of
  web-based courses has been an economic success,
  if they disregard external research and
  development grants.

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The Online Teachers Nightmare
The Cost-effectiveness Trend

• Online education offers students excellent
  opportunities to individual communication with
  their tutors. They can be contacted via e-mail 24
  hours a day, 365 days a year. Few learning
  environments provide equal opportunities for
  individual access to teachers. It is obvious that
  online students appreciate to always have a
  personal tutor available. It is the students'
  dream, but it could soon become a nightmare for
  the tutors. 

• I'm really concerned about the heavy workload
  reported by online teachers. Online education
  will never become a real success until we are
  able to limit the teacher workload.
• What will happen when they start teaching large
  scale courses?

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Systems Integration
The Systems Integration Trend
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The Need for Integration

• With the introduction of large-scale online
  education, the need for integration between LMS
  systems and student management systems increases.
• The analyses revealed a general lack of such
  integration.
• The Nordic universities have standardized on
  national student management systems and
  interesting integration efforts are in progress.

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The M-learning Trend
The M-learning Trend

• M-learning, the new buzz-word
• Telecommunication companies have invested
  enormous resources in a broadband mobile
  telephone infrastructure (GPRS, 3G, MMS)
• Improved mobile terminals (PDA, tablet PCs,
  advanced mobile phones)
• Private wireless networks are affordable and
  increasingly popular in offices and private
  homes.
• Public wireless networks are available in an
  increasing number of airports, hotels,
  restaurants etc.
• E-books could replace paper based text books

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SPICE (www.nettskolen.com/spice)
The M-learning Trend

• NKI has developed the Specialization Program in
  International Online Education and tested it
  with mobile students using PDAs and mobile phones
  in the EU-project From e-learning to m-learning
  (http//www.nki.no/in_english.xsql?menyID43)
• SPICE 601 Introduction to International Online
  Education
• SPICE 602 Design and Development of Online
  Courses
• SPICE 603 Online Teaching and Learning
• SPICE 604 Administration Systems andSupport
  Services for Online Education
• SPICE 605 International and ComparativeOnline
  Education

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The Broadband Trend
The Broadband Trend

• The bandwidth capacity has increased steadily and
  significantly ever since online education was
  introduced.
• The modem I bought in 1985, applied 300 bits per
  second, less than two decades later, I have
  wireless Internet access at home providing 300
  000 bits per second.
• This significant increase in bandwidth will
  continue in the foreseeable future and provide
  online education with opportunities for richer
  media content.

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The Broadband Trend
The Broadband Trend

• The web-edu project showed that there is an
  obvious request for more bandwidth and more
  multimedia abilities.
• Several interviewees wanted to include video
  services such as streaming video,
  videoconferences, web-cameras, and moving
  pictures.
• Audio services such as voice communication and
  audio files were also requested.

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E-learning Standard Ambivilance
The Standardization Trend
SCORM AICC IMS XML

• Where are the European interestsrepresented?
• Where are the educational professionalsinterests
  represented?
• The interviewees are aware of the e-learning
  standards, and several claim that their systems
  follow the standards.
• Few state that the standards are important to
  their institution, and e-learning standards do
  not seem to have had much impact on online
  education in Europe.

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Education is Not Like Soft Drinks
The Globalization Trend

• In the preface to her book Global Education,
  Robin Mason (1998) stated
• Unlike the soft drinks market, education is
  unlikely to be dominated by a few giant
  providers. Why? Because it is too difficult
  there is too little money to be made, too many
  complex issues to handle, and too great a need
  for "people skills" rather than technical skills.

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Why will Online Educationbecome more global?
The Globalization Trend

• The ongoing European harmonization of degrees,
  certificates, credits, and grades encourages
  global mobility for online students.
• The commercialization of education and the
  growing acceptance of tuition fees make it
  interesting to increase income by targeting
  foreign students.
• The proliferation of a few, predominantly North
  American, learning management systems such as
  WebCT and BlackBoard and the growing acceptance
  of e-learning standards makes it easier to use
  foreign content and to collaborate with foreign
  institutions.

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Education as an Export Industry
The Globalization Trend

• In Australia, education is one of the country's
  most important export industries. In an action
  plan from the Commonwealth Government it is
  clearly stated that"Education in Australia is
  a multi-billion dollar export industry of vital
  importance to our economy".
• In Scandinavia, export ofeducation does not
  evenseem to be an issue forpublic discussion.

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Seven Important Trends

• The Large-scale Trend
• The Cost-effectiveness Trend
• The Systems Integration Trend
• The M-learning Trend
• The Broadband Trend
• The Standardization Trend
• The Globalization Trend

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Theory of cooperative freedom
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Ten important Web-edu findings

• Regional differences
• From small-scale to large-scale operation
• Much used commercial systems
• European competitors
• North American dominance
• Many self-developed systems
• The need for integration
• Cost effectiveness
• Knowledge, policy, and strategy
• E-learning standards

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Strategic Recommendations (1)

• Recommendations from the CISAER Project to
  politicians, educational administrators, and
  educators
• Promote national and international harmonization
  of degrees, certificates, credits, and grades to
  facilitate online mobility of students
• Oppose national regulations that inhibits
  institutions from charging tuition fees
• Focus on cost effective online education
• Develop better systems for administration of
  online education

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Strategic Recommendations (2)

• Support initiatives for training of online
  teachers, administrators, and instructional
  designers
• Oppose regulations and attitudes that inhibits
  online assessment
• Support further research on online pedagogy and
  didactics
• Develop and implement strategies to reduce the
  workload of online teachers