September 2004 — Editorial
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The Future of E-Learning
Like much in technology, the notion of e-learning has evolved over the last decade. The phrase itself seems to have come from distance learning, a 1980’s term referring to delivering instruction over satellite. (One could argue that correspondence courses were the first distance learning courses, but we won’t go back that far.) Originally used in higher education to define courses delivered over the Internet, e-learning has grown to include virtually any use of technology to deliver curriculum or instruction. Market Data Retrieval (MDR) still uses the term “distance learning” for purposes of comparison with prior surveys. In “The College Technology Review: 2003-2004 Academic Year,” MDR notes: “The term has come to mean any type of nonclassroom academic offering - including Internet, satellite, videoconferencing or other virtual setting. Increasingly, these programs utilize a combination of technologies, although most preserve many of the same structures of traditional classroom courses with lectures, opportunities for interaction with professors, ‘homework’ assignments, and examinations and other methods to assess student learning” (p. 20-21).
Growth in Distance Learning
According to MDR, distance learning programs are offered by two-thirds of colleges and universities, and the percentage of institutions offering accredited degrees through distance learning has increased to about 55%. The University of Ph'enix, a for-profit institution, has grown into a huge and profitable entity on the back of e-learning, and an entire niche industry of course management systems (e.g., Blackboard, WebCT, eCollege) has grown with the field. The course management systems niche is interesting in two ways: one of its members, Blackboard, went public this summer, and the niche has spawned a major collaborative open-source project, the Sakai Project (online at www.sakaiproject.org), sponsored by the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Indiana University, MIT and Stanford University. The sponsors have pledged to begin using the Sakai course management product in 2005, and more than 40 other universities have said they will give it a try as well. This growing marketplace is another sign that e-learning is a viable force in the business world as well as in the education sector.
This issue of T.H.E. Journal provides what could be called the beginnings of a “normative forecasting” exercise regarding e-learning. Normative forecasting involves describing a possible future for a topic (e-learning), looking at the current iterations of the topic, and then charting alternative pathways from the possible future to the present. One possible future for e-learning is provided by T.H.E. Journal ’s own editorial board member Dr. Chris Dede in the first of a two-part feature article titled “Enabling Distributed Learning Communities Via Emerging Technologies.” This thoughtful article looks at how e-learning has the potential to evolve into rich learning communities distributed around the globe.
