September 20, 2012
Online Learning and Higher Education: A Sleeping Giant Awakens

- In many regions, governments have been gradually cutting funding to universities, pushing the financial burden onto students, parents, and charitable donors.
- Many students now graduate with many tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt. This has created a ticking financial time bomb, with student debt surpassing the level of credit card debt in the U.S. The result is growing student resistance to higher tuition fees.
- Universities must increase revenue to cover rising costs yet find they are between a rock (reduced government funding) and a hard place (student push-back against rising tuition fees). It's tough to scale up a bricks-and-mortar educational model. If your only option for financial growth is to add more students, do you build another campus? Do you increase class size?

- Whereas many institutions will film a lecture, put it on the Web, and call it online learning, many others will pursue innovative ways to use technology for learning. These innovations will spill into workplace learning.
- Traditionally, many people only experience online learning once they've left school and entered the workforce. With the adoption of learning technology in higher education, these individuals are more likely to champion its benefits at work, leading to even greater adoption of learning technologies in the workplace.
- Most importantly, the line will blur between higher education and workplace learning. Both will leverage similar strategies and technologies, and each will lead to the acquisition of knowledge and new skills.
TAGGED:
Academia,
Academic,
e-learning,
elearning,
eLL,
higher education,
learning management,
LMS,
online learning,
training,
Universities,
University,