Distance Learning Marches On

Most of the commentary on distance learning lately has been about the sudden and profound effect it is having on our education infrastructure and on the workforce transformation that is following on the heels of huge changes in our labor market.

Reuters has a story today on the increase in distance learning enrollment for the year. The release of new attendance records has led to speculation on where the online schools might be headed, which results in an interesting mix of appreciation for the value of distance learning and some reality checks about its limitations.

The Growth

First the statistics: the online education sector grew 13 percent over this past academic year and had been growing at about 20 percent in previous years. About 25% of all college students are taking some courses online this year, up from 10% in 2002. Two million students, most over the age of 24, take all their courses online and two million more take one or more online course.

Online courses and degrees have become a fixture for colleges and universities of all makes and models. About half of the nation's 4,500 campus-based colleges offer some sort of online options. Some schools have found their online programs so popular that they have restricted enrollments for on-campus students because the available online slots were being taken away from people who can't get to the campus.

The Limitations

The CEO of Kaplan University, one of the major for-profit online and campus schools, makes the point that the nation can't meet the substantial goals for education upgrade with our current system. "Obama wants to make us first again by 2020," he said. "In order to do that, we need to create 63 million college graduates over that period. The higher education system as constructed will come up 16 million degrees short. There's not capacity in the system."

Other experts see the online system at a plateau until more sophisticated technology becomes available. Students enrolled in nursing schools can't learn to draw blood or give injections online; there's no substitute for clinical training available online. However there have been enhancements such as virtual laboratories where biomedical engineering students can conduct experiments that might be too costly in an on-site laboratory class.

Students seeking a teaching degree can't obtain their student teaching experience in front of a computer; however some schools like Kaplan and the University of Phoenix have developed relationships with schools and medical facilities near their campuses so that nursing and teaching students at their schools can get in their student clinical hours

It's also fair to say that at this point, many traditional universities are willing to offer courses online but less willing to allow for online achievement of degrees. You can take most of the courses for a computer science degree through Harvard's Extension School, but you must take at least four courses on campus. Many other respected universities haven't gotten to the point where degree programs are acceptable.