October 27, 2006

Patrick Sutton

Higher education enrollment is changing due to distance learning via the internet. It may be difficult to ascertain just how many people are choosing to study on-line rather than attend traditional universities, but at the Eduventures conference in Boston in mid-October, an interesting figure was cited: by 2008 1 in 10 college students will be an e-learner.

Aside from the experiential differences between brick-and-mortar and e-classrooms, many other issues are worth considering. For instance, in March of this year Congress passed a law that eliminated the requirement that colleges offer at least half their courses in a physical classroom in order to receive federal student aid. In addition, according to a study by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, approximately 65% of all universities that offer traditional graduate classes also offer online graduate classes. There are many trends in online education, and universities are approaching distance learning in a variety of ways. There is one constant though—it is cheaper to run an e-classroom than a brick-and-mortar classroom: universities looking to maximize profit margins now have a way to do so.