Internet Learning Volume 3, Number 2, Fall 2014 | Page 23

• Developing communities of learning
both within classes and institutions as
well as among institutions.
Operations-driven
Internet Learning
• Using online learning to increase institutional
size without expanding the
physical campus.
• Finding efficiencies in administrative
expenses by using technology to automate
many back office processes.
• Building online courses that can be offered
repeatedly or at scale, thereby reducing
costs.
• Cost-effectively providing student support
services (such as advising, tutoring,
career services) online in conjunction
with online courses.
Market-driven
• Using online education to increase access
to courses and programs to grow or
supplement enrollments.
• Expanding the institutional brand to
enhance awareness and prestige which
may have enrollment, research, and
fund-raising benefits.
• Addressing the needs of new non-traditional
potential students – high school
students, adult learners, corporations/
associations/government employees, international
students, alumni, and lifelong
learners.
Noted scholar on disruptive innovation,
Clayton Christensen, has stated that
“fifteen years from now more than half of the
universities will be in bankruptcy, including
the state schools” (Schubarth, 2013) unless
they adopt online education and technology
to lower costs and tuition and fundamentally
change their business models. While
some people may consider that to be an
Figure 1. Examples of primary reasons for
developing online courses and programs
overstatement and that the higher education
model is resilient, the reality is that for
many institutions, the change has already
begun as more colleges and universities
have adopted online education, increasingly
with market considerations in the forefront.
The question for many institutions
is whether a transition to online learning
for market reasons is solely sufficient to
keep them from becoming obsolete. If a
preponderance of colleges and universities
adopt online education, the basic economic
supply-and-demand dynamics are not
necessarily changed but they can be skewed
towards institutions that distinguish themselves.
A review of the online higher education
landscape can prove to be a worthwhile
guide as institutions seek to find their way
successfully into online learning, no matter
how they define success for themselves.
Online Higher Education Market
Dynamics
The most recent survey report from the
Babson Survey Research Group details
a large, but slowing online higher
education market. Grade Change: Tracking
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