Optimal E-Learning Utilization: A Win-Win
This item looks at the reasons employees resist e-learning and offers suggestions for reducing that resistance. The usual suspects are indicted: "People may resist e-Learning because it can feel cold and impersonal. It creates a participant-centric environment that requires initiative and effort. More...

Communities of Practice - The QUT Approach to Online Teaching
Outline of work done at the Queensland University of Technology in the field of communities of practice. The authors identify three major themes in the literature: the relation between communities and teams, the resulting need to change academic work practices, and the need to support, harness and integrate the learning. This is a very organization-centric approach to communities of practice, one that I don't necessarily endorse. It isn't about an organization "harnessing" the learning network: quite the opposite - it's about letting go. More...

E-learning and its Future I so want to comment, but there isn't room. An excerpt tells the story:
From the old to the new:

• From education as a right, as an established system, to learning as a commodity, where the consumer can choose (and where the learning products increasingly can be purchased);
• From education which controls entry, which regulates availability, to learning for all, to deregulation;
• From education as a qualification or credential, to learning and skilling as a lifestyle; where instead of working your way through someone elses prepackaged information, you cherry pick from all the available courses to get the skills you need for the work you want to do; and
• From education as a scheduled activity, to learning any time, any place, any pace; what ever you need for as long as you want it and you only pay for what you use;
• From taking in content (studying), to making information, doing something with the resources, creating something new: a solution, process, methodology;
• From memory testing, to the demonstration of performance; it's not what you know (which has little value in itself) but what you can do with it: the value is not in the known but the new; and
• From competitive to collaborative practices; whereas the book, the essay, the exam, have all been isolated activities, the online and networked environment allows for a much greater degree of collaboration. More...

Back to Basics - E-learning in 2003
This smart article captures many of the trends I have observed through 2002, offers some insight into the confusion surrounding e-learning, but leaves me disappointed when it discusses the trends to expect in 2003. The best bit is near the middle: "here are three completely different ways of looking at e-learning. More...

Les emplois de la Formation à distance

If you are in the field of distance learning and you work in French - or are looking for work in French - then this site may be of interest. More...

Distance Learning at the Tipping Point
This report from EduVentures discusses the current status of fully online distance learning programs (which, I might add, is an uninterrupted and continual increase in enrollments and revenues), lists a series of success factors for online learning, and looks at options for colleges and universities regarding outsourcing. More...

The future of the distance education university
Mark Nichols, John Daniel, Ross Paul, António Teixeira, Tony Bates, EDEN, 2018/03/14
What would we lose if we lost open and distance universities? This question was posed at a panel hosted by EDEN last week and available as a video here. Sir John Daniel suggests we would lose the inclusiveness agenda, the idea that higher education should be offered wiodely across society. More...