Duration: 01.01.07 - 31.03.07
Preliminary, alphabetical list of identified initiatives which the project has studied
The Alliance for Lifelong Learning was founded on 28 September 2000. It was founded by Stanford University from California, USA, Oxford University from Oxford, England, Yale University of New Haven, Connecticut, USA and Princeton University of New Jersey, USA. It ceased activities in late 2005 and was officially closed in March 2006. Read the Alliance for Lifelong Learning case study.Bedriftsuniversitetet (www.bedriftsuniversitetet.no) was a consortium established as a company in 2000 by four prestigious Norwegian institutions: the University of Oslo, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norwegian School of Management, and the SINTEF research institute. The aim was to offer online education to corporations and organizations. In April 2003, the general assembly decided to shut down the operation. A messages posted at Bedriftsuniversitetet’s homepage referred to a decreasing market for tailor-made competency building at college and university level, and stated that there was no basis for continuation of a company at the costs a consortium requires. Read the Bedriftsuniversitetet case study.
California Virtual University (CVU) was a high profile venture with a dismal history. It was launched in April 1997 as a joint project of the University of California, California State University, California Community Colleges and the Association of Independent California Colleges and Universities. In April 1999, Stephen Downes wrote an interesting analysis 11 claiming that the CVU dream lay in ruins. In his analysis, he stated: "While on the one hand this is just another story of an unprofitable enterprise biting the dust, on the other hand it is a story of wider impact because CVU was seen in some quarters as a model for the future. The failure will affect online learning in general, and the reasons for the collapse attributed to weaknesses in the medium as a whole". Read the California Virtual University case study.
IT Fornebu Knowation was a result of the controversial political decision to establish a world-class research and development center for information and communica-tion technology when the old Oslo International Airport was shut down in 1998. The project was the subject of continual political and bureaucratic quarreling. Some critics claimed that the project’s main objective was to secure valuable real estate properties in an attractive area. The center needed educational enterprises and IT Fornebu Knowation was a key player to attract educational activity. A number of video-conference studios were located and planned around the country. The opponents of the project claimed that the selected technology and locations were chosen to get the necessary support from local members of parliament. The company experienced a difficult economic situation, and has more or less disappeared after several reorganizations and mergers. Read the IT Fornebu Knowation case study.
The Competence Network of Norwegian Business and Industry (Næringslivets Kompetansenett (NKN)). NKN (www.nkn.no) was a commercial company established in August 2000. It was owned by the Confederation of Norwegian Business and Industry (www.nho.no), the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions, and Telenor, which is the largest telecommunication company in Norway. The powerful owner institu-tions wanted to show their vigor and dedication to supporting further and continuing education in the workforce. The dot-com hype also helped the initiation of NKN. It was primarily a provider of LMS services to companies (customers) in collaboration with course and content providers (partners). But NKN was never able to cover its costs and the share-holders lost nearly € 10 million 15 . To avoid the bad publicity of a bankruptcy, the owners decided to pay off the creditors with about € 1 million and to sell NKN to the CEO for a symbolic sum in 2002. Read the NKN case study.
The Scottish Interactive University was started in Scotland on 15 October 2002 and was closed four years later on 17 April 2007. Read the Scottish Interactive University case study.
Scottish Knowledge was a short-lived partnership between Scotland’s 21higher education colleges and universities which offered online courses and distance education courses to students around the world. It had offices in the United Arab Emirates, Malaysia, the USA and in Edinburgh, Scotland.Read the Scottish Knowledge case study.
SWI. In the first decade of the second millennium a Hungarian educational site called okta.to (EDUCATOR) made visible progress towards on-line learning with many courses offered on a reasonable price. The site was owned by a free-web-service provider SWI and after a very promising start-up, it closed down in 2005. At the time of operation that was Hungary’s largest publicly accessible on-line learning opportunity. Read the SWI case study.
The UK e–University project was effectively wound up in 2005 after spending £50 million of public money but having succeeded only in attracting 900 students. Read the UK e-University case study.
The United States Open University (USOU) was established in 1998 by the British Open University (OU) as an independent US-based institution. Ranked in the top ten among British universities for the quality of its teaching, the British OU sought to develop a sister institution in the US. The OU had achieved quality at scale, enrolling over 200,000 students in the UK and Europe. However the US market was more competitive and the OU brand identity little known in the US. USOU offered baccalaureate and master’s degrees in business, comput-ing and IT, and the liberal arts. It developed nationally recognized programs with commu-nity colleges and joint degree programs with major US universities. However, not all British aspects of the academic or business models worked successfully in the US. USOU evolved from producer-driven, largely undergraduate courses and systems derived from the UK to a US-market-led institution based on partnerships and graduate programs. Marketing shifted from students to institutions. Enrollments increased considerably every semester from fall 2000 to fall 2001, but revenues failed to grow fast enough. So, the British OU decided to terminate the project and shut down the activity. Read the United States Open University case study.
Other initiatives of interest for the project
The Danish Virtual University was initiated by the Danish Ministries of Education and Research in a mission statement on March 27, 2000. The € 5 million budget for the period 2000-2003 was intended to support the development of Web-based courses and provide information about the courses. The next government shut down the initiative, partly as a result of lacking support from the affected institutions. The only remaining result seems to be a portal provid-ing information about further and continuing education (www.unev.dk) that was initiated by the Danish University Rectors’ Conference and scheduled to open in August 2003.Winix was an LMS system that the Norwegian Ministry of Education initiated in 1988. According to a 1994 article in Computerworld Norway, the Office of the Auditor General (Riksrevisjonen) showed that the project spent more than € 10 million in the nineties. In 1992, it was clear that the project had failed. The software was not finished on time, and several companies that depended on Winix lost much money.
Articles and links
Online Education ObituariesUK e –University. A report from House of Commons Education and Skills Committee
What Happened at California Virtual University
OU closes US operation
NHS university axed in quango cut
Problems at e-learning university
Why did e-learning go bust in the USA?
Discussion in DEOS-L; June 2005
Stabile universiteter
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/education_culture/publ/educ-form_en.html#Study
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/news/40766.html
http://www.sfeuprojects.org.uk/inlei/
Norgesuniversitetet refers to an article in Financial Times about online education failures. The article link is referred to at the bottom of the Norwegian page http://norgesuniversitetet.no/n.nsf/alt/59UHB6
http://norgesuniversitetet.no/n.nsf/ak/D6785400DFDAB888C1256F5E0034145F
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