Web-based Instruction: (Still) a Challenge for Higher Education Leadership
EDIT 720, Leadership Issues in Educational Technology, October 15, 2001

Popular opinion states that the Web is everywhere, affecting the way we do business, communicate socially, politically, even defining our home life. The Web is also believed to be well entrenched in education, particularly higher education. But just how ubiquitous is the Web? A few national research studies provide some insights.

Now in its tenth year, The Campus Computing Project by K.C. Green (2000) is the largest continuing study of the role of technology in U.S. colleges and universities. Each year, 600+ institutions participate and answer questions about technology planning, policy, and the role of technology in teaching and learning. Although the Web has become an accepted tool in the educational process, it is still used primarily as a resource to enhance content delivered in the classroom. Instructors provide students with discipline-related web sites or online journal web sites, but do not yet use the Web’s technology to deliver engaging course content.
The 2000 survey began tracking campus services on the Web, asking institutions which services they provide online. Not surprisingly, the 4-year institutions tend to offer more online services than 2-year institutions, yet the majority of all institutions surveyed offer online courses.

The rise of instructional portals also demonstrates the ubiquity of the Web. The GartnerGroup report on higher education enterprise portals (2000) stated that 5% of all institutions of higher education in the U.S. had partially implemented a portal in 2000, and that by 2005, 80% of all institutions will have implemented a portal.

Importantly, the federal government is committed to the Web in higher education. A bi-partisan commission on Web-based education issued a report (2001) outlining the results of a 2-year study on how the Internet can be used in education from and what barriers might be slowing the spread of Internet use in education. All of the report’s recommendations – including the barriers to financial aid for online learners and barriers to broadband access – have contributed to the ubiquity of the Web. Ubiquitous or not, the Web has become synonymous with revenue potential. According to the NCES (2000), the number of adult learners heading back to “school” in pursuit of lifelong learning now comprises nearly half of the higher education student population in the US. Despite the shakeout in the dot com world, including the failure of some prominent e-learning ventures like Hungry Minds and Harcourt University, a report from Merrill Lynch (2001) projects the revenue potential in higher education e-learning at $7 billion by 2003. What higher education leader would not salivate at these numbers?

This is the environment in which educators are pressed into offering Web-based instruction. Khan (1997) defines Web-based instruction as “a hypermedia-based instructional program which utilizes the attributes and resources of the World Wide Web to create a meaningful learning environment where learning is fostered and supported.” Although this definition seems pretty straightforward, the translation to implementation has been a rocky road for most institutions, particularly those who initially saw Web-based learning as a “make-a-buck” enterprise. Some of the practical realities that have complicated Web-based instruction implementation are:

• Assessing the true costs, particularly as compared with classroom based training. Some college and university business officers have come to realize that they have no idea how much it costs them to educate a student, with or without technology;


• Enhancement vs. replacement of classroom time. This has accreditation implications, where seat time is a key performance measure;


• The role of the faculty and faculty development opportunities. Training, remuneration, release time, and technology in tenure decisions are among the hot, unsettled issues for faculty who have been asked/told to use Web-based instruction;


• Building/maintaining technology staff. Until recently, skilled information technology and instructional technology professionals were not inexpensive. Higher education has a challenge when competing with the attractive compensation packages offered by the private sector;


• Academic technology and administrative technology synergy. Institutions have spent millions of dollars on their mission-critical student information systems, financial systems, human resource systems, and institutional advancement/fund-raising systems. However, the data in these systems (e.g., registration and student payment information) is of value to faculty members who have adopted Web-based instruction and are using course management systems (e.g., WebCT, Blackboard) to facilitate their classes. Integration of the back-office business systems with learning management systems would eliminate hardware redundancies and save faculty time and effort manually entering data that already resides in the institution’s information systems. However, the technology staff that runs the back-office system is often different and far removed from the academic computing professionals responsible for integrating technology into instruction

Green, K.C. (2000). The campus computing project. North Carolina. http://www.campuscomputing.net

Higher education e-learning (2001). Report prepared by Merrill Lynch for The Wall Street Journal. (March 12, 2001)

Kerry, B. & Isakson, J. (2001). The power of the Internet for learning: Moving from promise to practice. Report of the Web-based Education Commission. Washington, D.C. http://www.webcommission.org

Khan, B. (1997). Web-based instruction (WBI): What is it and why is it? Badrul H. Khan (Ed.) Web-based Instruction. Educational Technology Publications, Inc.: Englewood Cliffs, NJ

Zastrocky, M. (2000). Higher education enterprise portals: What’s next? report of The GartnerGroup, Higher Education Technology Sector (HETS), http://www.gartner.com