“Bringing Online Education to Employees”

If you can’t send your employees to school, bring school to them.

Nearly half of all U.S. colleges and universities now offer classes taught by audio, video or over the Internet, according to a new U.S. Department of Education study. Between the school years 1994-95 and 1997-98 the number of universities offering "distance-learning" classes rose from about 33% to 44%. During that same period, the number of course offerings and enrollments in distance learning nearly doubled.

Driving demand is the number of adult workers looking to enhance their careers. There were more than 54,000 different distance-education courses offered in the 1997-98 school year, with about 1.6 million students enrolled. Subjects ranged from computer science to criminal justice.

The Internet is generating the lion’s share of increases. Institutions offering Internet classes in their distance-learning programs nearly tripled from 60% in 1997-98, up from 22% in 1994-95.