Karen Vignare, Michigan State University

Understanding the Landscape

• Models and compatibility with mission, vision, values, strategy

• Rubrics for baselines• Measures of success• Managing change in dynamic environment

Business Models

• Incremental• Alliance• Cost or profit center• Overhead or service center• Independent, for-profit

Respondents

College Classification Sample Percentage

Doctoral 31

Master’s 24

Baccalaureate 22

Associates 17

Specialty 2

Goals of Online Learning

• Rank Order (Most Important)• Extension, surplus, brand value, diversity, on-campus

retention & speed to graduation

• Rank Order (Not Important)• Speed to graduation, retention, diversity, surplus, brand

value & extension

• Rank Order (Combined top two ranking)• Brand, extension, surplus, retention, diversity & speed to

graduation

Online Course Development

• How is it done?• Individual faculty develop and deliver• Individual faculty develop but others deliver• Faculty team develops and delivers• Faculty team develops and others deliver

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

Business Planning Integrated Marketing Functions

Price Setting Ability to enter partnerships

Ability to remove products from the

market

Business Decision Making

Ind Self Funded College Unit Self Funded College overhead

Student Services

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

Student services

Technical support

Quality contro

l for th

e learning experience

Retention for non-credit s

tudents/custo

mers/...

Retention for students enrolled in cre

dit bea...

Ind Self Funded College Unit Self Funded College Overhead

Curriculum Issues

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%

Ability to hirefaculty instructors

Ability to createnew customized

curriculum

Ability to createnew non-credit

curriculum

Ability to createnew creditcurriculum

Ind Self funded College Unit Self Funded College Overhead

Starting points and goals

• Most institutions began online learning programs with 1 of 2 goals (Miller, Schiffman unpublished paper)• To extend access to programs• To improve quality of existing programs

» e.g., retention, throughput• What was your starting point? • What were (are) your initial goals?

Value chain

DESIGN

DEVELOP

DELIVER

MAINTAIN

BUSINESS DECISIONS

STUDENT SERVICES DECISIONS

CURRICULUM DECISIONS

IMPROVEMENT LOOP

Institutional “Fit”

• Why do some institutions succeed and others fail?• Using technology to develop new delivery system is

complex• The link among mission, vision, values, and strategy

is critical

Some words about costs

• Courses run from faculty time to $500,000 USD• If you plan a course that can be shared amongst many

faculty short-term investment increases but long-term costs are

• Programmatic costs (for a certificate to degree)—USD $50,000 to $ 1,000,000

• Institutional costs USD $50,000 to $10,000,000

Some words about costs

• REMEMBER: US market now 50% of online belongs to for-profit companies making billions—so if you don’t build someone else will

• US universities went after high value markets first • Graduate degrees mostly Master’s programs—

Business, Information Technology, Education, Engineering

Some words about costs

• Then two year programs based on need to be scalable (like community colleges)• Focused on top 20 courses taught throughout the country• Most charged a technology fee

• Only now ten years after launch is the US addressing four year degrees• Typically general degrees—Nursing, Education, Business,

Information Technology and Cross-Disciplinary degrees

Some words about sustainability

• US model is tuition based and grant/scholarship funded

• Technology costs are generally shareable across the university as on-ground services are expected to move online

• All students will demand internet based services• Current method of lecture based is actually a bad

investment but it is cheap enough that no one cares

MSU Case Study

• Functions needed for Scaling• MSU current methods• Vendor approaches• Costs/Recommendations

• Comparative Survey amongst Big Ten

Discussion

• Lessons learned without investment market will leave, will it happen here

Summary

• Best approach is to get started with grants and as a group.

• Use collaborative approaches to build foundation courses

• Allow universities to specialize with blended/experiential curriculum

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© Karen Vignare, Michigan State University, MEAS project.

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Disclaimer

This presentation was made possible by the

generous support of the American people

through the United States Agency for

International Development, USAID. The

contents are the responsibility of the

author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the

views of USAID or the United States

Government.