The Provision of e-learning in the European Union

The Provision of E-learning in the European Union by Per Arneberg, Desmond Keegan, Jüri Lõssenko, Ildikó Mázár, Pedro Fernández Michels, Morten ` Flate Paulsen, Torstein Rekkedal, Albert Sangra, Jan Atle Toska, Dénes Zarka

The provision of e-learning in the European Union

by

Per Arneberg, Desmond Keegan, Jüri Lõssenko, Ildikó Mázár, Pedro Fernández Michels, Morten Flate Paulsen, Torstein Rekkedal, Jan Atle Toska, Albert Sangrà and Dénes Zarka

The provision of e-learning in the European Union

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Š Megatrends Project 2007 1st edition.

Publisher:

NKI Publishing House, Hans Burumsvei 30, N-1357 Bekkestua, Norway P.O. Box 111, N-1319 Bekkestua, Norway Telephone: +47 67 58 88 00/ +47 67 58 89 00 Fax: +47 67 58 19 02 E-mail: fapost@nki.no Homepage: www.nkiforlaget.no Project Homepage: www.nettskolen.com/in_english/megatrends

Copyright Š Megatrends Project 2007. All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission.

This publication was produced with funding from the Leonardo da Vinci programme of the European Commission. The sole responsibility for the content of this report lies with the authors. The Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.

ISBN 978 82 562 68177

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The provision of e-learning in the European Union

Contents Foreword .................................................................................................................................... 4 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 5 Country Reports ....................................................................................................................... 15 Austria ...................................................................................................................................... 16 Belgium .................................................................................................................................... 18 Cyprus ...................................................................................................................................... 21 Czech Republic ........................................................................................................................ 24 Denmark ................................................................................................................................... 25 Estonia...................................................................................................................................... 27 Finland...................................................................................................................................... 29 France ....................................................................................................................................... 31 Germany ................................................................................................................................... 37 Greece....................................................................................................................................... 40 Ireland....................................................................................................................................... 42 Italy........................................................................................................................................... 45 Hungary.................................................................................................................................... 51 Latvia........................................................................................................................................ 54 Lithuania................................................................................................................................... 55 Luxembourg ............................................................................................................................. 58 Malta......................................................................................................................................... 59 Netherlands............................................................................................................................... 60 Norway ..................................................................................................................................... 61 Poland....................................................................................................................................... 63 Portugal .................................................................................................................................... 65 Slovakia.................................................................................................................................... 67 Slovenia.................................................................................................................................... 70 Spain......................................................................................................................................... 73 Sweden ..................................................................................................................................... 84 United Kingdom....................................................................................................................... 86 Bibliography............................................................................................................................. 89 About the Authors .................................................................................................................... 92

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Foreword This is one of four books published as a result of the Leonardo da Vinci project “Megatrends in e-learning provision”.

The four books are: 1. The first book, The Provision of e-learning in the European Union (ISBN 978 82 82 562 68177), presents data gathered from Norway and the 25 members of the European Union as an introductory overview of the provision of e-learning in Europe.

2. The second book, Megaproviders of e-learning in Europe (ISBN 978 82 82 562 88184), includes 26 case study articles of European megaproviders of e-learning.

3. The third book, E-learning initiatives that did not reach targeted goals (ISBN 978 82 82 562 68276), provides case study articles and analyses of nine prestigious European elearning initiatives that did not reach their targeted goals.

4. The fourth book, Analyses of European megaproviders of e-learning (ISBN 978 82 82 562 68191), presents important success factors identified by the in-depth analyses of both the megaproviders and the discontinued initiatives identified in the project.

All four books, a comprehensive bibliography and a set of recommendations can be downloaded free of charge from the project’s web-site at: www.nettskolen.com/in_english/megatrends The provision of e-learning in the European Union is a product of the Leonardo da Vinci project ‘Megatrends in e-learning provision.’

The partners in the ‘Megatrends in e-learning provision’ project are: • • • • • • •

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NKI Fjernundervisning (NKI Distance Education), Bekkestua, Norway Distance Education International, Dublin, Ireland Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (The Open University of Catalonia), Barcelona, Spain Eesti Infotehnoloogia Sihtasutus, (Estonian Information Technology Foundation), Tallinn, Estonia Norgesuniversitetet (Norwegian Opening Universities), Tromsø, Norway European Distance and E-Learning Network, Milton Keynes, UK Budapesti Műszaki és Gazdaságtudományi Egyetem (Budapest University of Technology and Economics), Budapest, Hungary

The provision of e-learning in the European Union

Introduction The Provision of E-Learning in the European Union is a product of the Leonardo da Vinci project ‘Megatrends in e-learning provision’.

The objective of the ‘Megatrends in e-learning provision’ project was firstly, to identify the megaproviders of e-learning in the European Union, that is to identify e-learning systems which have achieved robustness, sustainability and critical mass to such an extent that one can confidently assert that they are permanent providers of e-learning in Europe and will not be going away.

The second objective was to carry out case studies of the successful institutions to identify how and for what reasons they had successfully matured as e-learning providers and had passed the stage of being a project and had achieved maturity today.

The third objective was to write up the project’s findings on the megatrends and the megaproviders for the benefit of the European Commission and for the benefit of e-learning institutions and practitioners in Europe.

The project set up these strict criteria for inclusion as a megaprovider.

The institution had to either: •

Enroll more than 5000 enrollments in e-earning courses per year

•

Have more than 100 online courses on offer at any one time provided that Institutions whose e-learning provision was from a base in the United States of America or elsewhere outside Europe would not be included in the surveys

or

•

and provided also that •

The students were distance education students, that is students who did at least 50.1% of their course off-campus.

The last criterion was controversial and difficult to administer, because institutions and governments do not gather statistics that reflect the required data.

It was included for two reasons: • •

Firstly, this is a distance education research project. Some of the project group (Rekkedal, Paulsen, Keegan for instance) had worked extensively in distance education and had made major contributions to the literature of distance education.

Secondly, it made the project possible. If this criterion were not included the project would be impossible as there would probably be hundreds of institutions qualifying and the dimensions would be unmanageable.

During the course of the project it was clear that important data were being gathered from most countries, but that excellent work in e-earning was being omitted from the study because

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of the size of the populations of a number of countries (Ireland, Estonia for example). It was decided therefore to publish the data gathered from the whole 26 countries studied (the 25 members of the European Union in 2006 plus Norway) in book form, as an introductory overview of the provision of e-learning in the European Union.

No one is more conscious than the researchers within the Megatrends project that there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of experts and practitioners in the 26 countries studied who know more about e-learning in their area or district than they do. In every survey of this kind local knowledge is more accurate than research findings in identifying a phenomenon in a local area.

This is an open project. The researchers look for and welcome clarification, correction or additional data. All the findings of the project have been published un-passworded on the project website from the start at www.nettskolen.com/in_english/megatrends/the_project.html with an invitation to readers throughout the world to contribute correction, precision or commentary. Many have already done so and their contributions have been included in the findings of the project. The results of the project thus far have also been distributed to the 850 members of the European distance and e-Learning Network (EDEN), the leading grouping of European experts and stakeholders in e-learning, representing 350 institutions and 50 countries, with an invitation to provide correction or additional data.

With the publication of this book we repeat this invitation. If you know mistakes in the research, omissions in the data, or valuable commentary that should be added to the report, please send it to the Megatrends project at morten-flate.paulsen@nki.no.

e-Learning index The Economist e-Learning index indicates a country’s ability to produce, use and expand Internet-based learning. It is built up from scores for education, industry, government and society. This index gives an indication of the preparedness of the European Union countries for the provision of e-learning.

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The provision of e-learning in the European Union

Figure 1 E-learning index (The Economist)

Methodology The partners of the project distributed the countries of the European Union plus Norway between them. However, as the countries and regions differed a lot, the researchers in practice chose different solutions for collecting valid and reliable data. Dependent on the individual researcher’s knowledge of the actual country or region the following common directions were given: Contact the Ministry of Education (and/or the Ministry for Universities) in each country allocated to you. From the Ministry it was recommended to try to get information about possible official e-learning officers in the country and leading e-learning experts. Try to get support for the project from leading experts in identifying the 5 leading e-learning providers in the country. Try to get data on the size of these providers in terms of annual enrollments and number of courses and possible contact persons at the institutions. In addition known experts from the field were identified, based on personal knowledge and membership of the major European organizations in the field, European Distance Education and E-Learning Network (EDEN), European Association of distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) and European Association for Distance Learning (EADL). Further, national surveys, such as the work in the United Kingdom of Britain and Liber (2003), could constitute valuable information for further examination.

Some references to procedures are presented below.

Survey of Norway The search for megaproviders was carried out with a base in Norway Opening Universities (NOU). NOU is a national governmental agency for flexible and lifelong learning in Norway.

NOU focuses primarily on higher education and has a good overview of e- learning at higher educations institutions. In addition, the project partners at NKI had detailed and extensive

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knowledge about other parts of the distance education landscape in Norway. Thus, the list of megaproviders identified (given below) should be considered exhaustive.

The search has identified four institutions that are clearly megaproviders. Three of them are private education institutions and one is a public university college. The three private institutions provide courses within higher education, secondary level education and vocational training. The university college offers higher education courses.

The four institutions are: • • • •

NKI Distance Education (NKI DE) (www.nki.no).

NKS Distance Education (NKS DE) (www.nks.no).

BI Distance Education (Norwegian School of Management) (www.bi.no).

Sør-Trøndelag University College (www.hist.no).

Further information about Norway is given in the alphabetical presentation of countries below.

Survey of Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands The literature search for these countries was initially based on one of the Megtrends project researcher’s book Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E-learning in a Scandinavian Perspective (Paulsen 2003). Part Three of the book Global E-learning in a Nordic Perspective includes several articles about e-learning in the Nordic countries (Paulsen 2003a, b, c and e), Sweden (Holmberg 2003, Paulsen 2003d) and Denmark (Nipper 2003).

Another valuable source was Ranebo’s (2001) report on Nordic initiatives to develop virtual universities.

The search for megaproviders started with the seven potential regional candidates identified through the two EU-funded projects CISEAR (Paulsen 2000) and WEB-EDU (Paulsen et al.

2002). The institution’s contact persons were asked whether they could confirm that they were megaproviders. Only the contact persons at the University of Lund in Sweden and the Open Universiteit Nederland confirmed that the institutions were megaproviders. It was later hard to get other sources to reconfirm that the University of Lund was a megaprovider.

A number of individual experts on online education were asked to suggest potential megaproviders. The experts were identified and chosen based on the researcher’s personal network developed through twenty years’ work with international online education.

The three important European networks for e- learning, EDEN (www.eden-online.org), EADTU (www.eadtu.nl), and EADL (www.eadl.org) were also approached. Requests for nomination were distributed to the EDEN members through the EDEN Newsflash in November 2005 and as an EDEN Request in September 2006. The participants at the EDEN conferences in Helsinki (2005) and Castelldefels (2006) were also invited to nominate potential megaproviders. An invitation to submit nomination was e-mailed to the EADTU secretariat and the preliminary project results were presented at the EADTU annual conference in Tallinn (2006). A request for nominations was also distributed via the EADTU newsletter in the autumn of 2006. (These activities were in support of the surveys for all the countries).

This research has so far identified two potential megaproviders in Germany, one in the Netherlands and one in Sweden as indicated in Table 1 below.

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Table 1 Potential megaproviders in the Netherlands, Sweden and Germany Institution name Open Universiteit Nederland Virtuele Hochschule Bayern Lund University Oncampus Fachhochschule Lübeck

URL

Number of course enrolments (2005)

Number of online courses

Average of enrolments per course

www.ou.nl

44432

270

165

www.vhb.org

20000

150

133

www.lu.se

10000

100

100

www.oncampus.de

9386

119

79

In addition several independent sources indicate that Markkinointi-instituutti in Finland and Leidse onderwijsinstellingen (LOI) in the Netherlands probably are megaproviders. These institutions do, however, decline to provide information for the research.

The research does not by any means indicate that these are the only potential megaproviders in these countries. Therefore, as stated above, the project appreciates any feedback regarding additional institutions that may qualify as megaproviders.

Survey of Austria and Cyprus The following procedures were followed in the research undertaken in order to identify the megaproviders of e-learning in Cyprus and Austria. The initial list of candidates comes from either careful web research using a number of different keywords and search engines or official sources like the ministries of science/education of the different countries, or lists made by competent educational researchers of the respective countries. Further information was basically gathered using four different channels: • • • •

E-mail contact (administration or competent contacts within the institution) Telephone (administration or competent contacts within the institution) Personal face-to-face conversation with competent contacts Web research (Web sites and pages of each institution, articles or other information about the institution).

Survey of Hungary, Slovenia and Slovakia The investigation of Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia regarding e-learning megaprovision, conducted by the European Distance and E-Learning Network (EDEN), was two-fold. On one hand, using EDEN’s professional experience, clearly relevant cases directly could have been identified; on the other hand, by the use of EDEN’s extensive contact list, there was a great coverage of the three countries.

The validation of the research’s findings derives from the fact, that all of the EDEN network was invited to provide information about the state of the art of the e-learning in the selected

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countries and in the region in general as well as informing us of relevant case studies, providing us with contact of the major providers.

There was a lot of feedback from the network members of EDEN although the majority of them came from the western countries.

Given this massive coverage of the international e-learning scene, it was very apparent that the reason we did not receive any feedback from Slovenia and Slovakia about e-learning megaprovision was most likely the fact that there is not any. This assumption was later confirmed by the region’s experts who were contacted personally. The report is the result of formal and informal conversations with experts, feedback from the EDEN members and desk research conducted by the research team of EDEN. There was a lot of feedback from the network members although the majority of them came from the western countries. At the moment, the EDEN network has more than 850 members, representing almost 350 institutions; covering 50 countries (see the figure below).

Figure 2 EDEN members’ geographical coverage (a. NAP members, b. Institutions represented in the membership, c. Institutional members from left to right)

In spite of the effort to follow the agreed procedures to examine and report the situation in these three countries, the country reports do differ in their presentation. Some give more extensive account of the status of e-learning in the actual country and give more detailed information on individual institutions than others. Thus, it is important to note that there is no real connection between the level of details presented and the level of e-learning development in the countries presented.

The common features of Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia are that they are all small countries with official languages not typically spoken beyond their borders. The cost of creating elearning content in their national languages is very high. In the case of Slovenia, the differences are present even within the country: although a small one, the regional differences (from language dialects to economic developments) are surprisingly strong.

Also, these countries have only joined the European Union relatively recently; therefore they are only slowly opening up their educational programmes to the larger public. Another commonly applicable phenomenon in these countries is that their larger-scale e-learning initiatives are mainly considering the development of mainstream education, slowly supplementing higher education (HE) institutions’ programmes with e-learning elements, such as electronic administration portals and the use of Learning Management Systems (LMS-es). In most cases these initiatives are yet in a premature stage to meet the project 10

The provision of e-learning in the European Union

criteria, but they are definitely strong and promising, and they are likely to reach a stage when some of them can be added to the Megatrends list sooner or later.

Survey of the provision of e-learning in 10 new European Union states The situation of ICT and e-learning in the Central Eastern European region can best be understood by realizing that for these newly accessed countries the challenge of modernization and the building of the information society all starts from a drawback, and adds up to parallel, cumulative tasks. Certainly, in this field also, the accession played a very important role in the definition of the national strategy and priorities but there is still a lot of work ahead of them before they diminish the huge gap between Eastern and Western Europe and the USA (see the figure below).

Figure 3 Economist Intelligence Unit e-learning readiness rankings, 2003 – The above ratings take into account nearly 150 qualitative and quantitative criteria in four main areas: Connectivity (the quality and extent of Internet infrastructure), Capability (a country’s ability to deliver and consume elearning, based on literacy rates, and trends in training and education), Content (the quality and pervasiveness of online learning materials) and Culture (behaviours, beliefs and institutions that support e-Learning development within country).

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The main constraints on the researched region’s providers to create a strong e-learning provision are the following: • • • • • •

difference in languages, the state of their economy, different education and training systems, difference in the national curricula and examination, divergence of cultures, difference in the market size.

GDP % expenditure on education 7 5,8 6

5,2

5

4,5

5,6

5,5

5,5

5,6

6,2 6,1

5,8 5,5 5

4,5

4,2 4,3

4 4

2000

3

2003

2 1 0 Czech Estonia Hungary Republic

Latvia

Lithuania

Poland

Slovakia Slovenia

Figure 4 GDP % expenditure on education in 8 of the 10 New EU Member Countries

Another commonly applicable phenomenon in these countries is that their larger-scale elearning initiatives are mainly considering the development of mainstream education, slowly supplementing higher education (HE) institutions’ programmes with e-learning elements, such as electronic administration portals and the use of Learning Management Systems (LMS-es). In most cases these initiatives are still in a premature stage to meet the project criteria, but they are definitely strong and promising, and they are likely to reach a stage when some of them can be added to the Megatrends list sooner or later.

As a matter of fact, according to a recent study titled “Benchmarking Access and Use of ICT in European Schools 2006” a strong increase in ICT use took place over the past 5 years and schools have moved over to broadband and the first measurement available for the New Member States are also showing encouraging signs. The percentage of schools having broadband internet access 2006 is shown on Figure 5 below. These statistics, however only concern school level education; give a valuable illustration of broadband access in the EU member countries.

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Figure 5 Percentage of schools having broadband internet access 2006

There were several initiatives both at national and European Union level which aimed at elearning development and the building of the information society in general. One of the programmes of which the main aim was to support the national governments in their efforts for the development of the information society was the eEurope+ initiative in 2001. The eEurope+ was carried out with the participation of the then candidate countries, and the countries of the next round of accession (Romania, Bulgaria) and Turkey.

The goals of the initiatives – mirroring that of the eEurope initiative – are the following: • • • •

to foster economic reforms and modernisation; to help organizational development; to support competition and to facilitate social cohesion.

The goal of the program was to survey, to analyze, to stimulate and to support the national governments in their definition of the national action plan for the development of the knowledge society. In these initiatives, a strong emphasis was put on the commitment of the local government.

The surveys were concentrated on the following fields: • • • • • •

the development of and the access to telecommunication infrastructure (bandwidth, the degree of digital divide, system security); the presence of ICT in education and in research; the existence of public e-points; access of those who are living with disabilities; the relation between ICT and gender: does a digital divide exit between genders, what is the proportion of women and men among Internet users, and what is the proportion of gender in IT education; how would it be possible to encourage the use, how often and where do people have access, and what is the purpose of their usage.

Besides education, the other two research topics were eBusiness and eGovernment.

Considering eGovernment, the kind of on-line services are accessible to citizens and to

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businesses was surveyed, also the on-line presence in the healthcare sector, and the existence and level of the information flow between the different sectors.

The report stated that the participating countries in the four years of the program were successful in many objectives or at least they are on the right way to meet them, but there are still a lot of steps ahead to create the knowledge society (the program made actual suggestions to the national governments).

The provision of e-learning in the 10 new members of the European Union that joined in 2004: the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Sovakia, Sovenia, Malta, Cyprus, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania is at present being studied in an important project, Next steps in developing Information Society Services in the New Member States. This is the project website: www.jrc.es/activities/information-society/e-applications.cfm The aim of the project is to analyse the current situation in the new member states in the following three domains - eGovernment, eHealth, eLearning - and based on this analysis to propose actions for the Commission.

The planned products of this project are: • • • • • • •

10 eGovernment Country reports (at least 100 pages per country) 10 eHealth Country reports (at least 100 pages per country) 10 e-learning Country Reports (at least 75 pages per country) 1 eHealth Synthesis report (80-100 pages) 1 eGovernment Synthesis report (80-100 pages) 1 e-learning synthesis report (80-100 pages) 1 eServices Synthesis report (80-100 pages).

The results of this project were not available at the time of publication of this volume.

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Country Reports

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Austria Austrian e-learning activity can be observed from different aspects. Government is enhancing the Austrian education system via major programs like e-fit Austria, in the framework of the Austrian National Development Plan. On the other hand there is quite a bit of e-learning activity in the adult education, and training sector.

While national programmes are well administered, e-learning on the educational market is a fragmented activity. Many training companies have started the introduction of e-learning to support their activities, and there is quite a lot of small companies who produce e-learning material for internal use of the industry.

E-learning enterprises Links to enterprises working in the e-learning field: • • • • •

Click and Learn www.clickandlearn.at Infowerk www.infowerk.at Xplain www.xplain.at Kochmedia www.kochmedia.com Dynamicmedia www.dynamicmedia.at

In the educational sector, they mainly do not provide courses but an Authoring and eTesting tool (as well as an LMS), so that their clients are able to create their courses themselves.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Wu Konig www.wukonig.com Unilog www.unilog.at Easybusiness www.easybusiness.at MIT www.mit.at Digitale Akademie www.digitale-akademie.at/index2.htm Wktirol www.wktirol.at Bauakademie www.bauakademie.at HR Management www.hrmanagement.at Wiener Trainerakademie www.wienertrainerakademie Sriptech www.striptech.at Teamconsult www.teamconsult.at Perfect Traning www.perfecttraining.com

Training providers • • •

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WIFI www.wifi.at BFI www.bfi.at bit media e-Learning solution www.bitmedia.cc

The provision of e-learning in the European Union

bit media is a definite megaprovider in Austria. bit media is offering its services under different web addresses, like: • • •

www.lernportal.at www.bildung.at www.sbx.at

In each case the provider of the courses (content) - is bit media. Additionally they also develop and operate the technical solutions (e-learning portals/learning management systems) through which the courses are delivered.

Overall figures e -learning portals powered and operated by bit media: • • •

Number of course enrollments in 2005: 32000 Number of online courses: 126 Average number of enrollments per course: 250

Higher education The Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration (WU) WU is one of the largest business schools worldwide. It has a total of more than 25,000 students, and more than 4,000 freshmen enrolled for the academic year starting in October 2002. Each semester, approximately 2,000 courses are offered at the WU. The Learn@WU project was launched in order to ease the learning situation for freshmen.

The main objective of this project was to provide an electronic learning environment for students and faculty in order to support the mass courses.

As of May 2003, Learn@WU had more than 8,500 registered users, of whom about 4,000 used the system regularly (all first-year students). Usage patterns on the platform change substantially during the semester. At the beginning, students use Learn@WU to download educational material accompanying the courses they wish to take. Later they prepare for the exam by using self assessment tests.

University of Innsbruck They are a “traditional” University but have an e-learning policy since 2000.Their main tool is Blackboard, in 2005 they had about 1300 active Blackboard courses with about 18.000 students using BB in some way (which means almost all “active” students are using BB). In 2006 all their “traditional” courses also have an associated BB course, but faculty are still free to use those courses.

The number of “e-learning only” courses is still small - but will increase when Bologna compliant study programs start in 2007. They also have an active community of teachers developing e-learning materials, help desk and support staff for e-learning.

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Belgium The research has identified the following major providers of e-learning in Belgium.

Belgacom Belgacom is the Belgian national telecommunications agency. It runs the Belgacom Corporate University (BCU) which provides e-learning training for company staff and to a limited extent to the general public.

The BCU has over 100 courses, which are available for company training and to a certain extent to the general public. Over the course of a year several thousands of students would take these courses.

Flemish community U and I Learning UNI-Learning is a large Belgian e-learning provider. They present themselves thus: “We are passionate about developing and delivering effective e-learning and content solutions that help people to perform better. Our best practices and proven instructional designs ensure that your employees, customers and partners get the skills and knowledge they need, to move your business forward.

U&I Learning is passionate about developing and delivering compelling, results-oriented and custom e-learning solutions that enable people to perform better. Our solutions have a direct impact on job performance by teaching the precise skills and knowledge that your employees need on the job. U&I Learning’s experience goes beyond the need for training. We offer services for various industries, including banking and insurance, pharmaceutical and health care, manufacturing and distribution, and the public sector.

Our e-learning technology is based on the Learning Service 5 architecture. This architecture is designed to create, deliver, coach, monitor and administer learning activities via the Internet.

Learning Service 5 accelerates knowledge development and management. It offers coaching facilities and assessment tools, improving corporate processes and operational flows. Its open technology allows you to create your own courses or plug in external content.�

VDAB VDAB is the Flemish Vocational Training Authority. Besides its extensive face-to-face training courses it also has a large role in e -learning training. VDAB has a large e-learning operation, providing courses for the unemployed and job seekers. Because the e -learning courses are free of charge they are very popular.

VDAB has 430 online courses and in 2005 had an enrolment of 30,000.

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KU Leuven E-learning at the KU Leuven is run by the AV Net. All 25000 students at the university do digital learning. The university is a mixed mode institution which provides e-learning for all students on campus.

Instruxion Instruxion is a major e-learning provider. Instruxion is a developer of e-learning courseware.

They focus on advanced courseware development, using advanced formats, multimedia and voice over support. They believe that the market considers text based courses and reading based courses are unsatisfactory. All their courses, therefore, are animated and have voice over. Much of their courseware is tailor made for customers.

Instruxion is a young company but its course profile is growing rapidly and they are working with international partners in the development of e-learning solutions. For the delivery of their courses they work with the 3 larges web providers in Belgium: MSN, Telenet, Skynet. These companies run the web content and consumers can subscribe to the courses and view the content.

Instruxion also have a range of courses focused on the home user: courses on software, Word and Excel; on home related subjects like First Aid and Spanish for Travellers.

They present themselves thus: “Instruxion is a fast growing Belgian e-learning company and as a real trend setter offers cutting edge e-learning based on the unique “high impact” concept, without doubt the best elearning concept available on the market today. Instruxion specializes in the creation of online multimedia e-learning content, using a powerful combination of strong pedagogical and graphical design.

This online learning content is offered in a new, different and very attractive format: animated, interactive, and guided by a professional voice-over. This “high impact” format ensures that a company’s investment in training for employees or marketing communication towards a specific target audience is very effective and reaches its business goals. The combination of the attractive format with carefully designed didactical content is a strong differentiator in the e-learning industry. Instruxion develops content for both national (Belgian) as international customers, and for all kinds of target audiences, regardless of their education level: technical, sales & marketing, employees or end users, and even the general public.

A new way of learning. More than just online text reading. Instruxion helps organisations reach their business objectives with a new approach to e-learning and market education. We develop attractive and effective content, aligned with business goals and customised to your needs. We provide new learning experiences, which engage the online user and achieve real and measurable learning. We create online learning and marketing solutions that impact knowledge, skills and behaviour.”

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French community Université de Liège The University of Liège has an e-learning department of 35 staff. The University offers more than 145 online courses and 14,000 FTE enrolments on a WebCT campus licence. The virtual campus at the university is administered by LabSET, a unit of IFRES. Every student who enrolls at the university is given a WebCT address and they do varying numbers of courses by e-learning: some 1 or more; some 5 to 10. There is an on-going debate on whether they should stay with WebCT. The University of Liège is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

Université Libre de Bruxelles The Université Libre de Bruxelles has more than 100 online courses and a large enrolment from a university with about 20,000 students. There is an e-learning department with less than 10 staff. The department is very active internally in the university.

Forem Forem is the vocational training authority for the French-speaking community in Belgium. It corresponds to VDAB on the Flemish side.

Forem is a large organization, which runs vocational training courses all the way from faceto-face to fully online. Students can study totally online or face-to-face with 1 -2 hours of elearning. Forem have recently adopted a new Learning Management System and have set out to make their products more uniform and change the e-learning landscape.

Forem, like its counterpart VDAB, provides courses for the unemployed and job seekers.

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Cyprus The current supply of e-learning courses in Cyprus is very weakly developed. Learning provision is based upon rather traditional techniques. E-learning provision could be researched in schools and in distance education institutions. E-learning in Cyprus is catching up, but it is mainly offered as a supplement to traditional degrees. Several organizations participate in EU funded projects focusing on e-learning. There are several occasions where institutions in Cyprus collaborate with other international organisations in offering online degrees.

Compulsory education The Cyprus Ministry of education is offering (Roumanian) LMS for founding e-learning infrastructure for 650 schools. Use of ICT and e-learning in public schools is in an embryonic state content cannot be researched in that phase. In the Cyprus school system e-learning content can be found therefore researched mostly in private schools. They use ICT for supporting their pupils in different aspects of learning.

• • • • •

Using computers for pupils fulfilling homework, assignments, by researching on the web.

Using applications like Autocad and Photoshop for learning purposes (intra curriculum activity).

Using specially designed CBT for learning, for example Educational software in Geography.

Web based activity is not very successful due to the narrow band access.

There is no observable on-line learning activity in those schools.

Adult and higher education Cyprus Productivity Centre The Cyprus Productivity Centre (CPC) was established in 1963 by the Cyprus Government, with assistance from the United Nations Development Program and the International Labour Office; the relevant co-operation agreement expired on 30th November 1974 and the Government has since taken over completely the operation of the Centre. Administratively, the CPC is a Department of the Ministry of Labour and Social Insurance. This system is expected to provide additional support to the traditional training programs and to enable the Cyprus Productivity Centre to design and operate e-learning training programs in Greek, which will be tailor made so as to meet specific needs of the business community in Cyprus.

The e-Learning Management System is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2006.

Cyprus e-Learning 2005: Expertise and Business Partnership (Cyprus Portal) For people to acquire these skills Cypriot education and training programmes must be able to meet the challenges ahead. e-Education will open the door to digital inclusion by responding to the major challenges of the 21st century: to promote the e-Europe initiative and especially the lifelong learning, encourage universal access to global education and help people,

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particularly youth, acquire the qualifications and skills they need to realise the benefits of the knowledge society.

As the understanding of the role of IT for enhancing learning processes increases, e-learning is starting to show real benefits. There are new opportunities for learner interaction – both face to face and at a distance – by combining traditional education with innovative educational pathways. This ‘blended’ flexible approach to the provision of e-learning must be complemented by a similar flexibility in content and services.

There seem to be obvious advantages for Cypriot SMEs to use e-learning, as they cannot afford the costs and time involved in sending staff to off-site/abroad training. However, further effort is required to allow small companies to understand, shape and use e-learning tools and methods according to their own requirements. In addition, corporate e-learning solutions often require significant investment in infrastructure, content and services, and are therefore only cost effective when there is a sufficiently large number of learners.

Therefore new approaches are required to help SMEs achieve the critical mass necessary for cost-effective e-learning solutions. Public administration organisations must speculate as to how constraints such as the legal framework, accreditation and policy measures can be reformed to accommodate e-learning/e-training transactions and at the same time exploit the opportunity of providing better service to their citizens. Public figures such as parliament members and ministers must be exposed to the potential growth of this business sector. They have to understand the opportunities in designing tomorrow’s digital education that will allow the economy of the country to depart from dependency on a single volume source of income such as travel and tourism, which are so fragile these days.

HE institutions having some kind of e-learning activity: • • •

Intercollege (the largest higher education institution in Cyprus) www.intercollege.ac.cy CARDET (Center for the Advancement of Research and Development in Educational Technology) (a non-profit research and development organization focusing on elearning) www.cardet.org University of Cyprus www.ucy.ac.cy

Open University of Cyprus (www.ouc.ac.cy) The procedures for the establishment of the Open University of Cyprus proceeded as the Interim Governing Board is taking the necessary measures to commence the operations of the university in January 2006. The Interim Board has convened in 12 sessions and has dealt with issues regarding the preparation of all budgetary, legal and functional problems for the operation of the university.

Distance learning, in particular in higher education, is now a reality in Cyprus through the start this year of the Open University. Speaking at a special ceremony to mark the start of the first academic year of the Open University, House President Demetris Christofias said a university reflects its era and the conscience of society and described this means of education as progressive and revolutionary.

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The Open University aims to meet the fundamental need for broad education and offers the inalienable right to education for everybody, irrespective of age, he said. At this early stage the Open University will offer two post graduate programmes of study, in the administration of health units and in education.

Methodology

The Open University utilizes a variety of media to help students learn no matter where the students are located. The following techniques and methods are employed: • • •

By means of course material in digital form, received either over the Internet or through CDs and DVDs, or from printed course materials.

By attending lectures via the Internet and, in the near future, using subscription television, at fixed timetables, specified by the teaching personnel, By using the Electronic Portal in order to: – Find relevant information concerning Thematic Units, which are the basic operational units of each course – Contact professors or lecturers using synchronized and non-synchronized technologies such as chat, videoconferencing, and forums.

– Exchange ideas, thoughts and opinions with other students who are studying the same Thematic Units.

– By directly communicating with the teaching personnel over the telephone at predetermined times.

On-line E-learning provision in the University is in the longer-term plans. There is no on-line content provision currently.

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Czech Republic At the beginning of the 1990s, higher education institutions in the Czech Republic gradually learned about the techniques used in distance education. The main reason behind this process was the ever increasing demand for this type of studies on the part of applicants. In the Czech Republic there are no plans to establish an independent open university of the kind that exists in some countries in Western Europe. The trend is to provide distance education simultaneously with full-time programmes, i.e. to develop a kind of “dual” higher education institutions in this respect.

Distance education is based on a system of controlled self-study and requires that the educational institution should have very good technical facilities. This demands a relatively large initial investment in the development of study aids of high quality, in distance study centre facilities and in the training of educational, administrative and other staff. For these reasons, the development of distance education in the Czech Republic has been progressing only slowly.

A major contribution to the development of distance education in the Czech Republic was support by the EU by means of the Phare Programme – specifically through a multi-country project completed in 1999. Its main outcomes included the establishment of the quite well equipped (technical equipment, Internet access, distance education library) National Centre for Distance Education (NCDE) and four local centres for distance learning (Prague, Liberec, Brno and Olomouc). They form a basis of the distance education network in the Czech Republic. First steps in terms of collaboration with the European distance education network have been taken and support for further development is expected as part of the state longterm.

The Centre for Higher Education Studies The Centre for Higher Education Studies (CHES) is formed by four departments. Its major task is to conduct research into higher education (Research Department). However it also performs other tasks aiming to make use of the research results. These concern open and distance education (the National Centre for Distance Education), the information about recognition and higher education in the Czech Republic and, where applicable, in other countries (the Centre for Equivalence of Documents about Education Czech ENIC/NARIC), and implementation of European Union programmes in education (the National Agency for Educational Programmes of the European Union – the Socrates programme).

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Denmark According to Nipper (2003, 219), Danish education is firmly rooted in a long-standing tradition for learning through ‘the living word’ as opposed to the printed word. It emphasizes online education that includes face-to- face seminars and collaborative learning. So far, this may have been a wise strategy since collaborative learning is relatively swift and inexpensive to develop. But one may question if the use of face-to-face seminars make Danish online education more expensive and less flexible. One may also discuss whether collaborative learning is suitable in large-scale environments.

Denmark has initiated various national initiatives in order to enhance the use of ICT in education. In the middle of the 1990s the Danish government established The Centre for Technology Supported Education (CTU). CTU was ment to be a national knowledge centre for pedagogical use of ICT, providing funding to pedagogical ICT projects at Danish universities, colleges and schools. In 2000 the project funding was discontinued and CTU was closed down. In its place the Danish government established Learning Lab Denmark (LLD) as a unit at the Danish Pedagogical University to do research in learning, including ICT and learning. LLD still exists as a research unit. In education the Danish government around the turn of the century tried to establish Danish Virtual University (DVU) as a coordinating agency and a common portal for e-learning in Danish higher education. This top-down initiative was met with fierce opposition by the Danish universities. After some period of heated discussions the responsibility for the DVU development was handed over to the universities and nothing much has happened since then. In Denmark there is quite a number of interesting research and development done in the field of ICT and learning. Distance education and e-learning, however, remain small scale activities.

Two institutions were identified as large providers of online courses by both the CISAER and the Web-edu projects: • •

Center of Distance Learning www.cfu.dk had 500 online students and 41 online courses according to the CISAER project (Paulsen 2000).

Danmarks Netskole www.netskole.dk had 7,000 course enrolments and 40 online courses according to the Web-edu project (Paulsen 2002).

The contact people at these institutions now declined that they are megaproviders.

A request for nominations was distributed through UNEV’s (www.unev.dk) network of contacts at the offices of further and continuing education at the 12 Danish universities, to ITvest, and to Rektorkollegiet in Denmark. Similar requests were distributed to the members of the Danish Association of Flexible Learning (www.fluid.dk) via the FLUID newsletter and the e-learning newsletter Linqx (www.linqx.dk/x/index.php?searchterm=megatrends).

None of these requests resulted in any nominations as megaproviders of e-learning in Denmark.

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The following institution in Denmark is a member of EADL: •

Akademisk Brevskole A/S www.akademisk-brevskole.dk

The following institutions in Denmark are members of EDEN: • • • •

Copenhagen Business School http://cbs.dk HK/Privat www.hkprivat.dk/default.asp The Danish Association for Flexible Learning www.fluid.dk Tietgen Business College www.tietgen.dk

The Danish member of EADTU is the Danish Association of Open Universities (DAOU) http://mit.au.dk/daou.

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Estonia The establishment of the necessary infrastructure for open and distance education started in Estonia in 1994. By now Estonian universities are well prepared for distance education: a lot of experts who are familiar with educational concepts, good contacts with universities, distance education centres and research centres in other countries, co-operation between Estonian universities.

The statistics for July 2006 show that there are just over 1000 e-courses on offer in Estonian universities. Annual growth is expected to be about 20%. One third of the total numbers of students has participated in at least one online course. However, it is important to note that large majority of these courses are offered in a blended form as support to ordinary face to face sessions. Distance education programmes are offered mostly by the Open University offices within traditional universities in Estonia. There are currently no programmes in distance education that can be fully completed online.

The major providers of distance education are the following: • • •

University of Tartu Tallinn University of Technology Tallinn University

University of Tartu The Open University was established in 1996 to provide an opportunities for life-long learning for all those who are interested in it without causing serious disruptions in their every day lives.

The mission of the Open University is • • • •

to improve access to education to diversify study opportunities to make the education more student-centred, taking the student’s needs into greater account to provide high quality education under maximum flexibility, with course offerings being independent of time and place.

Today the Open University is a successful hallmark of the University of Tartu, covering both degree education and continuing education programmes through distance education or other “unconventional” learning environments. Training under the trademark of the Open University is provided by the standing faculties and colleges of the University of Tartu. The activities are coordinated by the Open University Office.

There are currently 135 online courses with approximately 5000 students on offer in distance education programmes.

Tallinn University of Technology About 120 courses are currently available online in a blended form to support the studies of on-campus students. No significant online initiatives are available in distance education programmes.

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Tallinn University There are about 350 active online courses listed in the university’s own learning management system IVA. Most of them are blended courses for on campus students but about 50 of the courses are offered in distance education programmes.

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Finland Two major sources about e- learning published in Finland are: • •

eLearning in Finland -Enhancing Knowledge-based Society Development (Markkula 2004) and Utbilda via Internet– Handbok i IT-pedagogik. LearnIT (Nyberg and Strandvall, 2000).

According to the University of Tampere: The Open University system in Finland is based on the Open University in Great Britain. The first Open University in Finland started in 1970 at the University of Tampere. Before that, Open University education had been available in summer universities. The big universities (Helsinki, Turku, Jyväskylä, Tampere, and Oulu) arrange about 70% of today’s Open University education. More than 80,000 students participate in Open University education every year. Open University education is available at 200 localities throughout Finland. (www.avoinyliopisto.fi/en-GB/open/intro.html).

The Finnish Virtual University (www.virtuaaliyliopisto.fi) is a partnership of all 21 Finnish universities. As described in the article Nordic Virtual Universities (Paulsen 2003), it is based on collaboration, division of labour, shared knowledge and the expertise of these member universities. It promotes online learning and teaching and develops compatible information infrastructures. It is not a university in itself and does not provide university education.

The following institutions in Finland are members of EADL: • •

Markkinointi- instituutti www.markinst.fi Institutet för Distansstudier www.svefol.net/distis

Markkinointi Instituutti (www.markinst.fi) is an independent educational establishment providing vocational and continuing training for adults. According to the institute’s web pages in English, it specializes in further training and re-training. In all, it has over 50 standard examinations and training programmes. Completing one examination or diploma lasts from 3 months to 2 years. The Institute of Marketing uses an integrated teaching system, which combines innovatively various distance-teaching and face-to- face teaching forms supported by modern educational technology and media.

Several independent sources indicate that the institution probably is a megaprovider. The institution does however decline to provide information for the research. The reason for this is unknown, but obviously the institution does not want to share this information with the public, the authorities, the students, or the competitors.

The Institute for Distance Studies Distis (www.svefol.net/distis) was founded in 1928 under the name the Swedish Correspondence Institut in Finland. The aim of the institute is to provide increased opportunities for education through distance courses for the Swedishspeaking minority in Finland. Distis is one of two distance study institutes in Finland, the other catering for the needs of the Finnish-speakers. Through current education legislation, both are attached to a folk high school.

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The Finnish member of EADTU is the Finnish Association for Distance Education (FADE) www.fade.fi.

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France The French government Ministry of Education, of Higher Education and of Research provided this list of major providers of e-learning in France with their websites: • • • • • • •

UMVF: université médicale virtuelle francophone (The French Medical Virtual University) www.umvf.prd.fr UNJF: université numérique juridique francophone (The French Digital Law programme) www.unjf.fr UNIT: université numérique ingénierie et technologie (The Digital Engineering and Technology University) www.unit-c.fr AUNEGE: association des universités pour l’enseignement numérique en EconomieGestion (University Association for Digital Teaching in Economics and Management) www.aunege.org.

UVED: université virtuelle environnement et développement durable (The Environmental and Sustainable Develoment Digital University) www.uved.fr UOH: université ouverte des humanités (Humanities Open University). In the process of creation.

UEL: université des sciences fondamentales (Basic Sciences University) In the process of creation.

Today e-learning in France is organised in Campus virtuels (Virtual campuses) and Universités Numeriques Thématiques (UNT) (Thematic Digital Universities). The virtual campuses were created in the years 2000-2002 as projects funded by the Ministry of Education. More recently these virtual campuses were amalgamated into Thematic Digital Universities.

The digital thematic universities (UNTs) were founded by the French government for the sharing and development of French national digital resources in important areas of higher education. They are the products of all institutions and are grouped by themes: medicine, law, engineering, economics and management, human sciences, environmental sciences. In 2006 there are 5 UNTs established and 2 more are in development. They bring together most of the former virtual campuses which began as projects funded by the Ministry in 2000-2002.

15-50 Universities or institutions of higher education are involved in each UNT. The UNTs seek to establish the best synergy possible between institutions to develop their activities: • • • • •

Sharing of existing pedagogical resources in the thematic areas Development of the activities of the virtual campuses in the area Production of new, high-quality, digital pedagogical resources in the area Access to the maximum number of students possible to the resources on the internet Training for staff and students.

The digital thematic universities (UNTs) form part of the worldwide movement of access to digital resources. They are based on the decision of the Ministry of Education to support the development of digital content and its use.

The goal of the UNTs is to bring together all the institutions that work in the thematic area and to bring about the sharing of the production of resources. They offer access on the Internet to pedagogical resources which will strengthen French achievements in the thematic

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area and make knowledge and know-how available to a maximum number of students and users.

Research at the different UNTs is as follows.

Université médicale virtuelle francophone (The French Medical Virtual University) The UMVF is a Public Interest Grouping (GIP) created jointly by the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Economics, Finance and Industry on 13 August 2003. The GIP is a Federation of higher education institutions whose mission is to put in place Information and Communications Technologies (TIC) for the initial and continuing training of health professionals.

28 universities are today members of the federation: Town

University

Faculty

Amiens Angers Antilles - Guyane Besançon

Université de Picardie Jules-Verne Université d’Angers Université des Antilles et de la Guyane Université de Franche-Comté

Bordeaux Bourgogne Brest Grenoble Lille Limoges Marseille

Université Victor Segalen - Bordeaux 2 Université de Bourgogne Université de Bretagne occidentale Université Joseph Fourier - Grenoble-I Université du Droit et de la Santé - Lille 2 Université de Limoges Université de la Méditerranée AixMarseille-II Université Montpellier-I Université Henri Poincaré - Nancy-I Université de Nantes Université de Nice-Sophia Antipolis Université René Descartes - Paris-V Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris-VI Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11 Université Paris XII Val-de-Marne Université de Paris-Nord - Paris 13 Université de Poitiers Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne Université de Rennes-I Université de Rouen Université Louis Pasteur de Strasbourg Université de Toulouse Paul Sabatier Université François Rabelais de Tours Université de Versailles - Saint Quentin en Yvelines

Pôle Santé Saint Charles Faculté de Médecine d’Angers UFR des Sciences Médicales UFR Sciences Médicales et Pharmaceutiques UFR Médicales Faculté de Médecine de Dijon Faculté de Médecine de Brest UFR de Médecine Faculté de Médecine de Lille Faculté de Médecine de Limoges Faculté de Médecine de Marseille

Montpellier Nancy Nantes Nice Paris 5 Paris 6 Paris 11 Paris 12 Paris 13 Poitiers Reims Rennes Rouen Strasbourg Toulouse Tours Versailles

Faculté de Médecine de Montpellier Faculté de Médecine de Nancy UFR de Médecine et techniques médicales Faculté de Médecine de Nice Faculté de Médecine René Descartes Paris 5 Faculté de Médecine Pierre et Marie Curie Faculté de Médecine Paris-Sud Faculté de Médecine de Créteil UFR Léonard de Vinci Faculté de Médecine de Poitiers UFR de Médecine Faculté de Médecine de Rennes Faculté de Médecine de Rouen Faculté de Médecine de Strasbourg Faculté de Médecine (Purpan et Rangueuil) Faculté de Médecine de Tours Faculté de Médecine Paris-Ile-de-FranceOuest

The headquarters of the UMVF is at the University of Lille 2.

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Université numérique juridique francophone (The French Digital University Law progamme) The UNJF is a voluntary grouping of universities and associated partners who wish to put together the means and resources for the development of distance education.

Today the membership is: Université Toulouse 1 Sciences Sociales à Toulouse : Faculté de Droit Université Rennes I : Faculté de Droit et de Science Politique Université de Limoges : Faculté de Droit et des Sciences Economiques Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines : Faculté de Droit et de Science politique Université Montpellier 1 : Faculté de Droit Université Paul-Cézanne - Aix-Marseille III : Faculté de Droit Centre universitaire de formation et de recherche Jean-François Champollion à Albi : Faculté de Droit Université Lyon 3 Jean Moulin Faculté de droit Université de Nantes : Faculté de Droit et de Sciences politiques Université Clermont Ferrand 1 : Faculté de Droit et de Science Politique Université d’Avignon et Pays du Vaucluse Université Montesquieu Bordeaux IV : Faculté de droit Université Pierre Mendès-France - Grenoble II : Faculté de Droit Université Robert Schuman à Strasbourg : Faculté de droit Université de Lille 2 : Faculté des sciences juridiques, politiques et sociales Université de Paris Val de Marne : Faculté de droit Université de la Réunion : Faculté de droit et d’économie de la Réunion Université de Nancy 2 Université de Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1) Université d’Orléans Université de Panthéon-Assas (Paris 2) Centre national d’enseignement à distance (CNED) France has 173,000 law students and these e-learning courses are available to 80,000 of them.

The UNJF has 54 online courses including the full programme for Bachelor of Laws III and the full programme for Master of Law I. The courses are designed with up to date pedagogical techniques including interactive modules and computer corrected assignments. This is in great contrast to the traditional teaching of Law in French universities which tends to be face-toface in large lecture theatres.

It is not known how many students are enrolled in the e-learning programme nor is this a statistic that is of importance to the UNJF authorities. What is important for them is that every student of Law in France has the right to enroll.

Université numérique ingénierie et technologie (The Digital Engineering and Technology University) The consortium UNIT brings together all the public and private higher education bodies in the sciences of Engineering and Technology who wish to share digital resources, tools, experiences, and to co-pilot projects in Information and Communications Technologies for Education. It proposes a large diffusion on the Internet of digital resources capable of

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enforcing the quality and the visibility of the educational courses offered by the partners of UNIT.

Association des universités pour l’enseignement numérique en EconomieGestion (University Association for Digital Teaching in Economics and Management) The UNT AUNEGE brings together the digital programmes of 15 universities (about 150,000 potential students and is in existence for one year, being founded in 2005. Its goal is the sharing of micro- and macro-resources between the universities in the field of economics/management, both in association with face-to-face and with distance education. At the moment 80% of the resources of AUNEGE come from the virtual campus CANEGE, while it waits for the contributions from the other universities. A catalogue of available courses is being developed at www.aunege.org.

Université virtuelle environnement et développement durable (The Environmental and Sustainable Development Digital University programme) UVED is still in its first year and research is under way on the pedagogical characteristics of e-learning materials. There are as yet no online courses and no e-learning enrolments. The first online courses are scheduled for December 2006.

Université ouverte des humanités (Humanities Open University) This UNT is in the process of creation.

The UOH focuses on the Faculties of Human and Social Sciences, Institutes of Psychology and IUTs (Departments of Social Careers, Departments of Information-Communication).

The statute foreseen for this UNT is that of an inter-academic service. The first courseware will be in the field of the ‘essentials’ and ‘great lessons’ of the Humanities together with indexes to already existing resources. The target for the first courses is the Licence degree especially L1. The UNT will also be used in the fight against failure in L1 and L2and will also be used to provide a common basis for the universities by identifying ‘key concepts’ online for beginning students. This is the first stage addressed to all universities teaching in the social sciences, languages and literature.

Université des sciences fondamentales (Basic Sciences University) This UNT is in the process of creation.

CANEGE CANEGE (www.canege.org) is a digital campus in Economics and Management which has existed since 2000 and brings together 5 universities: • • • • 34

Université Paris Dauphine Université Pierre Mendes France Grenoble 2 Université Nancy 2 Université of Nice Sophia Antipolis The provision of e-learning in the European Union

•

Université de Paris Sud

and the CNED: •

Centre National d’Enseignement à Distance (French National Distance Education Centre).

CNED is totally in the field of distance education and offers a complete programme of 70 modules by e -learning. These modules are accredited degree courses (100 hours study each) for programmes from levels Bac+1 to Bac+5. The degrees offered are the DEUG, Licence, Maîtrise( =M1) , Masters (M1 and soon M2). There are about 400 students per year.

The role of CANEGE is to become the distance education development centre for AUNEGE.

Non-government provision Crossknowledge (www.crossknowledge.com) Crossknowledge has 250,000 e-learning enrolments and has provided e-learning courses since 2000. It provides 300 e-learning courses.

With more than a thousand pre-existing interactive and multilingual training modules, powerful circulation technologies, individualisation and monitoring and strong support in consulting and roll out services, Crossknowledge has become the reference in the development of leadership skills using new technologies of learning.

Crossknowledge conceives and develops customised distance training solutions, which may be rolled out very quickly on a large scale. Skills have become a key asset for companies. In a globalised economy in which, more than ever, the ability of an entire organisation to carry out the strategy makes the difference, Crossknowledge offers increased performance and development of company leadership through new learning technologies.

Firstly, by thinking globally and by multiplying the number of development programmes at all levels of the organisation. Business universities addressing a handful of managers with expensive programmes no longer have a monopoly on leadership. With new learning technologies, these leadership programmes can now be deployed throughout the organisation.

Secondly, by targeting efficiency and measurement. How many alignment and awareness programmes have been deployed at great cost - and immediately forgotten? With new learning technologies, large-scale training may be individualised, measurable and longlasting, demonstrating a real return on the investment.

Crossknowledge tries to apply these principles in a pragmatic way with its clients, more than one hundred multinationals who now place their trust in the company. It does this by thinking in terms of the specific issues of each of these companies, providing them with a dedicated solution which can be offered at all levels, and by capitalising each time on best practice to continue providing the best possible value for its clients.

By giving its consultancy experience in creating HR-training operations and by guaranteeing project support through a number of services, Crossknowledge now opens up prospects for The provision of e-learning in the European Union

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skills development actions that thus far have been inaccessible in terms of teaching effectiveness and economic efficiency.

Crossknowledge allows best advantage to be taken of new learning technologies to put them at the service of company performance.

Crossknowledge is a megaprovider of e-learning in Europe.

EDHEC Business School (www.edhec.com) EDHEC Business School has 90,000 students, 890 courses and 408 teaching staff. Now in its 100th year and with over 4,500 students on its double campus registered for the academic year 2006-2007, EDHEC Business School is the leading management education group in France.

Ranked in the top 5 business schools in France, it is the leader in international programmes, offering a wide choice of management programmes, 7 of which are targeted specifically at foreign students and taught entirely in English. In 2006, 37 nationalities joined the Master of Science programmes alone.

Internationally renowned for its excellence in research (the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre is ranked number 1 in Europe) and for its experienced international faculty, EDHEC Business School is proud to belong to the elite club of business schools (only 1% worldwide) to have been awarded all three accreditations, EQUIS, AMBA and AASCB. The 17,000 graduates from EDHEC Business School are represented across the globe in over 100 countries and form a powerful international alumni network.

While the Business School’s two main units, the ESPEME Bachelor programme and the EDHEC Grande Ecole Master programme are present on both the Lille and Nice campus, the School has nevertheless chosen to reinforce the specificity of each campus.

Over the last few years, the Nice campus has been given an increasingly international role.

The Master of Science programmes in English, the English Track and the most recent newcomer, the Intercontinental Track, thus naturally found their place on this campus, where they were joined by the Theseus Institute to create the Theseus-EDHEC MBA. The EDHEC Business School is a megaprovider of e-learning.

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Germany Virtus, Cologne had 12,000 online students and 50 online courses according to the Web-edu project (Paulsen 2002). When asked whether Virtus now was a megaprovider, the contact person e- mailed this answer: “The VIRTUS project has ended in 2001. But the name still was used for the elearning activities at the Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Social Sciences in Cologne. Since 2005 we are running one ILIAS installation for the entire university - including the former VIRTUS activities (www.ilias.uni-koeln.de/ilias).

But I am afraid we are not reaching the benchmark of 100 online courses in 2005.

This is also because we are offering learning content not only in courses but also within our repository. Therefore not every professor chooses an online course to deliver learning material. Some of them creating a learning unit - without any course functionalities like enrolment - and use it like a virtual book for supporting their lecture.”

According to the Web-edu project (Paulsen 2002), LVU Hagen had 27000 online students and 270 online courses and SAP AG had 2000 online students and 500 online courses. Several contacts doubt that LVU Hagen qualifies as a megaprovider. The researcher has not been able to get any response from SAP. The following six individual experts were contacted: Michael Lammersdorf, Burkhard Lehmann, Ulrich Bernath, Helmut Fritsch, Ervin Wagner and Bernd Schachsiek. Several of them did not believe there were any megaproviders in Germany. Among the large providers that were mentioned as not large enough to meet the criteria were: The FernUniversitaet, the FernFachhochschule Darmstadt, the Europaeische FernFachhochschule Hamburg, the University of Kaiserslautern, and the University of Oldenburg.

The responses did however result in the following suggestions for potential megaproviders: SAP, Tele-Akademie Furtwangen, Bavarian Virtual University and Oncampus.

The contact person at Tele-Akademie Furtwangen declined that the institution was a megaprovider: “However, according to your criteria I’m afraid that tele-akademie is not a megaprovider. The range of enrolments per year in the last years varied from 150 to 500 in about 10 up to 30 courses/year.”

The contact persons at Bavarian Virtual University and Oncampus confirmed that their institutions were megaproviders.

The Bavarian Virtual University The Bavarian Virtual University (Virtuelle Hochschule Bayern – VHB) www.vhb.org is an institute set up by all nine state universities and all 17 state universities of applied sciences in Bavaria. A further ten universit ies in Bavaria outside the jurisdiction of the Bavarian Ministry of Higher Education have also become members, e.g. the University of the Armed Forces (Universität der Bundeswehr) and the Film and Television Academy (Hochschule für Film

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und Fernsehen) in Munich, the Catholic University in Eichstätt and the protestant Augustana Hochschule in Neuendettelsau.

The aim of the VHB is to complement the programmes of the traditional universities, not to replace them. With the help of the VHB, students can earn credit points in individual courses.

They cannot obtain degrees, as the VHB does not offer complete courses of study.

In the academic year 2005/2006, 183 different courses were available. Most courses are offered each term (semester), some courses are offered once a year. In both terms of the academic year 2005/2006 combined, 329 courses in total were conducted. In these 329 courses, there were 44,500 enrolments by 15,000 individual students.

The VHB helps its member universities to provide high quality education for growing numbers of students in times when state funding does not grow proportionally. It helps the students to organise their individual studies in a more flexible way. This is especially valuable for non-traditional students. It also helps students to complete practical courses and trainings as well as studies abroad without extending the duration of their studies. In addition, by studying through VHB-courses students develop e- learning literacy, thus enhancing their employability.

The VHB employs neither academic staff nor tutors. Teaching is offered by professors of member universities who work within the VHB either as part of their workload or in addition to it. For day-to-day course work, professors usually employ tutors. The remuneration of the tutors is provided by the VHB. Full-time employees of the VHB are administrative and technical personnel.

Until now, the VHB has been financed almost exclusively from state funds; member universities have contributed indirectly through their infrastructure. From summer 2007, member universities will contribute financially in relation to the number of students they have.

Oncampus Oncampus is the e-learning department of Lübeck University of Applied Sciences (LUAS).

The history of online education at Lübeck University of Applied Sciences (LUAS) is prior based on large third party projects dealing with online distance education. The aim has been to gain more target groups for higher education by part-time study programmes. The close cooperation with universities is one of the main success factors.

LUAS started the activities 1997 as lead partner in the German national flagship project “Virtual University of Applied Sciences” (VFH). Within a consortium of universities the aim was to implement full online distance study programmes in engineering and computer science (Bachelor and Master level). At this stage, the oncampus methodology of 80 % online teaching and 20 % presence phases was appointed.

The development and implementation of international online distance programmes started 2002, based on the project “Baltic Sea Virtual Campus” (BSVC). The focus was again on engineering and furthermore transregional management (Master level).

The regional focus was covered in 2002 by the ESF-project “Portal to future”. The aim was to implement particular online courses in continuing education. The respective e-learning 38

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courses were dissolved out of the already provided Bachelor and Master programmes. The credit points attained are chargeable on full programmes, leading to the respective degree.

All e-learning activities of LUAS and all activities with relation to the consortiums VFH and BSVC are today bundled under the name “oncampus”. Actually about 35 professionals are full-time employed at LUAS. They care for deve lopment, implementation, operation and marketing of programmes as well as for the project administration. Approximately 150 persons have been involved part-time as authors and teachers. Oncampus actually runs 145 elearning modules (online material). At the moment, 480 courses are being offered and 5,300 course enrolments are registered. More than 1,300 students have been enrolled since 2001.

The following institutions in Germany are members of EADL: • • • • • • • • •

Bildungswerk für therapeutische Berufe www.naturemed.de DAA-Technikum www.daa-technikum.de Forum DistancE-Learning www.forum-distance- learning.de ILS - Institut für Lernsysteme www.ils.de Private FernFachhochschule Darmstadt www.privatfh-da.de Studiengemeinschaft Darmstadt (SGD) www.sgd.de DWG – Deutsche Weiterbildungsgesellschaft mbH Europäische Fernhochschule Hamburg (EURO-FH) www.euro- fh.de Schachtsiek Verwaltungs- und Beratungs GmbH & Co KG www.schachtsiekberatung.de

The German member of EADTU is FernUniversität in Hagen www.fernuni-hagen.de The following institutions in Germany are members of EDEN: • • • • • • • •

Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg www.uni-oldenburg.de/uni EENet European Experts’ Network for Education and Technology www.eenet.org FIM-New Learning, University of Erlangen www.fim.uni-erlangen.de German Association for Distance Education http://ecampus.zfuw.uni-kl.de/Ploneindexe.htm Private Fernfachhochschule Darmstadt www.privatfh-da.de University of Applied Sciences, Zwickau www.fh-zwickau.de University of Hildesheim www.uni-hildesheim.de/de/zfw.htm Virtuelle Hochschule Bayern www.vhb.org

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Greece Adult distance education in Greece became initially available in 1998 with the founding of the Hellenic Open University (EAP) (www.eap.gr). The Open University offers the opportunity to study at home, at any time and pace of learning. Everyone who is over 23 years of age and has obtained a secondary education diploma can be accepted to the university’s undergraduate programmes without preliminary examinations. The university also offers full Master’s and PhD degrees. Courses at the Hellenic Open University are delivered exclusively at distance.

And students communicate with professors via traditional (courier, telephone) and newer (fax, e-mail) forms of distance communication. Students must pay a tuition fee for each thematic unit they choose to follow; however, scholarships are offered as well. Studies are certified at five levels ranging from the beginning of tertiary education to a post-doctoral degree.

The public in Greece has enthusiastically welcomed this new learning opportunity: For the academic year 2003-2004, the university had an enrolment of 8,976 undergraduate students, 5,133 Master’s students and 24 PhD students. The university received 65,979 prospective student applications for the academic year 2004-2005 for a total of 5,257 places. So far, the number of Open University graduates has reached 2,083.

Most Greek universities are starting to develop e-learning platforms mainly for the use of their own students, but some also offer access to the general public. Examples, many of which are still in an early stage of development, include: • • •

Greek Universities Network Gunet (www.gunet.gr/index_en.php) - A catalogue of 66 available courses for Greek university students and professors, some of which are open to the general public.

Ifigenia - Distance Education Courses - The University of Crete (www.uoc.gr) is currently developing web-based courses suitable for online distance education.

Computer Networks and Telematics Applications Lab (CONTA) by University of Macedonia (www.uom.gr) – offers online seminars on Telematic Applications & Computer Networks, Information Systems in Education and Web-based TeleEducation.

Vocational training centres are currently being developed by three Greek universities: • • •

Tele-education Centre by Athens University of Economics and Business (www.stat-athens.aueb.gr/en/frames.htm); Vocational Training Centre by Panteion University (www.panteion.gr/uk); Vocational Training Centre - National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (www.uoa.gr).

None of these institutions meet the criteria established for the Megastrends project.

Hellenic Open University (www.eap.gr) The HOU is the 19th Greek State University but the only one that provides distance education in both undergraduate and postgraduate levels via the development and utilization of appropriate learning material and methods of teaching. Promoting scientific research as well

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as developing technology and methodology in distance learning fall within the scope of HOU’s objectives.

The courses are designed according to the distance learning methodology. According to this methodology students study using books and study – guides designed to be compatible with the distance learning methodology, participate in 5 tutorials for each module taking place in 8 towns, communicate with the corresponding tutor by telephone, fax, email and letters, prepare 4 – 6 assignments for each module and finally take a final examination 10 months later, that is at the end of each module. The students of a module are placed into several student groups. A tutor is allocated for each group of a maximum 32 students who live in a certain geographical region.

For the academic year 2002/03, the website of this university provides the following figures: • • • • •

Undergraduate students 8,251 Postgraduate students 4,436 PhD students 19 Number of Courses being offered 22 Number of Modules being offered 106

These figures seem to indicate that the Hellenic Open University is a megaprovider of elearning.

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Ireland The leading providers of e-learning in Ireland are:

Dublin City University Dublin City University was the first major university in the world to adopt the Open Source Learning Management System (LMS)/Virtual Learning Environment (VLE), Moodle.

The Irish National Distance Education Centre (Oscail) is run as a faculty of Dublin City University.

All 3,400 of DCU’s academic modules are set up online on the Moodle system. 800 of these are actively used for e-learning. There are also 70 active courses used for credit purposes (courses to support students at the programme level, courses used as staff communications areas.)

The following programmes are available completely online: Through Oscail: • • •

MSc in Information Systems for Managers MSc in Internet Systems MSc in Management of Operations

Through the School of Physical Sciences: Undergraduate Certificate in Fundamentals of Plasma and Vacuum Studies Through the Remote Access to Continuing Engineering (RACeE) programme • • • • • • • • •

Masters in Telecommunications Engineering Masters in Electronic Systems Masters in Electronic Systems (major in nanoelectronics/photonics) Graduate Diploma in Telecommunications Engineering Graduate Diploma in Electronic Systems Graduate Diploma in Electronic Systems (major in nanoelectronics/photonics) Graduate Certificate in Telecommunications Engineering Graduate Certificate in Electronic Systems Graduate Certificate in Electronic Systems

Oscail also offer some programmes partly online: • • •

BA/Diploma in Arts – Mostly online with some face-to-face tutorials BSc/Diploma in Information Technology – Mostly online with some face-to-face tutorials Bachelor of Nursing Studies – Part online

There are 18,476 users registered on the Moodle VLE system. 3,000-4,000 of these log on each week. 3500 students and 460 staff members are actively using the system.

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Oscail. The National Distance Education Centre Described above see under Dublin City University.

Trinity College, Dublin, Dublin University E-learning at Trinity College started in 1998. Trinity College had 400 modules or courses online. It has 9,000 students enrolled on its WebCT system. This represents 60% of Dublin University’s 15,000 FTES (full time equivalent students).

Trinity College uses a blended approach to e-learning. E-learning is centered in the University’s Centre for Academic Practice and Student Learning (CAPSIL) and incorporates the University’s Centre for Learning Technologies. These centres are responsible for all academic staff development in TCD and for learning initiatives for the University.

The development of the University’s 400 online courses or course modules has aimed at high quality and high innovation, but has not put a huge emphasis on multi media. A major effort has been made to train academic staff in e-learning skills.

The 9,000 students enrolled in the WebCT system would nearly all have used e-learning for their studies during the course of the year.

The Trinity e-learning philosophy has been to use a blended learning approach and to reduce contact hours ad to put resources on the web. Their aim is to keep the virtual and the traditional together and they would not support a structure in which the student does not come in to the University at all.

National University of Ireland, Galway E-learning at NUI is led by the university’s Centre for Excellence in Learning and Teaching.

The university uses the Blackboard Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). Blackboard is used for everything. All the university’s 15,000 students use it. It is used for class based courses, distance learning courses and courses run by the university with the USA. There are very few courses at the university that do not use the Blackboard system. It is used for distance learning and for blended learning. They also use other technologies like Question Mark for assignments and videoconferencing for which they have 8 locations using IP at 1 to 3 Mb per second.

Almost every department in the university uses e -learning in all their courses. There has been a steep growth rate of e-learning in recent years. It is difficult to calculate the number of modules in use as there is great variety of use including professional development for staff and discussion groups for students.

There are many variants of e-learning use: blended courses/intensive courses, courses with a small amount of e-learning/courses offered fully online. 10 post graduate courses are offered fully online and there are some undergraduate courses that are available fully online too. Up to 1,000 students would be using e-learning in a pure distance learning setting.

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University College Cork At UCC each department runs its own e-learning offering. The university’s Learning Technologies Unit has an advisory role for the whole university, runs the Virtual Learning Environment, and assists the departments in materials development and other activities. There is said to be a lot going on in pockets with no large, overall structures.

The Virtual Learning Environment used is Blackboard, which was chosen by the university because, after trials, it was found to be the easiest to use. E-learning is used very much to enhance classroom activity. The university has 1,000 modules online.

9,000 students at the university use the VLE regularly. There is no faculty and no department that does not use it. There are some distance learning courses but mainly it is used by on campus students. Pure distance learning courses are on Blackboard. These are structured in different ways: some might use e-learning plus 4 meetings per year, others have other structures.

University College Dublin The development of E-learning at University College Dublin has been an evolutionary process. It started at what is now the Teaching and Learning Centre using the Learning Management System TopClass.

Then the Business School of UCD commenced e-learning using the Learning Management System Blackboard which was run from the Computer Laboratory.

A third aspect of e-learning at UCD is the Audio Visual Media Centre which develops elearning content for the departments.

Thus, Ireland’s largest university has three centres for e-learning today.

The Blackboard environment is described thus: The Blackboard Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) is used to provide e-learning services to staff and students. It allows lecturers to share course materials, post announcements for students, and run quizzes and surveys. Blackboard also includes a Virtual Classroom facility, discussion forums and various other course tools.

Kilroy’s College Kilroy’s College is the commercial Irish distance education institution. It has 10 e-learning courses. These courses have 400 students.

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Italy According to Osservatorio ANEE-Assinform 2005 the overall value of the Italian e-learning market in the year 2004 ascended to 365, 6 million Euros, which was about 18,6 % of the total expenditure on training and education. The estimated growth of this value for 2005 was 17,9% with an increased value of about 430 million Euros. The figures include content, technology and services/consultancy, the three main business areas of the Italian e-learning scenario.

Figure 6 Evolution of the expediture on e-learning in Italy (Source: Osservatorio Anee/Assinform 2005 – The executive summary of the report can be downloaded from: www.anee.it/anee/osservatorio.htm#1)

The same study indicates that users consider e-learning an efficient way of learning.

Nevertheless, this positive attitude is still not reflected in a corresponding level of usage of the e-learning offer. The traditional classroom is still the most popular environment for almost 90% of the Italian learners, although the gap between the two teaching and learning modes tends to decrease.

The development of the e-learning provision undertaken by the Italian universities can be described as a growing process not only in quantity but also in quality and innovation regarding the offered e-learning solutions.

The table below shows the growing number of universities providing e-learning and the spectacular increase of the number of universities that offer their e-learning courses on a virtual campus.

Table 2 Italian universities offering e-learning Indicators Osservatorio 2003 Universities that offer 72.2% e-learning Universities with a Virtual Campus 26% (Centro di ateneo)

Osservatorio 2004

Osservatorio 2005

83%

85%

57%

82%

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The BSOLE eTEN project (2003) (www.bsole.com) has identified a number of e-learning projects in Italy, as for example the platform “Postelearning”, created by Poste Italiane in order to offer e virtual space for communication to all Italian employees. The initiative promotes the integration between blended solutions with traditional training methods (www.postecom.it).

A second example would be the National Citizen Portal, www.italia.gov.it, a service that delivers free online training focusing on ECDL and the use of ICT. A third example worth to mention is the collaboration between the French AFPA (the national association for adult education) and the Italian Consorzio Nettuno (a network of 38 Italian universities and companies and the British open universities). AFPA is now broadcasting its programme on the Italian television channel Rai Nettuno Sat 1. AFPA has already programmed almost 150 hours in 5 domains: general education, practical skills of several professions, pedagogy, help in finding a job, social problems. The virtual training programme is supported by online services through the AFPA website.

Sfera (www.sfera.it) “In 1999, Enel (power and gas provider) has created Sfera, a knowledge provider for adult learning and human resources improvement. The learning methods are based on editorial instruments (accessible online) but also on tutoring and mentoring online, virtual classrooms, forum, chat and newsgroup. The e-learning delivery is based on a synchronous shared method because it is based partly on self-training, partly on virtual classrooms, tutoring interaction, online whiteboards, online tests, conferences, forum and chat. The learning contents supplied are the following: IT skills; English language (self-study and teacher-led); management (including a Master’s degree online); technical skills for the power sector. Overall Sfera has supplied 1800 online courses. Figures for 2004 are: 2000 online courses and 38.500 registered users. It is worth to mention that a considerable number of these online courses have a duration of only two to eight hours. (www.sfera.it/chi-siamo/cifre.asp) In order to have access to the e-learning courses supplied by Sfera, it is necessary to buy an “e-learning card”, which can be bought on the cited websites. This card can also be bought in some popular Italian libraries, or at some media suppliers. Sale points of the cards are presently located in 9 Italian Regions. The cards remain active for 6 months.” The information available on the Sfera-website seems to indicate that it is a megaprovider of elearning. It has yet not been possible to confirm the figures through personal contact with the representatives of the provider.

Università Telematica Guglielmo Marconi (www.unimarconi.it) The UniversitàTelematica “GuglielmoMarconi” is the first Athenaeum in Italy which follows the “Open University” model, already attended in many European Countries. Being public, but not a state body, recognized by the Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR -M.D. 1 March 2004), it adopts innovating learning modalities by developing suitable research strategies for most advanced technological solutions and by integrating non

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residential communication tools (E-learning, chat, forum, videoconference, mobile learning, etc.) with in presence activities (workshops, seminars, etc).

Università di Trento (www.unitn.it) The University of Trento provides some services in order to support the lecturers in online course design.

These services are addressed to: • • •

undergraduate and postgraduate students (on campus, distant and working) teachers and tutors lifelong education

The institution provides three types of e-learning formats: • • •

web-enhanced courses (in order to support the traditional face-to-face lectures); blended courses (lectures are partly face-to-face and partly online); entirely online courses.

The amount of our courses (mostly web enhanced – 90%) is 353 in the 2005/06 and the number of students enrolled is 6,048.

UNITN also provides: • • • •

Copyright advice Design of multimedia contents Design of online assessment e-tutoring

In spite of the large proportion of web-enhanced and blended courses it is assumed that the University of Trento is not a megaprovider of e-learning according to the criteria established by the project team.

Università Telematica Leonardo da Vinci (www.unidav.it) This institution has been founded as an initiative of the Università Gabriele d’Annunzio di Chieti-Pescara and of the foundation that carries the same name. UNIDAV provides 5 graduate programmes that sum a total number of about 120 courses. In addition to that there are 6 master programmes that can be divided into more than 100 single courses or modules.

The university’s platform called “Open Learning Center” is based on the “oracle iLearning” application.

According to the information on the website, the institution seems to meet at least the criterion on the number of courses. Unfortunately there is no information available about the number of enrolments. Attempts to establish contact with a competent party have been in vain.

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Scuola IaD – Università di Roma Tor Vergata (www.scuolaiad.it) The institution has offered online courses since 2001. Data for 2004-2005 indicates that the number of online courses offered is 120 with a total enrolment of over 5,000 students, and with an average of 42 students per course.

Scuola IaD is an interfaculty Unit of University of Rome Tor Vergata. It provides a wide range of online education courses (first cycle degrees, master, Continuing Education in Medicine, IT education as ECDL, EUCIP, IT administrator and Linux and adult continuous education).

Scuola IaD’s institutional frame (a horizontal body through different faculties) facilitates the access to a significant pool of competencies and it exercised a pioneer role in the Italian online education scenario.

Scuola IaD is inserted in a prestigious and scientific-oriented University (http://web.uniroma2.it), which provides research and technological support for online education development. It is engaged in developing “continuous and adult education” and it has a long tradition of partnership with social and economic actors (both public and private) Scuola IaD Director is member of the University Ministry Working Group for Life Long Learning and E-Learning. Scuola IaD is living laboratory to study innovation dynamics inside traditional academic environments. It is a member of EDEN and ICDE Scuola IaD can be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Nettuno-Network per l’Università Ovunque (www.uninettuno.it) “Nettuno is the first television and telematic University in Europe, using two satellite television channels RAI NETTUNO SAT 1 and RAI NETTUNO SAT 2, and an Internetbased Didactical Portal (www.uninettuno.it). Promoted in 1992 by the Ministry of the University and Scientific and Technological Research, NETTUNO is a Distance University that starts off from traditional universities. Italian Universities, International Institutions and Universities and technological companies created a non-profit association and they jointly design methodologies and contents of degree courses, distance masters and professional training and re-training courses. […] The didactic psycho pedagogical model is a mixed one that combines benefits offered by the traditional teaching and by guided learning, with those offered by a teaching distance model by means of new technologies. The same professors, who carry out research work on knowledge contents at traditional Universities, are also face to face, as well as distance courses teachers. […] The delivery models are the following ones: •

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Traditional Method: – Direct interactions between teacher/tutor and students; – Seminars and practical assignments carried out at the University technological poles; – Exams and assessments.

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Distance Method: – Academic lessons (video lessons broadcast on satellite television channels RAI NETTUNO SAT 1 and RAI NETTUNO SAT 2 and on the Internet via satellite); – Practical exercises on the Internet via satellite even through virtual laboratories; – Distance tutoring by audio and video chat, forum and videoconferencing.”

In spite of this declaration in favour of a more blended approach, Nettuno also offers a number of full degree programmes completely online for students that are unable to attend oncampus activities. The institution has affirmed that it meets the criteria for being a megaprvider of e-learning.

Università degli Studi Di Milano (www.unimi.it) The Milan University (Milano Statale) provides a “Piattaforma Ateneo” called “Ariel” (http://ariel.ctu.unimi.it/corsi/portal/user/loginHome.asp). This portal currently displays a variety of programmes and courses that are mainly based on blended learning approaches.

The institution offers support to teachers that wish to provide online courses via the Centro Televisivo Universitario (http://ariel.ctu.unimi.it/corsi/portal/user/loginHome.asp).

The information given on the university’s website does not suggest that UNIMI could be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Università Bocconi (Milano) (www.uni-bocconi.it) This university calls its e-learning Project “B-Learning” and uses “Lotus Learning Space” by IBM as a learning platform. The information given about the e-learning efforts undertaken by UNIBOCCONI indicates that this institution uses ICT exclusively to support traditional learning scenarios.

Università Bocconi cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Politecnico di Milano (www.polimi.it) The portal “COL” (Corsi Online) exists since 1998 and is a free service that publishes the resources related to the face-to-face courses offered by the university. It also provides some communication tools in order to improve and facilitate contact between students and teachers.

Politecnico di Milano also offers a graduate programme (INGEGNERIA INFORMATICA), which is completely online. This course belongs and is accredited through “CampusOne”, an experimental project promoted by CRUI, the Italian University Director’s Conference and financed by the Ministry of Education, Universities and Science (MIUR). A total number of 68 Italian Universities have adhered to this project, providing over 270 courses altogether.

The highest number of courses offered by one single institution is 5.

The data gathered on the website of Politecnico di Milano does not indicate that the institution is a megaprovider of e-learning.

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Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II (www.unina.it) The Naples University offers online services over a portal called DoL – Didattica online. (www.dol.unina.it) These services have the unique objective to enhance face-to-face courses.

UNINA is therefore not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Politecnico di Torino (www.polito.it) Politecnico di Torino currently offers 7 graduate programmes fully online (6 in 2004/05). The website does not offer any further information about this e-learning provision. The institution has been contacted in order to receive more details.

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Hungary Connected partly to the eEurope+ initiatives, in Hungary there were significant government programs in the recent years to develop the information society. The main obstacles of the development – similar to the other recently accessed EU countries, but different in degree and orientation – the relatively low individual consuming power, the high telecommunication and PC prices and the relatively highly cost sensitive e-learning market. The educational systems are burdened with general funding problems and the lower level of technological provision and Internet access is only slowly decreasing. The conservatism and the lack of funding of the educational institutions, furthermore the less consolidated market situation is proposing a further burden. It is obvious that the challenges of the modernisation and the informatics development can only succeed if it is carried out together with the strategic issues of human resource development.

However, regarding the e-learning provisions Hungary is most probably in the most developed state from the three investigated countries. The major obstacle of becoming a megaprovider in Hungary lays in the number of enrolments, that is due to the (relatively) small Hungarian speaking population and/or lack of foreign language courses. Theoretically, by the introduction of accreditation, many HE institutions could offer their courses to students from other EU countries, but practically this potential is not exploited to a satisfactory extent yet.

Among those elements that help the development of the e-learning market are • • • • • • •

the development of the e-learning culture, the development of infrastructure, government initiatives that stimulate demand (tax relief programmes, central funding of the developments of the institutions, government partnerships to help learners and teachers to get free software etc.), the development of the standards, the reliable certification systems, the development of accreditation, and the supporting of innovative pedagogy.

Our extended research in the field covered a wide spectrum of potential major providers. The investigated cases came from •

Distance education (DE) initiatives that are gradually transforming into e-learning programmes. New data from the National Statistical Institute show that distance education in Hungary is very popular at college level. In 2003/2004 educational year there were 140,491 students enrolled in distant education (26% of all students). From the total amount of students involved in distant education 64% studied at colleges. The share of students in adult education (who have already entered the job market) is not given. The expected results of the EU accession is that in accordance with the strategy of life long learning (LLL) – especially in public services and in business fields, in the non-profit region and for those working in HE – individual learning experiences gained through distance learning will play an important role and that distance education will also likely to gain more focus in the case of SMEs, given that the participation in traditional courses in their case results in shortfall in capacity.

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•

•

HE institutions that are introducing e-learning into their praxis. The use of eadministration is widely spread amongst HE institutions and the Virtual Learning Environments (VLE-s, or LMS-es) are also becoming mainstream applications, especially since freeware programmes appeared on the “market” as well. Several institutions are known to develop their own, self-tailored LMS-es internally.

Corporate organizations using e-learning that, by magnitude, can qualify as megaproviders (The Hungarian postal services, the army, banking corporations, insurance companies).

Considering all the formal and informal information gained through the EDEN network, it can be stated that surrounding e-learning, the illusions have gone, the previous euphoria gave place to a more down to earth consideration. After sobering, a slower but steadier growing is expected, the market will consolidate, and the need for newer generation, clean, more tailored to individual needs solutions will grow. The most important present processes are that the supply of on-line learning technologies and contents are growing, there is a convergence between technologies and methodologies, the different approaches cleared. The consolidation of market is expected as well as the appearance of mass products. It is also important to pinpoint, that the acceptance of e-learning products is changing for the better in every sector.

It is necessary that the e-learning reach that critical mass in the different educational sectors, from education, to vocational training, through higher education to corporate training, so that the advantages of technology can be used economically. Based on the surveys of the recent years, the main obstacles are the expensive ICT expenses, the lack of basic skills (there are mentions of 6.5 million digitally illiterates in the country of 10 million), and the missing home infrastructures. In Hungary according to people salaries, the Internet services are still very expensive; the needed infrastructure is still missing in many cases, same as the motivation. For example adult learning, although possibly one of the main fields of the use of ICT, is still under motivated by both the employees and the employers.

Hungary stepped into the leading pack of European countries for Internet access of schools by starting the “Sulinet” program in 1997, which is the national ICT and e-learning program for public education. Sulinet is mainly focusing on initial primary and secondary education in schools.. It is also the most important hardware and content provider in the field of education.

The program encourages the acquisition of computers for children in private households as well and the parents to learn how to use them, through a parallel initiative, Sulinet Express Program, which offered tax refund up to 50% when buying computers. In 2004, more than 16 billion HUF was claimed back by the taxpayers. However, the Sulinet Express program did not result in an extensive growth in ICT inclusion: mostly those, who already possessed ICT infrastructure, have taken advantage of it. The program will be shot down from the 1st January 2007.

In 2004 the Ministry of Informatics and Communications has started its Public-net program in 2004 to provide all schools with broadband Internet access and multimedia laboratories. In addition to the above-mentioned developments mainly focused at schools, the use of ICT spreads at a dramatic speed in Higher Education although the sector still lags behind welldeveloped western countries. There are significant achievements however: • •

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All higher education institutions are connected to the Internet with appropriate bandwidth through the National ICT Infrastructure Development (NIIF) network.

Application information system: the nationwide application to higher-educational institutions is supported by local and national systems. The central information system

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•

is well suited for the present institutional structure. Further development of this system can be one of the pillars for other information systems in the future.

Computer coverage: the 100000 PCs for approximately 400000 people show a moderate, but acceptable ratio.

However, in the same time there is a lack of systematic learning methodology, which would be necessary to take the full advantage of what the technology makes possible. The question of quality is also a reoccurring issue.

The new paradigms of e-learning and ICT in education and training helped to gain a strong position for education and learning in the political climate. However, the faster consolidation is hindered by the fact that the political programs adopt these considerations without thorough preparations, lacking fundaments. Also given the rhapsodic government changes in every four years resulted in a situation, where every new government wants to reform the education and the training system, so nothing ever gets carried out fully and evaluated properly. There is a need for coherent, long term and stable education policy and programs.

According to the Hungarian Gallup Institute (their detailed e-learning directory can be found here: www.gallup.hu/oktatas/ip/elearning/magyar/mint.htm), the main e-learning suppliers (although not meeting the project criteria of a megaprovider) are: • • • • • • • • • •

“Sulinet” in collaboration with Ministry of Education (www.sulinet.hu) Kodolányi János University College (www.kodolanyi.hu) “Gallup Távoktatási Központ” (Gallup Distance Education Centre): public educational quality development (www.gallup.hu/english.htm#edu) “Szaktanfolyam.hu”: Technical courses (www.szaktanfolyam.hu) “Eszterházy Károly Főiskola” (Eszterházy Károly College): distance education and elearning services (www.ektf.hu/english/index.html) eMenedger Online/Education Hewlett Packard/E-learning Internet Business Center Network “SZÁMALK” Open Business School (which operates the Denis Gábor College) (www.szamalk.hu/English/Default.htm) “Tr@iner” Education Centre (www.trainer.hu/index.php)

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Latvia Distance Education as a study form has been developed since 1993 in Latvia. A certain structure of ODL was created due to PHARE projects in the country.

Universities and other higher educational institutions widely offer continuing education, different courses to update the knowledge and skills.

The main areas targeted by distance education are: • • • •

continuing education continuing professional development community education academic education.

e-University of the University of Latvia The University of Latvia with more than 29 thousand students (23% of Latvian higher education market) is the largest university not only in Latvia, but also the largest in the Baltic states. The development goal of the e-University initiative was to use ICT – to improve, diversify and extend the university’s services; to be more effective and efficient; to be more attractive and competitive in a local and global market.

As a result more than 300 faculty members (35% from total) from all of 13 faculties developed and used approximately 400 e-courses in the WebCT environment to facilitate their face-to-face classes. Every term more than 7 thousand students were registered and used econtent to facilitate their face-to-face classes. That means that approximately 40 students on average used every one of 220 e-courses in autumn 2004 and every one of 171 e-courses in spring 2005.

Riga Technical University Distance Education Study Centre The Riga Technical University (RTU) Distance Education Study Centre (DESC) was founded within the framework of the PHARE “Multi-Country Co-operation in Distance Education” project. The Centre is a structural unit of RTU and was established in May 1997. The objective of the Centre is to develop distance education in Latvia using innovative applications of information and communication technologies.

The Centre’s mandate is to organise the development and adoption of distance learning courses as well as the delivery of courses, involving academic staff from RTU and other Latvian higher education establishments. Its target users are both adults who wish to develop basic skills and e-learning professionals. The Centre trains about 800 people annually, who obtain an RTU certificate at the end of their studies. Currently the centre has 279 courses with 5,853 students listed in their learning management system.

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Lithuania The Governmental Programme Information Technologies for Science and Studies (ITMS) 2001-2006 concerns important spheres of the information society – science and studies, and includes the principal modes of their computerisation.

The main goals of the ITMS programme are the following: • • •

Concentration of data on science and studies, and its employment in activities of different institutions for representation of the Lithuanian science and studies in the global computer networks.

Assistance to scientists, teachers and students in obtaining the information.

Use of information technologies in education and training of the population.

The ITMS programme consists of three basic and closely linked sub-programmes, dealing with the formation of following systems: • • •

Development of Distance Education in Lithuania (LieDM).

Lithuanian Academic Libraries Network (LABT).

Lithuanian Science and Studies Information System (LieMSIS).

In the process of its implementation, the ITMS programme will be supplemented with new sub-programmes: Development of Distance Education in Lithuania (LieDM) sub-programme executes following priorities: • • • •

Co-operation among higher education institutions in distance education development.

Higher education infrastructure based on modern telecommunications, information, and video conference technologies.

Virtual universities and enhancement of e-learning.

Lithuanian distance education system.

Research on e-learning carried out under the sub programme is focused on specific areas: • •

Methodological research on organisation of studies and preparation of courses in the synchronous distance learning systems.

Educational institutions in distance education development.

The Distance Education Council of Lithuania was formed under the Ministry of Education and Science. The main goal of the State Programme of Distance Education Development, adopted on 14 August 2001, is to increase possibilities for adults to attain the academic and professional qualifications, develop creativity and skills. The development of distance education will ensure universal access to educational services, and increase educational possibilities of the rural population.

Kaunas University of Technology Distance Education Centre The Distance Education Centre was established at Kaunas University of Technology in 1996.

The mission of the Centre is to promote and develop the higher and further education system supported by information and communication technologies.

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The Distance Education Centre (DEC) at Kaunas University of Technology aims at improving the quality of distance education services with respect to a demand for education services in the region and regional priorities. DEC has a good quality learning infrastructure and tutors for DE purposes. The Distance Education Centre has all in all 2 Master Degree programmes, 1 vocational 1 year programme for the teachers, 108 distance education modules (4 credits) and around 15 distance education vocational training courses (2 credits). Approximately 12,000 students are registered students. Currently the Distance Education Centre has 55 fully online courses with 3500 students.

Main Research Areas: The Centre aims at improving the quality of distance education services with respect to a demand for education services in the region and regional priorities. To accomplish these aims the Centre: • • • • • • • • • •

collects and disseminates information about distance education events, projects and methods in order to ensure distance education efficiency; explores regional supply and demand for studies and courses in the field of requalification, vocational education, high and higher education; collaborates with public information providers and disseminators, other institutions and enterprises, persons concerned; organizes distance education courses, carries out efficiency researches and other applied distance education researches in regional study and study support centres, other institutions; creates and updates database of open and distance education courses; while organizing competitions, provides regional study institutions with a possibility to take part in projects developed by the Centre and Lithuanian Distance Education Study Centre; organizes workshops, seminars, conferences for distance education tutors and organizers; takes care of the preparation, adaptation and improvement of distance education programs; disseminates information about distance education development in the world, Europe, Lithuania; carries out researches in the field of distance education organization, management and academic affairs; informs University, Lithuanian Distance Education Study Centre and other partners about significant distance education events; takes part in the development and management of the videoconferencing network.

Lithuanian Distance Education Network Lithuanian distance education network is founded in consonance with the program “Information Technologies for Education and Training (2001-2006)” (further termed as ITMiS) supported by the dictate of Education Minister No 115 for the date of January 30, 2001. The program consists of three main interrelated parts – Lithuanian Information Systems for Education and Training (LieMSIS), Lithuanian Distance Education Network (LieDM) and Subprograms for Development of Lithuanian Academic Library Network (LABT).

The objective is to generate and coordinate higher education studies and continuous training system based on information and telecommunication technologies in order to ensure Lithuania developing features of the information society.

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The Lithuanian Distance Education Network (LieDM) in 2005: • •

9 MSc study programs are available.

Over 20 000 students in 2004 have studied in the separate courses using LieDM resources.

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Luxembourg The providers of e-learning in Luxembourg are:

eTwinning (www.wtwining.lu and www.etwinning.net) This is a European programme seeking to establish partnerships through e-learning between schools in different countries.

My School (www.myschool.lu) This is a portal for e-learning of the Ministry of Education and of Professional Training of the Government of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. It is open to all public and private schools, and all educational institutions and public service training organisations of the Grand Duchy Of Luxembourg. The manager is M Daniel Weiler.

eBac (www.ebac.lu) The Professional Training Service and the Adult Education Service of the Luxembourg Ministry of Education and of Professional Training share the responsibility for Life Long Learning in Luxembourg. These services, in cooperation with the e-learning portal of My School, have romoted a blended learning course, using e-learning, towards the Bac (High School Matriculation Certification for Adults). The manager is M Alain Hoffmann.

Technolink (www.technolink.lu) This is a centre of coordination of the Education Service for the progressive introduction of Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) for primary and pre-primary schools in Luxembourg (aged from 3 to 12 years). The manager is M Gaston Nilles.

norTIC (www.nortic.lu) The norTIC project helps teachers who wish to make use of new technologies in their classes with pupils aged 3 to 12 years in the North of Luxembourg. By application to the Services Centre an appointment is arranged and one of the project representatives visits the class and helps in the use of ICTs. Managers M Yves Schintgen and M Fernand Bartel.

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Malta The current supply of e-learning courses in Malta is very weakly developed. There are three public providers involved with e-learning of which one, the University of Malta, is still developing its first online modules. The other two players are the Department of Further Studies and Adult Education and the Ministry of Investments, Industry and Information Technology. Each of them offers only one to two online courses.

No megaprovider of e-learning could be identified in Malta.

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Netherlands One specific article of interest is E-Learning and International Education in The Netherlands (Frencken 2006).

Open Universiteit Nederland According to the CISAER project (Paulsen 2000), the Open University of the Netherlands www.ou.nl had 2500 online students and 360 online courses. The contact person in this present research confirmed that the university was a megaprovider. According to the information provided at the university’s website (www.ou.nl/eCache/DEF/36.html), Open Universiteit Nederland enrolled its first students in September 1984. It is an independent government-funded institution for distance learning at university level. The Dutch government’s purpose in founding Open Universiteit Nederland was to make higher education accessible to anyone with the necessary aptitudes and interests, regardless of formal qualifications. A profile of the university is available at www.ou.nl/Docs/English/Corporate_brochure_2006_UK_def.pdf.

Three individual experts (Betty Collis, Peter Maassen and Dirk van der Mark) were contacted in addition to the EADL secretariat, which is located in the Netherlands, and the SURF secretariat. SURF (www.edusite.nl) is the Dutch higher education and research partnership organisation for network services and information and communications technology (ICT).

The only additional institution that was suggested from these contacts was LOI.

LOI Leidse Onderwijsinstellingen (www.loi.nl) LOI is an independent educational institution. Several independent sources indicate that the institution probably is a megaprovider. The institution does however decline to provide information for the research. The reason for this is unknown, but obviously the institution does not want to share this information with the public, the authorities, the students, or the competitors.

The researcher expected that the University of Twente could be a possible candidate, but no information was provided that indicated that this is the case.

The following institutions in the Netherlands are members of EADL: • • •

Dirksen Opleidingen BV www.dirksen.nl Hogeschool NTI www.nti.nl PAEPON www.paepon.nl

The Dutch member of EADTU is Open Universiteit Nederland.

The following institutions in the Netherlands are members of EDEN: • •

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EADL - European Association for Distance Learning www.eadl.org King William I College / School for the Future www.kw1c.nl/english

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Norway The search for megaproviders was carried out with a base in Norway Opening Universities (NOU). NOU is a national governmental agency for flexible and lifelong learning in Norway.

NOU focuses primarily on higher education and has a good overview of e-learning at higher educations institutions. In addition, the project partners at NKI has detailed and extensive knowledge about other parts of the distance education landscape in Norway. Thus, the list megaproviders identified (given below) should be considered exhaustive.

The search has identified four institutions that are clearly megaproviders. Three of them are private education institutions and one is a public university college. The three private institutions provide courses within higher education, secondary level education and vocational training. The university college offers higher education courses. The four institutions are: •

•

•

•

NKI Distance Education (NKI DE) (www.nki.no). NKI DE is a part of the NKI group and offers courses within higher education, secondary level education and vocational training. In 2005 NKI DE had 12 217 course enrolments in 470 distance education courses. Some of the courses (and enrolments) are based on traditional correspondence teaching. However, more than half of the students follow their courses online and a majority of the courses are given online. Thus, NKI DE clearly qualifies as a megaprovider.

NKS Distance Education (NKS DE) (www.nks.no). NKS DE offers courses within higher education, secondary level education and vocational training. In 2005, NKS DE offered 104 online courses and thus qualifies as a megaprovider. The number of enrolments in the courses was 2200 in 2005.

BI Distance Education (Norwegian School of Management) (www.bi.no). BI Distance Education (BI DE) is a part of BI (Norwegian School of Management), an on campus based institution. BI DE provides courses within higher education and vocational training. BI DE had about 8500 course enrolments in 54 online courses in 2005 and thus qualifies as a megaprovider.

Sør-Trøndelag University College (www.hist.no). Sør-Trøndelag University College offers courses at higher education level. In 2005, the institutions had about 2500 enrolments in 148 online courses, and thus qualifies as a megaprovider.

Another institution that was considered is the The Norwegian Networked University (www.nvu.no). This is a consortium presently consisting of 1 university and 5 university colleges. These are: Agder University College, Bergen University College, Nord-Trøndelag University College, Stord/Haugesund University College, Sør-Trøndelag University College and University of Stavanger. The consortium used to act as a common provider. However, during the last years, the participating institutions have increasingly been operating as independent providers, and in 2005 they ceased to operate as a common provider. They nevertheless continue to cooperate on research and development related to online e-learning.

Thus, today the consortium has several activities aimed at building knowledge and competence within e-learning provision and has important dissemination activities related to this (for example a yearly conference). Because the consortium does not act as a common provider, it was not nominated as a megaprovider. It should be noted that one of the members, Sør-Trøndelag University College is on its own a megaprovider (see list above).

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In addition, all higher education institutions in Norway (with exception of a few small privately owned ones) have implemented a virtual learning environment (VLE). Typically, a central part of a VLE is a commercial Learning Management System (LMS). Other systems are often linked with the LMS, for example administrative tools. A large number of these institutions have more than 5000 students or 100 courses using a VLE (for example, more than 15000 students use a VLE at the University of Oslo). However, surveys done in 2004 and 2005 show that the VLEs are often used to mediate simple text based information to campus students (for details, see Arneberg et al. (2005) and Arneberg 2006)). Even though the VLEs are also used for distance education, this use does not amount to the volumes required to be qualified as a megaprovider (with the exception of the four providers listed above, of course). Thus, even though e-learning through use of VLEs can be said to be widespread in higher education in Norway, the use does generally not conform with the kind of e-learning that the Megatrends project focuses on. Therefore, a large number of Norwegian higher education institutions with widespread use of VLEs are not considered as megaproviders in the current project.

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Poland • •

• •

•

Distance Learning Centre at Warsaw University of Technology www.okno.pw.edu.pl Open and Multimedia Education Centre at Warsaw University www.come.uw.edu.pl Courses offered include: English courses in Survival Polish, Social Change in Poland, English for Conferences and Polish courses in Evaluation in Education and Motivation Psychology Distance Education Study Centre at AGH - University of Science and Technology www.oen.agh.edu.pl Polish Virtual University (PUW) - joint project of Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin and Academy of Humanities and Economics in Lodz www.puw.pl. Courses offered include: Sales techniques, Negotiations, How to enter and be active on labour market, Bases of Interpersonal Communication, Polish Language and Culture, Psychology of colour in selling, Information Technology in Teaching, Computers in educational projects, The Internet as a source of school knowledge, Multimedia in a classroom, Business Information Systems, Modern Art History Seminar, Fine Arts History Seminar, Information Systems of the European Union.

National Bank of Poland (NBP) www.nbportal.pl offers, free of charge, the 4 following e-learning courses: “Economy around us”, “Euro is approaching”, “Financial analysis” and “Credits”. This portal was launched in November 2003 but it has already ranked among the most popular educational portals in Poland.

Warsaw University Centre for Open and Multimedia Education Center for Open and Multimedia Education (COME UW) is an independent unit of Warsaw University established in order to support, promote, and organize open and distance education.

COME carries out research on the utilization of modern technology in education, increasing the efficiency of instruction and enhancing the motivation of all students from all geographic and socio-economic backgrounds. Specifically, COME focuses on devising more practical methods of teaching with particular emphasis on those that make use of new information technology.

AGH University of Science and Technology 18.11.2004 Distance Education Study Centre became a Centre of Excellence in e-Learning “CeL”.

Centres of Excellence are scientific units conducting research in international cooperation, especially within European Union programmes, with the aim to develop knowledge in the fields, which has been recognized as priority for the economy and the policy of the state. It applies first and foremost to the following fields: • • •

health and life energy, ecology, new materials information and communication technology

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The aims of the Centre of Excellence in e-Learning “CeL” are: • • • • •

conducting scientific research in the field of e-learning maintaining contacts with similar centres at home and abroad, as well as with international organizations dealing with the same issue, cooperation with enterprises and administration lifelong learning analyzing effectiveness of e-learning methods

Polish Virtual University Polish Virtual University (PUW) is a joint project of Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin and Academy of Humanities and Economics in Lodz.

PUW offers study programmes and extension courses over the Internet. The task is to support traditional lectures and trainings as well as promote modern teaching methods.

PUW is a competence centre for methodology, technology and organisation of e-learning.

PUW has the capacity to provide state-of-the-art information technologies and methodological support to all interested institutions, especially to other Universities and Colleges.

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Portugal “e-learning is not yet consolidated enough in Portugal to offer a viable alternative to traditional educational structures. In fact, no national policy specifically addressing e-learning exists. Within the most relevant instrument, the Portuguese Action Plan for the Information Society (PASI), no reference of an e-learning policy can be found other than action 2.3.1 “Develop e-learning courses” of measure 2.3 “Lifelong Learning” of item 2 “New Competences”, which can hardly qualify as a structured policy.

With respect to existing providers of e-learning, a look at the public sector is disappointing […]. For their part, the two main distance learning providers in Portugal, the Open University – “Universidade Aberta”, and the Mediatised Basic Teaching, “Ensino Básico Mediatizado”, both combine traditional teaching methods with e-learning multimedia packages or video technology to provide basic education services to some populations. Similarly, some private sector training companies offer the alternative of offline e-learning (CD-ROM). Main providers on the Portuguese market appear to be CEAC, CCC and CampusEsine. Again, however, only one full e-learning course is provided by the Naval Centre for Distance Learning (Centro Naval de Ensino à Distância), which offers distance learning for Recurrent Secondary Education for a specific type of qualification: the Military Sergeants’ Course.” www.euser-eu.org/eUSER_eLearningCountryBrief.asp?CaseID=2251&CaseTitleID= 1092&MenuID=117

Universidade do Porto (www.up.pt) The institution has currently about 28,000 students at 15 different university schools or faculties.

Universidade do Porto started to offer e-learning activities on an experimental stage in 1998 and created for that aim a special service, the “Departamento da Universidade Digital”. The main objective has always been to provide on-campus students with an additional channel alongside face-to- face studies. At the same time, online applications (the university uses WebCT and MOODLE) were used to improve internal communication and coordination between the different faculties.

Presently the University of Porto offers about 70 online courses for approximately 5,000 students. These online courses however do not meet the criteria established for the Megatrends project due to the fact that they are specifically designed to support face-to-face teaching and learning. In addition to that, the University of Porto does not yet consider the possibility of giving any accreditation for course content presumably covered by online, offcampus activities from a legal point of view. The assistance to face-to-face scenarios is, therefore, compulsory and it always represents the main proportion of the course content.

Nevertheless the Department for the Digital University is planning to increase the number of pure online courses in the future.

Universidade do Porto cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

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Universidade do Minho (www.tecminho.pt) The University of Minho uses WebCT to provide online courses to their graduate students.

According to our contact person, the number of provided courses is not high enough to meet the megatrends criteria.

The e-Learning-Center TecMinho itself is a University Interface and deals with “Continuous Training Courses” for on-campus and off-campus targets (having around 10 e-learning courses per year). It is a technology transfer and training institution inside Minho University (like a Fundación Universidade Empresa).

The data that have been gathered about Minho University do not point to a megaprovider of elearning.

Universidade Aberta (www.univ-ab.pt) Universidade Aberta, the Portuguese ODL state university, is currently offering about 100 post-graduate courses online, on a totally virtual mode. However, next year, following the implementation of the Bologna Process in Portugal, the university is going to almost double the current amount of post-graduate courses delivered online. On the other hand, Universidade Aberta is also on the process of converting its ODL graduation courses to elearning. Consequently, it’s expected by the end of the decade about 10,000 students will enrol every year on an e-learning or online course by Universidade Aberta.

According to these figures, provided by Pro-rector for Innovation in Distance Learning Universidade Aberta will be considered a megaprovider of e-learning in the near future.

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Slovakia The data and information are based on selected literal quotes from the “e-learning country report for SLOVAKIA” (to be found at www.euser-eu.org/ShowCase.asp?CaseTitleID=606&CaseID=1244&MenuID=109)

Current supply of e-learning courses (and related services) The Slovakian e-learning programmes are rather self-motivated initiatives, as (unfortunately) there are not any national policies for fostering e-learning yet.

Several universities have developed e-learning courses (partly thanks to grants from the Open Society Foundation, Bratislava). Most advanced in the area of e-learning are probably the following universities: • • • •

University of Zilina (they have an e-learning programme in a pilot phase), Technical University of Kosice University of P.J. Safarik in Kosice the Slovak Technical University in Bratislava

Target groups of these courses are university students and participants of further professional education courses. Estimated number of participants is a few hundred.

Some e-learning activities are carried out also within the Infovek Project aimed at connection of all (secondary and primary) schools to Internet and provision of training activities (including e-learning).

Courses on a basis of e-learning are to a small extent delivered by a few private training companies (e.g. Elfa Ltd.) especially in the area of ICT and marketing (in most cases it is however blended e-learning).

Practically all large IT companies and banks provide e-learning training courses to their employees within their in house training system, but no official statistics could be tracked for this report. Probably the largest e-learning initiative in Slovakia is the CISCO Network Academic Program.

Role of distance education in the country Perhaps the highest potential of becoming a megaprovider (in Central Eastern European countries) lies in the reform of traditional education and the innovation (digitalisation) of paper-based distance education. In fact, the importance of distance education, as the precursor of e-learning, for adult education in Slovakia has never been very big, as even the role of distance education in Slovakia is arguable.

In 1994 a big multi-country Phare project started which had two phases and finished in 1999.

Five different local centres of distance education (DE) have been established within this project, all of them as so called “special purpose units” (local distance education centres) at the following Slovak universities: Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Technical University in Zvolen, Technical University in Kosice, Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra, and University of Zilina. All of these centres were coordinated by the Slovak National

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Distance Education Centre based in Bratislava at the Slovak University of Technology. City University Bratislava acted as a methodological centre for the DE centres in Slovakia. After the end of the Phare project the centres tried to cooperate and establish a solid base for DE provision. Most of them concentrated on provision of DE courses within further education.

Only three of the centres have participated actively in the provision of DE university graduate courses at their home universities (University in Zvolen, Zilina, and Bratislava). The current situation in university graduate studies in a DE form is as follows: approximately 100 students study graduate program at the Slovak University of Technology (study branch Electrical Engineering), approximately 250 students at the Technical University in Zvolen (study branch Corporate Management), 60 students of bachelor study at the Technical University of Kosice (study branch Geotourism).

All of the above mentioned centres provide life-long education (mostly short term) courses in DE form. The number of students varies.

Slovakia has sizable ethnic minorities, mainly Hungarians. That may be the explanation why (as it was mentioned in the previous chapter about Hungary) the Dennis Gabor College is quite strongly represented here as well, therefore (in a way) can also be considered as megaprovider in Slovakia.

Continuing education in Slovakia Another important factor enabling the initiation and spreading of the use of e-learning is adult education. Continuing education can be provided as: •

•

•

Education preparing participants for acquisition of a certain educational level; the acquisition of education leading to a desired educational level and to certain educational certificates. This is provided by primary schools, secondary schools and universities in accordance with special legislation (Law No. 29/1984 on Primary and Secondary School System (Education Act) as subsequently amended and the Law No. 172/1990 on Universities as subsequently amended); Professional education and training enabling participants to widen, deepen or replenish their knowledge and proficiency, or to attain a qualification to perform a certain activity. Professional education also includes retraining according to special legislation (Section 80 of the Law No. 387/1996 on Employment). Certificates confirming the acquisition of such education are issued by institutions of CE accredited as defined by this Law; and Special-interest education, civil education and other education, which enables participants to satisfy their interests and to become fully involved in the life of society.

Certificates indicating the acquisition of this form of education are issued by the institutions providing this CE.

In Slovakia provision of non-degree education is not restricted to particular types of organisation (it is so called “unregistered trade”). Many small and medium-sized companies providing training courses have emerged recently. However, provision of CE by other types of educational institutions (i.e. secondary schools, educational institutions of municipalities, and professional organisations) fluctuated, while provision of CE by other types of organisations (including civic associations, educational institutions of state administration etc.) decreased.

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Overall supply-demand match with regard to e-learning in Slovakia Supply of e-learning is currently not sufficient and well developed, nor is statistical data demonstrating interest of the public currently available. In general, there is an interest in elearning services, especially in courses leading international certificate. Actually not every course which is marketed as an e-learning course is a “full fledge” e-learning course.

Demand, to some extent, is hampered by still low penetration of Internet, including connection of households to Internet.

Some new projects are underway within EU funded projects (e.g. Leonardo da Vinci programme – development of an e-learning web portal eEDUSER; development of a virtual incubator for training and support for high-tech SMEs), but (at the end of 2004) they are only in a development or pilot phase.

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Slovenia As in the case of Slovakia, the data and information are selected literal quotes from the “elearning country report for SLOVENIA” (to be found at www.euser-eu.org/ShowCase.asp?CaseTitleID=607&CaseID=1245&MenuID=109) By way of introduction it is important to point out that a knowledgeable and reliable source and valuable personal EDEN contact, Ms Margerita Zagmajster, Deputy Director of the Slovenian Institute for Adult Education, has reported that there are no e-learning providers in Slovenia that would meet the megatrends requirements, even though Slovenia is one of the more advanced countries concerning penetration of the Internet and computer infrastructure.

According to data issued by the Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia (2004), there were 47% households with access to the Internet and 673,453 Internet users who represent 43% of the Slovenian population aged 16 to 74.

DOBA Group is the largest (private) e-learning provider in Slovenia, but even their statistics (www.doba.si/eng/facts.asp) do not allow them to be nominated as megaproviders.

Traditional distance education in Slovenia The first activities related to introduction of distance education in Slovenia started in period 1991-1993 within the University of Ljubljana at the University Research and Development Centre and the Faculty of Economics. This period was characterized by studying distance education theory and cases of good practice in the field of distance education in Western countries. In 1994 Slovenia was involved in the Phare Programme, which lasted from August 1995 until autumn 1999.

In the late nineties the interest in distance education and e-learning within the higher education (HE) institutions in Slovenia has been growing. Many HE institutions implement projects in the field of e-learning, some are developing on-line courses as a mean for enriching traditional forms of education. Apart from HE institutions, there are other institutions embarking on e-learning development at the level of primary and secondary education mostly as a mean for enriching traditional forms of education. Nowadays, elearning or on-line distance learning at tertiary education institutions through the Internet, at least in the form of individual subjects of study programs, is provided by 17% of surveyed institutions, whereas a complete study program is provided by 9% of institutions, with almost 35% of surveyed institutions preparing individual subjects for on-line distance learning, and one fifth institutions preparing whole study programs for on-line distance learning (Lesjak, D., Sulčič V., Trunk Širca, N., Vehovar, V.: Information and communication technology in tertiary education institutions in Slovenia. a prerequisite for e-learning; 2004).

In 2002, the Ministry for the Information Society with the help of the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport launched an interesting project entitled E-school, under which schools are opened up to everyone. Anyone can enter the classroom of e-schools and, with the help of a mentor who is always present, learn basic computer skills and how to find information, including about adult education through the Internet.

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National policies for fostering e-learning At the government level, the former Ministry of Education Science and Sport in coordination with other ministries and state bodies held primary responsibility for the development of national strategies regarding e-learning, but so-called “national policy for fostering elearning” has not been developed yet. What is missing at the moment in Slovenia is the existence of supportive deliberate educational policy fostering the development towards elearning in order to provide stable conditions and keep pace with current trends in this field.

First projects and initiatives in the field of e-learning started in Slovenia in late nineties. In the framework of the frequently mentioned Phare Programme two on-line courses were developed and 20 persons were trained in the field of e-learning.

In the National Programme for Higher Education approved by Slovenian Parliament in February 2002 the clear priority is given to the further development of distance education and e-learning.

In order to fill the gap regarding e-learning, Ministry of Education, Science and Sport approved the project Distance Learning in Slovenia in 2002. The project’s main objective is to elaborate national strategy in the field of e-learning covering different aspects as organisational, didactical, economic, technological, legal etc. for different levels of education system in Slovenia. The partners in the project hope that the project aim will be achieved and that the proposed national strategy on e-learning will be officially approved and afterwards implemented very rapidly.

Current supply of e-learning courses (and related services) According to an evaluation from 2001 (Steinbeis Transfer Centre, Germany) Slovenia is seen as having leading expertise in ICT applications for education and training within the region.

However, the number of online courses offered by educational institutions is still rather small and investment in ITC-based course is somewhat sporadic.

According to recent data (D.Lesjak, N. Trunk Širca, V. Sulčič, Electronic Learning in Slovenia, 2003) there were 26 web pages in Slovenia through which distance education was performed. However, the majority of pages focus the primary and secondary school market or regular students in higher education.

Learning languages online are offered by the above mentioned DOBA, Vocational College Maribor. Online courses or alternatively CD-ROMs are offered to learn English or German.

The students study independently at home in “virtual classrooms”. In addition, personal support service by mentors is available.

Computing courses online are offered by NEVRON do.o. Interactive solutions, a company with the mission to encourage the evolution of user-friendly, simple and effective e-learning solutions, mainly focusing on IT training. The “Virtual Academy” was established at the beginning of October 2004. Three methods of learning online are offered: “eCompanion”: independent learning through the Internet with the support of the automatic eMentor; “eCounsellor”: learning through the Internet with the permanent support of the mentor; eMentor: combined learning through the Internet with the intensive support of the mentor.

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Higher educational programmes online are available through • •

•

•

•

The “Virtual University” which provides links to faculties and schools of higher education that are members of the University of Ljubljana. www.e-studij.net portal which is a source of information and knowledge about elearning. It suits the need of various institutions as well as individuals interested in elearning. Providers: Faculty of Economics, University of Ljubljana and Educational Institute DOBA in Maribor.

DOBA which has begun in the study year 2000/2001 to implement the University Professional Business secretary programme in order to give an opportunity to educate people, who cannot attend traditional studies. The terms for matriculation are the same as for traditional study, but students must have multimedia computer equipment.

Communication between the teacher and students is implemented mainly over electronic mail (transmission of study units) and Virtual chat rooms. The examinations are taken at the institution.

The Faculty of Economics which is the higher educational institution in Slovenia delivering the whole degree/accredited distance education programme with more than 1600 students enrolled. That programme is based on different types of study materials (print materials as prevailing with elements of on-line delivery) and various study support services, which are available to the DE students (also by videconferencing).

The Faculty of Management Koper which provides in the virtual classroom one course on-line (academic year 2004/2005), developed for part-time students. It is meant for enriching traditional forms of education.

Overall supply-demand match with regard to e-learning in Slovenia The supply of e-learning courses/services in Slovenia is relatively modest. According to the results of RIS survey, conducted in 2003, only 10% of Slovenian companies have already used e-learning or distance learning for training and learning support for their staff. The RIS survey also indicates that 6.6% of the labour force in Slovenia are already using e-learning.

There are some non-formal online language and computer courses, which may have to be further developed and formalised to reach a wider audience. The development of online learning programmes related to formal education (leading to the attainment of educational degrees) would encourage the demand and thus new supply.

E-learning has no long tradition in Slovenia and therefore a lot has to be invested into promotion, both online any by using traditional media (TV, radio, press).

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Spain Adult education in Spain is organised around two different structures: seven of the 17 Regions of Spain are responsible for adult education provision on their own, while the remaining 10 rely on the central government. Regional governments receive guidance from the Education Department, but other Ministries, such as those of Employment, Culture, Social Welfare, Agriculture and Defence may be involved as well. Local administrations also provide adult education activities but these are mostly of a non-formal kind.

E-learning in Spain is at an initial phase of development. There is no specific policy on the part of the central government or the regional administrations to promote e-learning; however, there are more generic and horizontal plans that indirectly promote e-learning projects.

Following the e-learning initiative launched by the European Union in 2000, the Spanish government has developed a set of policies and initiatives to promote e-learning. The main points of this policy are: • • • •

providing all schools with the equipment and facilities for accessing ICT; developing Internet courses and training; setting up an observatory and laboratory concerned with the educational applications of ICT, thereby supporting innovation and development in such applications; strengthening cooperation between Latin America and Europe in the area of ICT in education.

Moreover, several plans and projects are dedicated to e-learning for vocational purposes.

These are supported by the Spanish Government through the European Social Fund, and through FORCEM (Continuing Training Foundation). It is indicative of the situation that 30% of all training plans presented in 2002 were related to e-learning. Moreover, the Ministry of Industry Tourism and Commerce has created FORINTEL, a program to promote the use of ICTs in enterprises, which offers e-learning courses. Currently, the Spanish government has launched the Plan España.es for the period 2004-05. One of the action points of the Plan is the promotion of accessibility to training and digital content.

The listing of Spanish universities is based on a research project undertaken by the Universidad de La Laguna in 2001 (www.edulab.ull.es/campusvirtuales/informe/documentos.htm). This project had the aim to analyze the use of virtual learning environments and content management systems in the universities of Spain. The fact that the results of this study are already 5 years old made it necessary to check every single institution in order to confirm that the data were still correct.

In some cases the characteristics of platforms, design, courses and contents had changed considerably. None of the universities listed in the study had given up ICT-supported teaching. Only in the case of the University of Almería the ongoing use of a virtual campus could not be confirmed due to an apparently dead website.

The G-9 group (www.uni-g9.net) Nine of the listed universities belong to a consortium created in 1997 with the aim to deliver some courses online thorugh a common platform. The main objective of this group, called G-

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9, is “to promote collaboration between them in terms of teaching and research activities and to stimulate student’s virtual mobility.” (Sangra 2005). Currently the consortium is offering 70 courses to all the students of these universities. The enrolment in any of these courses can be done via the computer services of the institution each student belongs to.

Universidad de Málaga (www.uma.es / www.ieev.uma.es) The institution offers both e-learning courses aimed to support face-to-face education and pure online courses.

MOODLE is the software used to generate the virtual learning environments. The university participates in a common project of 10 Andalusian universities that offer a total number of 30 online courses by means of a MOODLE-platform called Campus Andaluz Virtual (www.campusandaluzvirtual.es).

The number of courses offered is too small to consider Universidad de Málaga a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad S.E.K., Segovia (www.usek.es) Offers a “campus virtual” with administrative services like information, digital library, virtual classrooms, material as support to f2f classes.

This institution is not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia – UNED (www.uned.es) “The UNEDisadistanceteachingpublicuniversitycreatedin1972. […] From the beginning, UNED had a traditional distance teaching university education model […] mainly identified by paper based teaching materials supported by different means such as radio and TV broadcasts and video tapes, weekly face to face tutoring sessions in the associated centres spread out over the Spanish territory.[…] The ‘Plan de Virtualización de la UNED’ was made in 2000. In this plan, it was foreseen to systematically introduce online teaching services for different accredited degrees. The latest data show that 667 courses belonging to 25 different accredited degrees have already been put online.” (Sangra 2005).

The institution started to use WebCT. Later it developed an open source platform under the name of aLF (www.innova.uned.es).

The UNED has more than 180,000 students and declares itself the university with the largest number of online courses in Spain.

According to the figures offered by the UNED in the project’s survey for potential megaproviders, in 2006 the university offered more than 500 online courses in which over 16.000 students were enrolled. The number of enrolments per course must be higher (around 100.000) because the data show that the average of students per course is about 200.

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It has to be said that the data provided by the UNED are rather complex. Although online courses are said to be compulsory other data indicate that only about 30% of the students enter the virtualized courses. This seems to reveal that in spite of the virtualization of courses, UNED students do still have the possibility to design their studies on a traditional distance learning base.

Regardless these difficulties in interpreting the provided information, the UNED can be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad Camilo José Cela (www.ucjc.edu) Offers virtual environments as a support-tool for the students.

The UCJC is therefore not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat de les Illes Balears (www.uib.es) (http://campusextens.uib.es) Member of the G9 group. It offers 6 online courses on this shared portal.

The University of the Balearic Islands uses WebCT for online education. Their virtual campus is called “Campus Extens” which provides over 200 courses and a considerable number of degrees. Nonetheless, the information given about the teaching model applied on this campus indicates that the UIB cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning: The courses offered on “Campus Extens” have a face-to-face component of 70% of the total number of learning hours and are therefore not what we could consider “online-courses” under the terms of the Megatrends project.

Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha (www.uclm.es) Belongs to G9 with a common offer of “asignaturas de libre configuración”. UCLM has 4 courses of a total of 74 within the G9 group. Offers an e-library, but the main portion of titles is only accessible from computers that belong to the university.

The UCLM is therefore not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de la Rioja (www.unirioja.es) (campusvirtual.unirioja.es) Takes part in the virtual training program G9. The virtual learning environment used is WebCT. Unirioja offers as online courses 2 full degrees that sum a total of 43 online courses or subjects. There are 2 master degrees and 5 specialization courses in the postgraduate program offering a total of 44 courses. In addition to that there are 3 online courses offered under the category “lifelong learning”. All together the research on the university’s website allowed The provision of e-learning in the European Union

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identifying 90 online courses. There’s no information given about number of students and/or enrolments.

The figures indicate that Universidad de la Rioja is not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de Oviedo (www.uniovi.es) (www.aulanet.uniovi.es) The institution takes part in the G9-project and provides 12 online courses. It recently changed from an own VLE-design to MOODLE. The number of online courses offered is not large enough to consider UNIOVI a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de Cantabria (www.unican.es) UNICAN participates in theG9-project and offers 8 online courses within the common G9 program. It uses WebCT mainly to provide web enhanced face-to-face courses.

The University of Cantabria cannot therefore be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de Zaragoza (www.unizar.es) The University of Zaragoza currently offers 9 virtual courses via the G9-portal. The institution uses WebCT as the main VLE providing mainly support features for f2f courses.

The service is called ADD – Anillo Digital Docente (Digital Teaching Ring). The university’s website informs about one full degree and two diplomas that can be done virtually, but the links to further information do not work.

According to the information gathered, the Universidad de Zaragoza cannot be regarded as a megaprovider.

Universidad Católica San Antonio de Murcia (www.ucam.edu) (campus.ucam.edu) No relevant information found regarding the megatrends criteria. The “Campus Online” seems to be mainly used as a file server and for administrative means. Nothing indicates that the UCAM can be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de Murcia (www.um.es) (campusvirtual.um.es:8004/suma) Own Virtual Campus called SUMA (Servicios Universidad de Murcia Abierta; Open University Murcia Services). The system offers in four different modules administrative services, extracurricular functions like chats, forums general information panels, a 76

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commercial module aimed to possible contacts with organizations seeking for collaboration and a “modulo docente” with contents, self-assessment tools, discussion forums, chats, information about programmes etc.

The system is used for technology enhanced on-campus courses. Therefore the University of Murcia cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena (www.upct.es) The UPCT uses WebCT for its virtual program. 59 subjects offered as technology enhanced on-campus courses. Teachers can apply for a space in the VLE in order to place material and activities related to their f2f courses. The UPCT offers their teachers 3 courses about virtual learning and teaching and shows several demo courses based on WebCT as models to be followed.

The UPCT can not be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de La Laguna (www.ull.es) (www.campusvirtual.ull.es) The Universidad de La Laugna uses MOODLE as its VLE. Currently about 150 courses offered. The university’s website does not offer clear information about how many of these courses are mainly online. Information about the number of students and enrolments is not provided.

Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (www.ulpgc.es) Current academic offer over the Virtual Campus is: 5 full degrees, 7 master programmes, 23 specialization programmes that sum a total number of more than 450 online courses. The number of registered enrolments for these courses in the year 2005 was 12,237.

The vice-chancellor, who is for the implantation of the ULPGC’s virtual campus has supplied data that clearly indicate that ULPGC is a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidade de Santiago de Compostela (www.usc.es) The institution uses WebCT as their virtual platform.

No accessible information about online courses and enrolments.

Universidad del Pais Vasco (www.ehu.es)

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The virtual campus of the University of the Basque Country has grown considerably in the last 7 years. The graphics offered on the university’s website show that there were 6,027 students enrolled in online programmes in the year 04/05 while the number of courses was 246.

Figure 7 Online students and online courses at Universidad del Pais Vasco

However, the majority of these courses are a mere support for face-to-face teaching and learning. The university’s recent program (2005; 2006/07) for pure online teaching and learning counts 43 optional courses, 5 of which are offered as part of the G9 group’s virtual learning program. (www.uni-g9.net/portal/asignaturas.html) The University of the Basque Country cannot therefore be considered a megaprovider of elearning.

Universitat d’Alacant (www.ua.es) (cv1.cpd.ua.es) The University of Alicante uses its own VLE as a support tool for on-campus teaching. The environment has been developed by the Information Technology Services (Servicio de Informática).

As the university does not offer any online courses that meet the criteria established by the project team, the institution cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat Jaime I (www.uji.es)

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This university uses MOODLE as a VLE in order to provide mainly web-enhanced f2f courses. This service is called “Aula Virtual” and can be accessed via the university’s website. At the same time we can find the following address that leads us to 9 courses offered on WebCT: www3.fue.uji.es/campus.

The small number of courses that seem to be fully online takes us to the conclusion that the University of Castellón (Jaume I) cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad Politécnica de València (www.upv.es) (www.upvabierta.net) (www.cfp.upv.es) The “Área de Universidad Politécnica Abierta (AUPA)” is the university’s institution in charge of promoting the use of ICT in teaching. It encourages the use of the VLE and offers teacher’s training in order to improve online teaching. The AUPA also detects educational and technical needs in the context of e-learning.

The institution uses a VLE called “PoliformaT” which is a SAKAI-based platform. (To read more about the implantation of the SAKAI-platform in the UPV Abierta, go to: http://somi.cinstrum.unam.mx/virtualeduca2006/pdf/177-DRM.pdf Currently there are almost 18.000 postgraduate online students that can enrol in more than 250 courses.

These figures indicate that the Universidad Politécnica de València is most probably a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat de València (www.uv.es) (www.adeit.uv.es) The University of València provides technology-mediated courses via its foundation, the Fundació Universitat Empresa. The institution’s annual report says that in the year 2004/05 a total number of 36 courses were provided. The total number of students enroled in these courses was 1259. The VLE used is MOODLE. The figures indicate that the University of València is not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (www.aub.es) (https://interactiva.uab.es) The Autonomous University of Barcelona has developed its own virtual campus. The main declared objective of this tool is providing the possibility of blended learning within the classical program of face-to-face courses.

In the past academic year the UAB offered over 2,500 courses to more than 27,000 students.

About 1,300 teachers used the virtual campus as a tool for mostly blended teaching and learning. The “Campus virtual de la UAB” has 6 main tools that provide students and teachers with 6 basic functions: communication, information, materials, works, self-assessment and control.

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The UAB underlines its preference for blended learning. The online courses that would fit into the projects definition of e-learning are not enough to be able to call the UAB a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat de Barcelona Virtual (UB-virtual) (www.ub.es) (www.ubvirtual.com) (www.il3.ub.edu) The UB-virtual is the result of a joint initiative carried out by “Universitat de Barcelona” - on the public side - and Caixa Catalunya and Santander Central Hispano, two important banks, that represent the private part of the operation. The declared goal of the joint venture is to strengthen and to harmonize the offer of postgraduate, continuous and complementary educational programs.

The two centres for continuous training and education that belong to the UB, Les HeuresFundació Bosch i Gimpera (face-to-face teaching and training) and the Universitat de Barcelona Virtual (distance education) have recently merged to what is called IL3, the Institute for Lifelong Learning. This conceptual mixture is supposed to generate a new impulse to blended learning, for which there is a strong demand, according to the information on the IL3’s website (www.il3.ub.edu).

The UB-virtual as the distance learning part of the joint institution offers a large number of online courses (over 60 master and postgraduate programs with their respective courses, almost 100 certificate online courses, more than 200 extension university diplomas) on WebCT. In the academic year 2004/05 21.890 students were registered in UB-virtual, which means that the number of enrolments clearly exceeds the minimum of 5,000 necessary to qualify as a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat de Barcelona Virtual is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat de Lleida (www.udel.es) (http://itaca.udl.es) The “Unitat de Docencia Virtual” (Virtual Education Unit) belongs to the Institute of Educational Sciences and coordinates projects aimed to introduce or improve the use of ICT in the university’s educational activity.

The University of Lleida works with a SAKAI-platform. It only offers a few courses online and it is not clear if they would qualify under the terms of the Megatrends project.

The University of Lleida cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) (www.uoc.edu) The Open University of Catalonia was created in 1994 and is the first entirely virtual university worldwide. Its educational activity has been frequently awarded (educational quality, best online and distance university, world’s best digital opportunity, best European educational initiative) and has a constant and sustained organic growth.

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Figure 8 Growth figures from the Open University of Catalonia. (www.uoc.edu/web/eng/university/memoria0304/pdf/presentacio_eng.pdf)

The university works with an own virtual campus, which is also used to establish interuniversity collaboration by creating a metacampus.

The Open University of Catalonia has become a reference point throughout the world in the area of virtual education, or e-learning, and aims to lead new initiatives in education, research and dissemination of knowledge.

The UOC clearly meets the Megatrend project’s criteria for megaproviders of e-learning.

CEPADE – Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) (www.cepade.es) CEPADE has been working with First Class. This new academic year (2006/07) they change to Moodle. Data for year 2004/2005 shows that the number of online-courses offered were 250 and that the total number of enrolments were 6,000, i.e. average enrolments per course 24.

CEPADE - Centro de Estudios de Postgrado de Administración de Empresas – (Centre of postgraduate studies of company management) was founded in 1971 to cover an increasing demand of knowledge in the field of company management. CEPADE belongs administratively to FGUPM (Fundación General de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, a foundation created with the aim to promote science, culture and education within the general objectives of the UPM) but is academically integrated in the UPM. As a result, all CEPADE degrees are in fact postgraduate degrees by the UPM. According to the figures, CEPADE is a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (www.upc.es)

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The online learning programmes offered by the UPC are mainly blended courses and do not meet the criteria established by the project team. Also the number of ICT-enhanced courses offered does not seem to be high enough. Therefore the UPC cannot be regarded as a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universitat Pompeu Fabra (www.upf.es) (www.idec.upf.edu) The Universitat Pompeu Fabra is one of the 3 public universities in Barcelona.

The institution offers online distance and blended courses via the Continuing Education Institute (IDEC – Institut d’Educació Contínua). Currently there are 9 online master and postgraduate programmes offered which sum a total of 74 thematic modules. The online part represents only about 5% of the whole program offered over the IDEC. The UPF registered in the year 2005 nearly 8000 participants for the total provision of continuing education courses.

Considering these figures, the UPF cannot be regarded as a mega- provider of e-learning.

Universitat de Vic (www.uvic.cat) The University of Vic offers a service called “Campus Virtual” that aims to support students and teachers in their f2f courses.

The Universitat de Vic is not a megaprovider of e-learning

Universidad Pontificia Comillas (www.upcomillas.es) The institution that belongs to the Catholic Church and is run by the Jesuits offers only 2 master degrees and 6 courses online. The virtual campus is mainly used as a support for faceto-face teaching. The total number of students in 2004/05 was 7,159 (www.upcomillas.es/Presentacion/Documentos/Memoria_Academica_04-05.pdf) The figures indicate that UPCOMILLAS is not a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (www.upm.es) (www.gate.upm.es) The UPM coordinates its ICT-based activities via the “Gabinete de Teleeducación – GATE”.

In the year 2005, the institution offered around 110 online courses that meet the criteria of the Megatrends project. These courses cover the areas of optional graduate subjects (enseñanza reglada, cursos de libre elección), lifelong learning (formación continua) and staff training (PDI – personal docente investigador; PAS – personal de administración y servicios). UPM has registered more than 100 enrolments per course and states a total number of 14,000 enrolments regarding the provided online courses.

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The figures indicate that Universidad PolitĂŠcnica de Madrid can be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad de Extremadura (www.unex.es) This university currently offers 10 online courses via the G-9 consortium.

The University of Extremadura cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

Universidad PĂşblica de Navarra (www.unavarra.es) This university currently offers 8 online courses via the G-9 consortium.

The University of Extremadura cannot be considered a megaprovider of e-learning.

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Sweden Three reports of special interest regarding e-learning in Sweden are: On the Move Toward Online Education in Sweden (Holmberg 2003), Ett Nätuniversitet för livslångt lärande och kompetensutveckling (Hillefors et al. 2001), and E-Learning Experiences in Sweden and Possible Applications in South Africa (Odero).

The University of Lund www.lu.se was identified as a large provider of online courses in both the CISAER and the Web-edu projects. According to the CISAER project (Paulsen 2000), Lund Virtual University had 6000 online students and 80 online courses. Later, according to the Web-edu project (Paulsen 2002), the University of Lund had 6000 Luvit-users and 250 online courses. The contact person at the university has confirmed that it is a megaprovider, but it was not possible to get additional information that verified this.

The secretariats of CFL - Swedish Agency for Flexible Learning (www.cfl.se) and the Swedish Agency for Networks and Cooperation in Higher Education (www.nshu.se) were contacted, but no potential megaproviders were identified. The Swedish Net University Agency is responsible for the national portal for web supported distance education courses offered by Swedish universities. The portal itself and the web supported courses offered by the universities involved constitute the Swedish Net University.

Between 2002 and 2004 the Swedish government granted an extra 50.3 million EURO the Swedish universities for them to develop web supported courses. In the autumn of 2004 almost 38 000 students were registered in Swedish Net University courses, i.e. 11 % of the total student population in Sweden. Two universities had more than 3000 students registered as Net University students in the autumn of 2004: Mid Sweden University (4062) and University of Lund (3206). The extra grant from the government was discontinued in 2005 without the activity level in web supported courses dropping. It remains to be seen if Swedish universities keep backing e-learning and distance education within regular budgets now that the extra grant from the government has ended. In Sweden distance education and e-learning is quite extensive. Blended learning is the normal Swedish way of distance education, while pure e-learning so far is less common.

There are no EADL-members in Sweden.

The Swedish member of EADTU is the Swedish Agency for Networks and Cooperation in Higher Education www.myndigheten.netuniversity.se/en. It works with widening participation, pedagogical development and changes in the structure of higher education and degrees. Together with institutions of higher education in Sweden it works to deepen knowledge and to spread new experiences.

The following institutions in Sweden are members of EDEN: • • • • • • • 84

CFL - Swedish Agency for Flexible Learning www.cfl.se Lulea University of Technology www.ltu.se Lund University www.ltu.se Malmö University - Teacher Education www.lut.mah.se Örebro University www.oru.se The Regional Association of HE in SW Jonköping University SADE - Swedish Assocation for Distance Education www.sverd.org The provision of e-learning in the European Union

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Swedish Agency for Networks and Cooperation in Higher Education www.nshu.se University of Gavle www.hig.se

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United Kingdom The UK government Higher Education Authority provided this list of major providers of elearning in the UK: • • • • • • • • • • •

The University of Leicester Manchester Metropolitan University Staffordshire University London Metropolitan University University of Ulster University of Glamorgan University of Hertfordshire Edgehill University The Open University University of Wolverhampton Strathclyde University

There is also the UK government e-training agency called Learn Direct.

Research on this listing of major providers of e-learning resulted as follows:

The University of Leicester The university has 1,000 modules on its Blackboard Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). It also has commenced work on mobile learning. All 19,000 students at the university have access to the VLE with 7,000 of them counting as e-learning enrolments in the terms of the Megatrends project.

The University of Leicester is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

Manchester Metropolitan University The university has 1,000 e-learning modules which are available to over 30,000 students at the university, 15,000 of whom would qualify under the terms of the Megatrends project.

Manchester Metropolitan University is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

Staffordshire University The university has 350 e-learning courses. It has 5,000-6,000 students who would meet the megatrends criteria, and they are enrolled in 12,000 e-learning courses.

Staffordshire University is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

London Metropolitan University There seemed to be little knowledge of or interest in e-learning or online learning at London Metropolitan University. There seemed to be no online courses and no e-learning enrolments.

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University of Ulster The University of Ulster runs 222 e-learning courses, and has 1,300 fulltime online students each enrolled in many courses.

The University of Ulster is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

University of Glamorgan Careful research could find only a few e-learning courses with few enrolments.

The University of Glamorgan cannot therefore be regarded as a megaprovider.

University of Hertfordshire Careful research could find only a few e-learning courses with few enrolments.

The University of Hertfordshire cannot therefore be regarded as a megaprovider.

Edgehill University Careful research could find only a few e-learning courses with few enrolments.

Edgehill University cannot therefore be regarded as a megaprovider.

The Open University of the United Kingdom (www.open.ac.uk) All students are distance education students. It is estimated that online versions have been produced for 375 OU courses. It is estimated that 11,000 OU enrolments can be considered as e-learning enrolments.

The Open University of the United Kingdom is therefore a megaprovider of e-learning.

University of Wolverhampton The University of Wolverhampton has an extensive blended learning programme in which elearning plays a part. The system runs on the WebCT Virtual Learning Environment and provides local support for local people.

The University of Wolverhampton is not therefore regarded as a megaprovider.

Strathclyde University Strathclyde University is a major Scottish university. It has a Web CT office and an active elearning programme. This has 50 online courses for an enrolment of 200 fully online students.

Strathclyde University is not therefore regarded as a megaprovider.

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Learn Direct Learn Direct is presented thus by the UK government National Audit Office: Seven million adults in the U K have no formal qualifications. And as recently as 2003, an estimated 26 million people of working age did not meet one or both standards of literacy and numeracy that the Department for Education and skills considers necessary for school leavers in today’s economy.

While many UK employers educate and train their workforce to the standards of their best competitors, others provide little training. Our workforce productivity lags behind that of countries where the workforce has higher levels of skills.

Awareness of Learn Direct among adult population (summer 2005) 74 %.

Awareness of LearnDirect services for businesses among employers summer (2005) 37 %.

Learn Direct e-learning • • • • •

Total number of Learn Direct learners (to end July 2005) 1.7 million Total number of Learn Direct course take-ups (to end July 005) 4.0 million Learners who have not done any learning in last three years 65% Percentage of learners progressing on to other Learn Direct courses 59% Small and medium-sized enterprises that have used Learn Direct 0.2 million

0.5 million people are using UK online centres every year. Many had never used the Internet before, almost two-thirds are from the 2,000 most deprived and geographically disadvantaged communities in England and 80 % are from key disadvantaged target groups.

Learn Direct is attracting increasing numbers of learners with lower than level 2 qualifications: In 2004-05, 60% of learners were pre-level 2. Currently, over 70 per cent of learners are completing courses and over 50 per cent are achieving their goals.

Learn Direct has provided e-learning training to 2.000.000 citizens. It has 500 online courses and enrolls 400,000 students annually.

Learn Direct is an e-learning megaprovider.

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Bibliography Arneberg, P. Wilhelmsen, J., Støver, L.-E. and Iversen, A. (2005). Utredning om digital tilstand i høyere utdanning, – Om forhold knyttet til bruk av IKT i undervisningssammenheng.

Norgesuniversitetets skriftserie 1/2005.

Arneberg, P. (2006). Utredning om digital tilstand i høyere utdanning, fase II. Om organisatoriske forhold knyttet til bruk av IKT i undervisningssammenheng.

Norgesuniversitetets skriftserie 1/2006.

Brittain, S. & Liber, O. (2003): A Framework for pedagogical evaluation of Virtual Learning Environments. www.jisc.ac.uk/index.cfm?name=project_pedagogical_vle Frencken, H., R. Jacobi, and K. Jager, 2006. E-Learning and International Education in The Netherlands. EDUCAUSE Volume 29 Number 2. www.educause.edu/apps/eq/eqm06/eqm0629.asp?bhcp=1 Hillefors, L., B. Myringer, B. Svanteson, I. Rathsman, and M. Gisselberg, 2001. Ett Nätuniversitet för livslångt lärande och kompetensutveckling. Rapport från en utredning utförd på uppdrag av styrelserna för Distanskonsortiet, Svenska Distanshögskolan ock Västsvenska konsortiet för flexibelt lärande.

Kodolányi János University College (www.kodolanyi.hu/) Holmberg, C. 2003. On the Move Toward Online Education in Sweden. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 233-254. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Lengyel, G. (2005) Institut of Socioligy, Hungary: e-learning country report for HUNGARY (www.euser-eu.org/ShowCase.asp?CaseTitleID=596&CaseID=1233&MenuID=109) Markkula, M. 2004. eLearning in Finland - Enhancing Knowledge-based Society Development. Jyväskylä, Gummerus Kirjapaino. www.dipoli.tkk.fi/oppiminen/raportti/elearning.html Nipper, S. 2003. Online Learning in Denmark: A Personal Account. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 215-229. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Nyberg, R. og T. Strandvall. 2000. Utbilda via Internet – Handbok i IT-pedagogik. LearnIT. www.e- learnit.fi Odero, J. E-Learning Experiences in Sweden and Possible Applications in South Africa www.interped.su.se/publications/WPS3.pdf Paulsen, M. F. 2000. Online Education, An International Analysis of Web-based Education and Strategic Recommendations for Decision Makers. Oslo, NKI Forlaget. http://home.nettskolen.com/~morten/artikler/Online_Education.pdf

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Paulsen, M. F. 2002. An Analysis of Online Education and Learning Management Systems in the Nordic Countries. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, Volume V, Number III, Fall 2002.

Paulsen et al. 2002. Web-Education Systems in Europe. Zentrales Institut für Fernstudienforschung, FernUniversität, Hagen. www.fernuni-hagen.de/ZIFF/ZP_118.pdf Osservatorio Anee/Assinform 2005 (The executive summary of the report can be downloaded from: www.anee.it/anee/osservatorio.htm#1) Paulsen, M. F. 2003. Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global Elearning in a Scandinavian Perspective. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Paulsen, M. F. 2003a. The Nordic Scene. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 191-194. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Paulsen, M. F. 2003b. Online Education and LMS Systems in the Nordic Countries. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 195-214. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Paulsen, M. F. 2003c. Nordic Virtual Universities. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 230- 232. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Paulsen, M. F. 2003d. The Swedish Challenges: A Provocative Statement. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 255-256. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Paulsen, M. F. 2003e. Online Education Support Systems in Scandinavian and Australian Universities: A Comparative Study. In Online Education and Learning Management Systems – Global E- learning in a Scandinavian Perspective, M. F. Paulsen, 257-270. Oslo, NKI Forlaget.

Ranebo, S. 2001. A Nordic Survey of National Initiatives for the Development of Virtual Universities. Nordiska ministerrådets IT-policygrupp. www.norden.org/itp/dok/NORDIC_VIRTUAL_UNIVERSITIES.pdf Sabol, T. (2005) Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Informatics, Technical University of Kosice, Slovakia: e-learning country report for SLOVAKIA (www.euser-eu.org/ShowCase.asp?CaseTitleID=606&CaseID=1244&MenuID=109) Sangrà, Albert (2005). “E-Learning in Spain: The Consolidation of the Earliest Take-Off”. In: Dittler, U; Kahler, H.; Kindt, M.; Schwrz, C. (eds.). E-Learning in Europe – Learning Europe. Münster: Medien in der Wissenschaft, vol. 35, pages 181-201.

Sodelavci Laboratija za telekomunikacije Fakultate za Elektrotehniko Magyar Gallup Intézet: Internet és Pedagógia (www.gallup.hu/oktatas/ip/elearning/magyar/mint.htm)

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Vehovar, V. (2005) Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana, SLOVENIA: elearning country report for Slovenia (www.euser-eu.org/ShowCase.asp?CaseTitleID=607&CaseID=1245&MenuID=109)

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About the Authors Per Arneberg holds a PhD in biology and has worked as a lecturer and scientist at the University of Tromsø in Norway for a number of years. He has published several papers in highly ranked international scientific journals and has led development of distance education in biology. During the last years he has worked in Norway Opening Universities, a governmental agency established to stimulate development of distance education and general application of learning technology in higher education. Arneberg has written articles, conducted surveys and edited a number of books in this field. These are available at www.nuv.no.

Desmond Keegan was the foundation Chief Executive Officer of the Italian open university system, the Consorzio per l’Uiversità a Distanza. Today he is managing director of Distance Education International in Dublin, Ireland. He has designed, administered and brought to a successful conclusion more than 20 European projects. He has contributed extensively to the literature of distance education, e-learning and mobile learning including: • • • • • • •

Sewart D, Keegan D and Holmberg B (eds) (1983) Distance education: international perspectives. London and New York: Croom Helm. 446 pp. 2nd printing: Routledge 1985.

Keegan D e Lata F (eds) (1984) L'università a distanza. Riflessioni e proposte per un nuovo modello di università. Milano: Angeli. 173 pp.

Keegan D (1986) Foundations of distance education. London and New York: Croom Helm.

282 pp. Second edition: Routledge, 1990, Third edition: Routledge 1996.

Keegan D (ed) (1993) Theoretical principles of distance education. London and New York: Routledge. pp 272. Harry K, John M and Keegan D (1993) Distance education: new perspectives. London and New York: Routledge. pp 348.

Keegan D (ed) (1994) The industrialization of teaching and learning. Otto Peters on distance education. New York and London: Routledge. pp 260.

Keegan D (1997) Distance training in the European Union. Brussels: The European Commission, 100pp. Weidenfeld G and Keegan D (eds)(1999) L'enseignement à distance à l'aube du troisième millénaire. Poitiers: CNED. 360 pp.

Keegan D (2000) Distance training: taking stock at a time of change. London: Routledge, 152 pp. Keegan D (2002) The future of learning. From eLearning to mLearning.

Hagen:FernUniversität (ZIFF) 176 pp.

Jüri Lõssenko is a project manager of the Estonian e-Learning Development Centre where he is involved in developing, supporting and implementing e-learning initiatives in Estonian higher and vocational education. His responsibilities include coordinating national e-learning projects financed by the European Social Funds and several Community programme projects as well as participating in numerous national and international working groups and organisations.

Ms. Ildikó Mázár graduated at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics in 2002 as bio-engineer, and, in 2002 she completed a distance educational course entitled “Course development, learning management”. Since September 2002 she is obtaining her first job at the European Distance and E-Learning Network (EDEN) as Project Manager (earlier Project Co-ordinator).

Pedro Fernández Michels is researcher in the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) and teacher for German as a foreign language. He has been working in the field of education and language acquisition since 1990 and started implementing virtual learning environments for

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language courses in 2004. He holds a B.A. in German and Spanish Philology, a Postgraduate Degree in Didactics for German as a Foreign Language and a Máster in E-Learning, specialized in instructional design.

Morten Flate Paulsen is Professor of Online Education and Director of Development at NKI Distance Education in Norway. He has worked with online education since 1986 and published many books, reports and articles about the topic. Many of his publications and presentations are available at his personal homepage at http://home.nettskolen.com/~morten/.

His book Online Education and Learning Management Systems is available via www.studymentor.com.

Torstein Rekkedal is professor of distance education and Director of R & D at NKI Distance Education, Norway. He has worked in distance education research since 1970. He has produced a stream of research publications in the field of distance education and online learning. He has chaired the research committees of the European Association for Distance Learning (EADL) and the International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE). In 2003 he was conferred honorary doctor of the British Open University for his research work in the field. He is presently chair of the standing committee for quality of the Norwegian Association for Distance and Flexible Education. Home page: http://home.nettskolen.com/~torstein/ Jan Atle Toska holds a Cand. Phil. degree from the University of Bergen and a Master of Public Administration degree from Copenhagen Business School. He has published papers as well as several books on organizational and strategic issues in e-learning and higher education, see www.nuv.no. From 1995 to 2004 Toska was the managing director of SOFF, the Norwegian Agency for Flexible Learning in Higher Education and from 2004 to 2007 he has been the managing director Norway Opening Universities, the national agency for flexible and lifelong learning in higher education.

Albert Sangrà is full professor at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), where he has been director for Methodology and Educational Innovation (1995-2004), in charge of the educational model of the university. He is currently the academic director of the Official Master s Degree in Education and ICT (e-learning). His main research interests are the use of ICT in education and training and quality in e-learning. He has played the role of consultant in several virtual training projects in Europe, America and Asia. He is currently member of the Executive Committee of the European Distance and E-learning Network (EDEN) and also member of the Advisory Board of the Portugal s Universidade Aberta. He got a Degree in Education at the Universitat de Barcelona, a Postgraduate Degree in Applications of Information Technology in ODE at The Open University of the UK and a Diploma on Strategic Use of IT in Education at Harvard University.

Dénes Zarka has been working as head of development and adult education expert at the Centre for Learning Innovation and Adult Learning of the Budapest University of Technology and Economics since 1997. He worked as Project Manager at the Budapest Training Technology Centre in 1992-1997. His current work includes managing ODL projects, planning and developing of distance education and e-learning courses and service systems related to the developed, adapted learning materials (network of tutors, specification of courses, staff, tutor training, sale). He often gives methodological lectures and workshops on content development. Furthermore he is experienced with ODL and ICT research, corporate relations and market research. He is member of the Board of Experts in the National Council

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For Distance Education, in the Foundation For Open Learning in Vocational Education and at the Public Foundation of Apertus on the field of ODL, adult education and quality assurance.

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