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COL partners with Canadian organisations to develop guidelines to assist in risk reduction for consumers of e-learning
VANCOUVER - At their own risk, students of all ages are using the Internet for education and training. Every person who signs up online takes a chance that the time, registration fees, and effort may be wasted. Consumers need to know how to recognise and use quality online learning services. A new project just launched will help them to provide clear comparative guidelines for e-learning services.
The Commonwealth of Learning is working with the Canadian Association for Community Education (CACE) and FuturEd Consulting Education Futurists (FuturEd), and other partners to create a set of quality standards for online learning products and services in Canada. These standards will be consensus-based, consumer-oriented, recommended only, and futuristic. All elements of an online course - design, content, credibility - will be incorporated.
Barbara Case, past president of CACE, says: "Across Canada, students are overwhelmed by the amount of choice they have in online learning. They're wondering about quality and how to get the best return for their education investment."
The project will also create a consumer's guide to give students, parents, and workers the questions they should ask before signing up for an online course. Producers of online learning - public universities, colleges and school boards, not-for-profits, commercial firms - can then use the guide to meet consumer expectations.
Dr. Kathryn Barker, President of FuturEd, notes: "This project is a unique Canadian contribution to the on-going management of content on the Internet. It will provide consumers with a Bill of Rights, and it will create a Seal of Approval for Canadian producers of Internet-based education and training competing in the tough global market."
The draft guidelines, in the form of a consultation workbook, can be accessed online, in both English and French, at
www.FuturEd.com . Contributions are welcome.
The project is funded by the Office of Learning Technologies of Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC). Other project partners include the Canadian Association for Distance Education (CADE), the Association for Media and Technology in Education in Canada (AMTEC), LICEF Télé-Université (Université du Québec), SchoolNet of Industry Canada, the TeleLearning Network (the Centre of Excellence providing research in this area), CanLearn (the HRDC education web portal for higher education and training) and CanLearn Interactive. New partners are welcome.
National consultations are scheduled to take place during the next few months.
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