Straut, T.T. and Poulin, R. (2015) Highlights of Distance Education Trends from IPEDS Fall 2014, WCET Frontiers, 21 December
Source
WCET (the Western Co-operative for Educational Technology) has once again done an excellent job in analysing the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES)’ Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) data that reports Distance Education (DE) student enrollment for the Fall of 2014.
Results
Enrollments by students ‘Exclusively in Distance Education’ continued to rise in 2014. There were 2,824,334 fully online enrollments in 2014, compared to 2,659,203 in 2013, representing a 6% increase in just one year, or just under 13% of total enrollments.
Students taking at least some fully online courses but not an entirely fully online program also increased, from 2,806,048 in 2013 to 2,926,083 in 2014 (a 4% increase). [Note: these are not students taking blended or hybrid courses, but taking some fully online courses as well as campus-based courses.]
At the same time overall enrollments dropped slightly (just under 1%). Thus online learning continues to grow faster than conventional higher education. Taken together at least 28% of all U.S. higher education students are taking at least some fully online courses.
However, perhaps more interesting is where this growth occurred. The biggest increase in fully online courses came from the more prestigious private, non-profit sector (22% increase), while the for-profit sector (UofPhoenix, etc.) actually declined by 11%. Indeed, the for-profit sector now accounts for less than one third of all fully online enrollments.
Cautions
The IPEDS data is relatively new (this is the third year of reporting). There are problems of definition (‘distance education’ and ‘fully online’ are not necessarily the same), and there appears in past years to have been inconsistent reporting across institutions.
WCET will be following up on this initial report with more detailed reports in 2016, including an analysis of the reliability of the data.
Comment
Despite the cautions, this data, based on a census of all U.S. higher education institutions, is probably the most reliable to date.
Despite the (assumed) growth in blended learning, fully online learning appears to be more than holding its own. One reason is clear. Many of the more prestigious private, non-profit institutions have room to grow in their adoption of online learning, being slower initially to move in this direction.
To what extent this growth of online learning in the private, non-profit sector is owed to the publicity from or experience with MOOCs remains to be assessed, but the growth of for-credit online learning in this sector is an indication of the increasingly broad acceptance now of fully online learning.
What is needed now is more data on – and clearer definitions of – blended learning, as it seems reasonable to assume that as on-campus programs become more flexible through blended learning, this will impact eventually on fully online enrollments. But kudos to the U.S. Department of Education for setting up these surveys and to WCET in helping with the analysis. Now if only Canada…….Justin?
Dr. Tony Bates is the author of eleven books in the field of online learning and distance education. He has provided consulting services specializing in training in the planning and management of online learning and distance education, working with over 40 organizations in 25 countries. Tony is a Research Associate with Contact North | Contact Nord, Ontario’s Distance Education & Training Network.
