Sloan-C Western Survey Report Preview Just Released

March 25th, 2008 Keith Bourne

The Sloan-C Western Survey preview report is now posted! You can download it from this page:

http://www.emergingonlinelearningtechnology.org/western_survey

This is just a preview of a report that will be released on May 7 at the Symposium in Carefree, AZ, but there is already plenty of information to digest. 400 institutions out of around 900 potential institutions in the 14 western states were included in this survey spanning a 6-year time period, so this should paint a realistic picture of what is happening in western higher education at the strategic level concerning online education.

Comparing to the national survey, it looks like 73% of the Chief Academic Officers in the west believe there is still a growth opportunity in online education, while that number sits at 83% on the national level. One quick conclusion here is that if you take out the West, the other parts of the nation would be even higher. Why the difference in optimism in the West? Perhaps the opportunity has already been seized in some eyes? Or perhaps missions are just focused on different areas? Overall though, 73% is still very optimistic, so is the other 27% missing the boat? (disclaimer: these are just my own thoughts, so please don't think these will have any bearing on the survey report, which is conducted by an independent third party through Babson College.)

Thank you to Embanet ULC for sponsoring this important piece of work though, as I am finding the results very interesting. I am really curious to know what some of you that are at these western institutions think of the results, so please use these forums to discuss!

Please let us know what you think about the issue I raise, or any of the other comparisons you can draw at this point. You can sign up to be notified of the full release of the survey report on this webpage:

http://www.emergingonlinelearningtechnology.org/western_notification

You can also use that page to unsubscribe at any time, just in case! (When we do send the full report notification, it will include an unsubscribe link as well.)