The educational enterprise has always treated technology as a high cost item. We placed books in libraries, and follow the same procedure with films, videos, and CD-ROMs. We centralized the limited pool of audiovisual equipment and put computers in labs. It is an economics of scarcity. Even the one-textbook-per-student is no long possible in many schools and the cost of college textbooks often exceed their perceived value.

In some professions, the content changes so rapidly that whole sets of reference books must constantly replaced. Law and Real Estate are excellent examples. The CD-ROM has miniaturized storage and reduced publication cost to the point that offices and individuals can afford their own copy. Methods of licensing have been developed for different levels of user to ensure a fair return to the producer. By supporting a very large user base with inexpensive distribution technologies, these services have become very reasonable in price.

Education is beginning to benefit from the economics of scale, but the initial cost has been extraordinarily high. In the workplace we see a networked computer on almost every desk. In schools we concentrate them into labs or library.

There have been some exciting attempts to shift the paradigm. Experiments with laptops for every student that began in the early 90’s have led to new ways of teaching and learning where colleges no long buy computers for their labs. Instead they provide networks and servers with 24 X 7 access to local learning resources and the Internet. Lower cost computers and Internet appliances promise to make Internet technologies available for Universal Education in the very near future.

Perhaps the most exciting development from the point of view of distance learning is that many of the tools of distance learning — like multimedia and the internet — have been adopted for in-school or campus use. Thus, the distinction between different modes of learning is diminishing and the stigma against distance learning per se is disappearing. The net result is that students have the opportunity to learn, or to continue their learning, off-campus. (This is not new — it has always been true with textbooks!

Drs. Donald & Elizabeth Perrin
Managing Editors
Ed Journal and Ed at a Distance Magazine

USDLA Official Publications
3345 Pachappa Hill Riverside, CA 92506
Voice: (909) 369-4059 or (909) 408-446-3202
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EMAIL: eperrin@pacbell.net or dperrin@pacbell.net