The Distance Education Primer

OVERVIEW OF DISTANCE EDUCATION Distance education describes educational activities which interactively link two or more people at two or more locations.Recent telecommunications developments, particularly integrated voice, video and data systems, as well as satellite and compression technologies, have made distance education a viable alternative to improving access to educational opportunities for learners of all ages, at all levels and in diverse environments.
Distance education is a viable, effective and efficient training medium for a number of reasons:
Future education and training endeavors will be increasingly knowledge basedThe amount of information available to individuals will continue to explode
Rapid change will be the rule, not the exception
Inter-organizational partnerships, resource sharing and networking will improve information access
Distance education can provide access to many different types of resources, including:
Professional and educational training opportunities
Experts working at other locations
Personnel in remote or dispersed locations with access to primary site personnel, instructional materials and other resources
Network-dispersed groups
USING DISTANCE EDUCATIONDistance education can be used in any environment where people need improved access to information, have a need to share resources, or where learners, teachers, administrators and subject matter specialists must travel to distant locations in order to communicate with one another. In other words, educational, as well as business, government and private organizations can benefit from distance education. Some of those include:
K-12 schools
Colleges and universities
Vocational and technical schools
Business and industry
Government
Professional development centers
Community resource centers