Untangling the web

Students from 24 countries, including Sudan, Malaysia and Brazil, have now enrolled on internet-based, or e-learning, degree courses at British universities, via the government-backed online company UKeU. This week the project received a further boost, following the announcement of a link-up with the BBC educational website BBC Learning.

The company, whose full name is UK eUniversities Worldwide, was established by David Blunkett, with the help of a £62m government grant in 2001. The idea was to enable students across the globe to study for British university degrees without leaving their own country. Commercially, the aim was to allow British institutions to cash in on their global reputation for academic excellence.

UKeU took its time before launching actual courses and inviting students to enrol. But after two years' preparation, the first courses went live in March this year. There are currently a dozen graduate and postgraduate programmes on offer, with more in the pipeline. "I think it is a massive achievement to get from concept to delivery in such a short time," said the UKeU chief executive John Beaumont. Participating institutions include Cambridge University, King's College, London, Ulster and Hertfordshire universities. There are courses in business, health, science and technology and environmental sciences.

Behind the optimism and enthusiasm is a hope among UKeU executives that this online educational initiative will prove more enduring that most of the first wave of e-learning schemes introduced around the turn of the millennium. Many of those suffered from shallow preparation, and from the naive assumption that there was no difference between a student walking into a lecture theatre and one sitting at home in front of a computer. As a result, many bodies did little more than put lecture notes and a few PowerPoint presentations on the web.

It was seen as a means to cut costs by reducing overheads (teachers, books and buildings) while still collecting fees. Students across the educational landscape did not take long to rumble the tactic and they left in droves. John Beaumont says lessons were learnt from those experiences.

The private sector partner, Sun Microsystems, has invested £5.6m in developing the technological "platform" that will carry the online course materials. Experts regard this as the crucial factor that will determine whether UKeU takes off. Only if a student tapping into a PC in Bratislava, Khartoum or Bangkok really feels comfortable learning and receiving guidance from UK-based tutors via the interactive web-based elements, will the project grow. The company's sales pitch - study for a degree "at your own pace, at your own place" - has to become more than just a snappy slogan.

And commercial imperatives will begin to exert themselves next year, when the Government money runs out. After that, UKeU will have to be self-financing, the chief income source being student enrolment fees. Probably with this in mind, the courses on offer are mainly Masters or postgraduate qualifications in leading edge, business-related areas, and they are targeted as much at businesses as at individual students worldwide.

The latest course, to be launched this week, illustrates this point. The MSc and postgraduate qualifications in geographical information systems, put together jointly by the universities of Leeds and Southampton, claims to be tailor-made for the "corporate learner" market.

Students will acquire expertise in IT applications across key fields, such as health and environmental management, demography and census analysis. "There is a proven and growing demand for such training," explains Dr Graham Clarke, from Leeds University's school of geography.

Other courses on offer include an MSc in biomedical science, and a postgraduate diploma in coastal-zone management both from Ulster University, as well as a Masters in tourism and travel management from Nottingham University.

Less umbilically linked to the business world is an MA in war studies offered by King's College, London. This course will exploit its global spread of students, with the prospect of online seminars with participants contributing from conflict zones in every continent.

Overall, John Beaumont concedes that there's a degree of uncertainty about UKeU's future, but he exudes confidence about its position at the forefront of an academic advance.

"I don't think we know how e-learning will evolve over the next three to five years. We will certainly be developing our programmes and we will remain proactive in getting feedback from our students."