Like most people today, electric utility workers who want to develop their skills and advance their education often have a difficult time doing so because of work schedules, overtime hours, and family responsibilities.

Going online is one way to make it easier. In June 2000, Exelon, Entergy, Pepco, Florida Power & Light, OG&E Electric Services, Xcel Energy, and the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, among other companies, unions, and organizations, formed the Energy Providers Coalition for Education. EPCE's goal is to tackle the industry's growing need for thousands of technicians and develop a flexible, online training and education program. Students can earn their A.A.S. degree or certificate in electric power technology completely online, from home or work, in approximately two years.

Since September 2001, 143 students have enrolled in EPCE's courses. "EPCE is the only program that would fit my schedule. It gives me the ease and freedom to accomplish a degree outside of the traditional atmosphere," says Robyn Wilson, a mother of three and heavy hauling field representative for OG&E Electric Services.

Professors at Bismarck State College in North Dakota teach the program, which expects to enroll 1,000 students by 2004. The program also offers around-the-clock tech support, an online library and bookstore, and other services.

"Every single course (with the exception of the general education courses) is being designed to pertain directly to the electric utility industry," according to Jim Hunter, former president of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1900. "It's a program developed by the industry for the industry."

A few weeks after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the online journal Edge invited prominent scientists, philosophers, artists, and journalists to write a response to the incident. (1) One of the respondents, Roger Schank, discussed the terrorist attack in relation to U.S. policy on online education. (Schank is a noted cognitive scientist, and chair of the online-learning company Cognitive Arts.) In a piece entitled "Educating Arabs, Educating Ourselves," Schank argued that the root cause of the tragedy was lack of education-- education of the American public, and especially, the education of Arab youth. Schank proposed that a solution to the dense web of problems, conflicts, and political issues surrounding the September 11 attack could be found in online education. Creating and exporting online education to regions of the world blighted by "poverty and ignorance" would lessen the chance of a similar attack in the future. Schank writes:

If we created high quality on-line courses, for example, if Harvard and Yale and other universities took seriously their role as world educators, then perhaps what they built could be exported to the rest of the world. If it were not done on a for profit basis, but were offered for very little money, then people in poor countries might qualify for better jobs and might be able to reason more adroitly about the complex issues they face. Instead we leave their education to mullahs or their angry fathers in law. While we, as a nation export television, movies and blue jeans, we do not export quality education.

While Schank's comments are a rather stunning example of political naivete, technological determinism, and the banking model of education taken to new extremes, they are nonetheless consistent with the way in which online education has been talked about by many of its supporters in the U.S. over the last decade. For example, John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems, has said that online education will enable workers to "take more control of their jobs, while the dispossessed of the world will be able to make strides to improve their economic position" (McCright, 1999). CEOs, university administrators, publishers, and Nobel laureates routinely predict that online education will revolutionize learning, empower students and faculty, democratize knowledge production, and transform society. Schank's remarks provide a particularly vivid example of the narrow, technocratic character of many models of online education, and of the reductive way in which teaching, knowledge, and the university are often thought about.

2. THE GROWTH OF ONLINE EDUCATION

"The next big killer application for the Internet is going to be education. Education over the Internet is going to be so big it is going to make e-mail usage look like a rounding error."

John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems (cited in Friedman 1999, A29.)

Online education and distance learning have grown rapidly in the past decade. In 1999 one in three U.S. colleges offered some sort of accredited degree on line, and approximately one million students took online classes. (2) Private investment in online education went from $11 million in 1993, to just under a billion dollars in 1999 (Education Quarterly Investment Report, 2000). Wall Street analysts, accountancy firms, Internet entrepreneurs, and university administrators routinely tout the commercial potential of online education, and a variety of groups, both academic and corporate, have developed models. According to a 1999 Merrill Lynch report called "The Book of Knowledge: Investing in the Growing Education and Training Industry," the digitizing of education has made the university ripe for the kind of rationalization that took place in the health industry in the 1990's. The report prompted some Wall Street analysts to predict a future of "EMOs," or "Educational Maintenance Organizations."

According to Alessandra Bianchi (2000), traditional universities now find themselves "part of a new competitive marketplace with other online learning providers like UNext (part of the Knowledge Universe), Kaplan College, University of Phoenix Online, Jones International University, and over 400 new companies entering the online learning marketplace." Many universities have responded to the specter of increased competition by launching online courses and virtual universities of their own, by forming coalitions with other universities, or by forming partnerships with corporations. Todd Woody (1999) writes that elite universities and professional schools have been scrambling to "leverage their brands," and to organize their own systems of online education:

Fearing that they will be left behind, Ivy League administrators are becoming deal makers, and buzz phrases like "leveraging brands" and "tapping intellectual capital" echo from the Stanford Quad to Harvard Square... Now that this gold mine of intellectual property can be packaged and sold online, universities are determined to share in the profits. "The idea that all of this content--we used to call it teaching and learning--can be turned into content with an economic value is extraordinary," says Geoffrey Cox, a Stanford University vice provost. "Frankly, if anyone is going to get the economic value of that, it will be the university."

GETTING a degree via the Internet might have been unthinkable 10 years

ago, but today, an online degree programme is just another option for

pursuing tertiary education. Online education or e-learning is starting to

revolutionise the country's education system. Although still in its

infancy, online education is definitely catching on with more and more

universities adopting some form of online learning. Corporate

organisations are also beginning to conduct online training for their

employees. A report by International Data Corporation (IDC) reveals that

the corporate sector in Asia Pacific alone is projected to spend US$233.6 million on online learning in 2005, compared to US$83.5 million in 2000.

The projection by IDC does paint a very positive future for the online

education sector. But, there is no telling what would happen in the

future. Unexpected events have proven that the global economic conditions

are rather volatile. Naturally, one would conclude that the business of

online education would be affected by an economic downturn and suffer the

same consequences as other businesses. However, according to players in

the local online education sector, it might just be the other way around

especially for the higher degree level education.

`The state of the economy has affected most businesses in the country.

However, somehow education is one industry that would be least affected

because those who cannot get jobs will eventually have to think of

improving themselves and be more prepared to compete in the job market

later when the market improves,' says Datuk Dr Syed Othman Alhabshi, the

president and CEO of University Tun Abdul Razak (UNITAR). UNITAR was set

up by KUB Malaysia Bhd in December 1997 and began operations in 1998. It

marked the start of a new era in local education where online education

was seen as a big business for those who seize the opportunity. Othman

claims that UNITAR has enrolled about 7, 000 students so far.

Education experts quote a variety of reasons for the growing interest in

online education. These include the increasing number of households with

the PC (thanks to the EPF Computer Purchase Scheme) and the increasing

number of IT literate individuals in the country, a development attributed

to the government's efforts, such as the smart school and e- government

initiatives. Perhaps, some of the most compelling reasons for this growing

trend in online education at the tertiary level today are the increasing

unemployment figures, its competitive fees and the time flexibility and

non-gruelling timetable it affords.

The increasing rate of unemployment in the country, an after- effect of a

slowing economy, is one reason why online education is gradually stepping

into the limelight. The Ministry of Human Resources reports that the

number of people who were retrenched and those who opted for VSS

(Voluntary Separation Scheme) from January to Dec 8, 2001 was 36,404

people. As mentioned by Othman, these unemployed people with working

experience are often driven to continue their education in order to

enhance their chances of getting a better job in the future. `The

government's PSMB (Pembangunan Sumber Malaysia Berhad) has introduced a

scheme to help the retrenched workers and the unemployed to upgrade their

skills, especially in the fields of ICT. Such people will be more

accustomed to e-learning or online learning in the years to come,' says

Deisy Law , a research analyst from Frost and Sullivan.

Compounding the unemployment problem is the high number of fresh

graduates released into the market every year by local higher learning

institutions and the economic lull. In the Eighth Malaysia Plan, it is

forecast that in 2005 there would be 289, 806 students enrolled in local

public higher institutions. Of this number, more than 85 per cent will

graduate and compete in the job market. Thus, for unemployed graduates

online learning would be an alternative route to a better and brighter

future.

Another pull factor for online education is its relatively cheaper fees

compared to the traditional lecture-based learning method. UNITAR,

Malaysia's first virtual university, for instance, offers a Master of

Business Administration (MBA) for about RM15, 000 for the whole course,

which is much cheaper than what other local institutions are offering. The

cost for obtaining a general degree ranges from RM25, 000 to RM35, 000

depending on the university. Another local university, Universiti Putra

Malaysia (UPM), charges RM12, 000 per programme for an online Master of

Science in Human Resource, a sum considered affordable to those who are

keen to further their education. Although the duration of an online degree

course is a fraction longer than that for full-time enrolment, it is still

a flexible choice for many working adults.