Public Investment in University Distance Learning Programs: Some Performance-Based Evidence (Author Abstract) (Report‪)‬

Economics focuses on choice-making. Among the most critical public choice-makers are state governments, which in 2004-2005 appropriated more than $63 billion dollars to higher education [Chronicle, 2005]. A growing portion of these higher education expenditures by state governments now relate to 'distance learning' such that students and instructors do not make face-to-face contact in a bricks and mortar classroom. Instead, students and faculty members, who may be located continents apart, communicate via television, the Internet, or telephone. Course materials and lectures may be distributed in the same fashion, or by other means such as CDs and DVDs. Once a decision has been made to invest a specific number of dollars in public higher education, the relevant public policy question with respect to distance learning becomes--Does it work? Do students experience as much academic success when they utilize distance learning modes as they do when they pursue conventional bricks and mortar education? The answer is critical in determining whether burgeoning distance learning programs are cost-effective investments, either for students or for governments.