Future of Higher Education: Blended Learning

Technology has proliferated every area of our lives. Education is not an exception to this. Academics already use technology to create and host courses, usually through a Learning Management Systems (LMS).Technology is taking a prominent space in the area of education. Online education is not new. Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) has received much attention in the past few years. The popularity of MOOC’s means that format and use of technology to disseminate content is incredibly successful. However, Online and MOOCs are different. MOOC is offered by brand name universities for free online, the LMS is only accessible by university staff and students. Already technology has facilitated a move away from chalk-and-talk lectures toward more project based learning, workshops (sometimes online) and online forums and meetings. Many academics have also embraced multiple choice or online examinations through their LMS.  

                    Word Cloud Blended Learning

According to Stratistics MRC, the Global Online Learning Market is accounted for $165.21 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach $275.10 billion by 2022 growing at a CAGR of 7.5% during the forecast period.  Universities are launching online courses. We can ask ourselves: In the coming times, will higher education institutions be much different than they are today? Yes – we will all change. In fact, we are changing as we speak. Continuous learning will be vital as people change careers more often over a longer working lifespan. The blended model, combining face-to-face and online education, will become the new normal. By 2020, 50% of all face-to-face coursework will combine in-person and online learning; a shift driven by student demand for the convenience and effectiveness of online learning. Leveraging online courses, students will become continuous learners, cultivating new skillsets throughout their careers. Blended learning has a great future in Higher Education. Blended learning has been growing in popularity as it has proved to be an effective approach for accommodating an increasingly diverse student population whilst adding value to the learning environment through incorporation of online teaching resources. According to Subhash Kak Universities must prepare for a technology-enabled future. Technological advancements are reshaping education. In Australia we have Open University Australia (OAU), providing online courses since they began in 2011. The use of new technologies used in online learning, can assist in both the enhancement of traditional teaching methods and the development of students’ technical skills. I did a Google trend search using the key word “Blended Learning” in “Australia” and found that Victoria has the peak popularity of term Blended Learning followed by New South Wales and Queensland. On Google Trend numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart for the given region and time. A value of 100 is the peak popularity for the term. A value of 50 means that the term is half as popular.

                  Google Trend showing search results of Blended Learning 

Monash University and the University of Queensland are the first to offer blended courses online and have made an agreement to jointly develop online course material to use on both campuses. Buoyed by a successful partnership with online platform Coursera, Macquarie University will launch a new initiative. CQUniversity is offering many courses as a distance mode online study.

According to a study by Capterra, 53% of organizations around the world believe an LMS is useful not only for e-learning program delivery but also for managing classroom training programs. In my opinion, blended learning will be an integral part of higher education. LMS can be used to deliver blended learning effectively. The design of blended learning curriculum will be more diversified and personalized with the integration of creative in-class active learning strategies and innovative educational technologies, such as adaptive learning, virtual reality, mobile technologies, and so on. Universities should proceed with an effort to develop a blended learning community. Many academics are using LMS functionalities to provide support to their distance-learning students. Blended learning requires academics to use these functionalities at a higher level to support students.