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All aboard the e-Learning Rollercoaster!

by Adrian Snook
28 April 2005

In this article written for eLearning Age magazine, Adrian Snook reviews some of the highs and lows in e-Learning over the last few years. There are times when life in the e-Learning Industry feels a little like a rollercoaster ride...

The degree of interest in e-Learning has certainly fluctuated wildly ever since the term was first coined in the late 1990's. Sky-high initial expectations were followed by an extreme trough of despondency in the aftermath of the dot.com crash of March 2000.

It is undeniable that many private sector organisations initially approached e-learning without enough preparation or thought and wasted a great deal of money.

Nevertheless organisations like the DIY retailer B&Q and others that had committed to sensible investments in e-Learning infrastructure and resources during 2000 soon found they were getting robust and dependable results from these investments in subsequent years. As a result these organisations have continued to invest in content and other enhancements year-on-year and are now very mature users of e-learning. This growing maturity is leading to a level of confidence which is infectious and the private sector is gradually recovering its enthusiasm for e-Learning as a key component of their learning strategy

The picture in the public sector is different. Publicly funded organisations were broadly excluded from participation in the first wave of e-Learning roll-outs because their IT infrastructures were generally inadequate and because their management were essentially more cautious than their private sector colleagues. Hence public sector organisations were given the useful opportunity to learn from the private sector's bitter experiences of caught at the "bleeding edge" of learning technology adoption.

Improved state funding opened the door for the adoption of e-learning within public sector organisations from 2001 onwards. Whilst some public sector organisations have made good use of this opportunity and have avoided the more obvious pitfalls there have been high profile disappointments in relation to UK e-Universities (UKEU) and NHSU. Hence some of the more unrealistic expectations set by some public sector organisations between 2002 and 2004 are now being scaled back to more sensible levels.

Past enthusiasm for outsourcing e-learning content development and for sourcing off-shelf content in large standardised libraries is now moderating in favour of an increasing thirst for the capability to generate, customise and appropriately contextualise e-Learning resources in-house.

I would anticipate that 2005 will continue to see steady growth in the adoption of e-learning across both the public and private sector in the UK. Much of this growth will be attributable to growing levels of confidence and competence in relation to the development, implementation and management of e-Learning, underpinned by the growing adoption of skills programmes like the Certified e-Learning Professional Programme (CeLP).

Whatever lies ahead of us on the e-Learning Rollercoaster life is unlikely to be dull. Please keep your arms and legs inside and secure any loose objects!