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Costs of e-learning in HE - and the benefits

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Some impact from related work including RCIT (CNL methods ... Professor of Telematics. School of Computing and Management Sciences. Sheffield Hallam University ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Costs of e-learning in HE - and the benefits


1
  • Costs of e-learning in HE - and the benefits

Professor Paul Bacsich Sheffield Hallam
University, UK
2
Methodological foundation
  • Suitably interpreted and broadened, and
    leavened with pedagogy,the rather dry methods of
    business costing and planning can provide a
    sound basis for analysing e-learning
    developments and their impact.

3
Summary
  • CNL Phase 1 JISC JCALT
  • CNL Phase 2 JISC JCALT
  • Effectiveness impact of other work including
    analysis of the training sector EU Telelearn
    etc and the NLN Evaluation work FEDA
  • Some impact from related work including RCIT (CNL
    methods applied to admin IT systems) JCALT and
    soon perhaps from Managing Change (formerly
    TLTR) on change management in HEIs JCIEL

4
Main issues
  • What learners want - must be first!
  • Costs
  • Effectiveness

5
What learners want...
  • From our own work on learners (CNL)
  • students believe that e-learning increases costs
    to them
  • but they behave as though it saves costs
  • and saves time!

6
What learners want
  • From our own work on learners (CNL)
  • students believe that e-learning increases costs
    to them
  • but they behave as though it saves costs
  • and saves time!
  • From other work (including USA)
  • they want flexibility (but not too much)
  • some want overclocking (ie faster throughput)

7
Hidden Costs - examples
  • Increased home telephone call bills for students
    due to Internet usage
  • Entertainment expenses incurred by lecturers but
    not reimbursed by the HEI
  • The usage of teaching or research budgets to
    bolster IT budgets - or vice versa

8
CNL1
9

Conclusions - CNL1
  • In order to accurately record the Costs of
    Networked Learning you must have a universally
    accepted method of what costs to record and how.
  • Much of the literature formed interesting
    background reading but failed to travel far
    enough towards operational conclusions to be
    taken (individually) as a basis.
  • The method must include a lifecycle model,
    stakeholders, activity based costing and a
    cost-aware approach to planning.

10
Course Lifecycle Model
Three-phase model of course development

11
Breakdown of three-phase model
12
The main Stakeholders
  • The HEI
  • and the staff of that HEI
  • The learners

13
Stakeholders - two more special cases
  • The HEI
  • and the staff of that HEI
  • The learners
  • and their organisationand in some cases their
    parents/partners

14
The Financial Schema- cf Transparency Review
  • The traditional financial model underpinning work
    in most HEIs is defective in four ways

No Stakeholders
No agreed set of activities
Crude Overhead Allocation
No time recording
15
Planning Document and Financial Schema

16
Activity-Based Costing
17
Activity-based costing (ABC)
  • ABC was developed as an alternative costing
    methodology by Robin Cooper and Robert Kaplan of
    the Harvard Business School (1988) in their
    research into product costing in the
    manufacturing industry.

18
Cooper and Kaplan (1988)
  • They argued that traditional costing distorted
    product costs (peanut butter spread approach)
  • There is a cost to all activities carried out
    within an organisation
  • Activity costs should be distributed to products
    in relation to their use

19
ACTIVITY DRIVERS
Activities
method
Hold Tutorials
Staff time
Resources
Cost for each Customer/product/channel group
Business Intelligence
FT
Cost driver
I.T. Management
FT
No. Students
I.T. Management
DL
20
Definitions
A series of activities required to achieve an
outcome
Process
Invoicing Process
A series of related tasks carried out repeatedly
Chase a student for late payment
Activity
Telephone student
One action by one person at one point in time
Task
21
Advantages of ABC
  • Gives more than just financial information
  • Fairer system of overhead allocation
  • Accountability of central services
  • Highlights cross-subsidisation
  • Recognises the changing cost behaviour of
    different activities as they grow and mature
  • Can provide data for other initiatives

22
Disadvantages of ABC
  • Data collection is costly and time consuming
  • Initially it can be difficult to collect the data
    you want
  • Determining appropriate cost drivers
  • More complex system

23
Implementing ABC takes time
  • Its important in a service organisation to get
    started with ABM and not worry about total
    accuracy from the start. Accuracy will improve
    with time
  • Antos (1992)

24
CNL2
  • This was a trial of ABC in one faculty of
    Sheffield Hallam University, using
    industrial-strength ABC software and consultancy
    (Armstrong-Laing)
  • The trial was funded by JISC JCALT
  • The report of the trial (plus workbook) will be
    available in August 2001
  • The full set of costs are not reported!

25
Tiptoeing into effectiveness issues
26
History
  • Relatively early in the history of CNL1,
    effectiveness issues were looked at (Ash,
    November 1999)
  • Main conclusion was that a uniformly accepted
    methodology was needed there also and some
    suggestions were given, based to a certain extent
    on the US Flashlight work.
  • This work led into the NLN evaluation studies
    (English FE sector)

27
Effectiveness a big border between E T
  • The NSD effect in academia(No Significant
    Difference)
  • versus learning gains and large Return on
    Investment in training world
  • 700 ROI at Royal Bank of Scotland (Shepherd)
  • routine 10-25-40 learning gains
  • and situations with 60 learning gains

28
NSD in academia...
  • It is commonly believed, and apparently validated
    by the seminal work of Thomas L Russell in 1999,
    that the mode of delivery makes no significant
    difference to the grades or other performance
    indicators of students
  • The Web site teleeducation.nb.ca/nosignificantdiff
    erence/ rounds out and updates this earlier work.

29
NSD in academia
  • It is commonly believed, and apparently validated
    by the seminal work of Thomas L Russell in 1999,
    that the mode of delivery makes no significant
    difference to the grades or other performance
    indicators of students.
  • The Web site teleeducation.nb.ca/nosignificantdiff
    erence/ rounds out and updates this earlier work.
  • But we contend that the NSD work has several
    major flaws - in particular many key variables
    were not controlled.

30
Self-incrimination?
  • There were no significant pre- and post-course
    differences on the items related to students
    expectations and perceived benefits...
  • There were no significant differences between
    students in the online compared to students in
    the face to face courses for course retention
    or course grade...
  • but there were increases in the amount of time
    and the purposes for which students used
    computers." (Green et al 2001)

31
So is a key difference to do with time?
  • And what is time?

32
What is time?
  • Time is the new distance(Mason, inaugural
    lecture 2001)

33
Can e-learning save time?
  • travel time

34
Can e-learning save time?
  • travel time
  • reduce time on task
  • by better training (25-40)
  • by individualised training...

35
Can e-learning save time?
  • travel time
  • reduce time on task
  • by better training (25-40)
  • by individualised training...
  • by using time of the 3rd kind
  • by consolidating time fragments

36
Time of the 3rd kind
  • Time1 on duty - used to be called at work
  • Time2 off duty (not at work)

37
Time of the 3rd kind
  • Time1 on duty - used to be called at work
  • Time2 off duty (not at work)
  • Time3 in-between
  • on duty but less productive
  • eg travelling
  • eg slots in between other tasks
  • off-duty but somewhat productive
  • eg in bar with colleagues
  • at dinner with customers

38
One key conclusion
  • To understand effectiveness issues we need a much
    better understanding of time
  • and its monetary and other value to students
  • Only when one understands time should one move on
    to other measures of effectiveness

39
Details about our work at
  • http//www.shu.ac.uk/cnl/

Paul BacsichProfessor of TelematicsSchool of
Computing and Management SciencesSheffield
Hallam University
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