How is Asynchronous Learning accomplished?

How is Asynchronous Learning Accomplished?

What is Asynchronous Learning?

Who is responsible for making it happen?

Like most things in K-12 education, asynchronous learning begins with the classroom teacher. When I began looking at AL, I had no clue where to start. When I began doing some research, I found the following links to be of use because they are all AL environments which are readily available to a K-12 teacher. I've included such information on cost as was provided on the various website, but if you are interested in pursuing any of the environments, you should investigate the web sites. Sites are listed in alphabetical order . For more information, Future U provides a very comprehensive analysis of a vareity of course tools.

	CyberProf According to their web site, non-profit educational institutions can obtain a free copy of CyberProf through a beta test agreement starting from January 1, 2000. During the introductory period, a number of site licenses are available for no charge. After that, it varies depending on "the level of service."
	Lotus Learning Space Based on the web site, you can go to the "University of Wisconsin Learning Innovations for a FREE and informative session explaining online learning and how your organization can develop, manage and deliver instructor-facilitated, on-line training and education."
	Mallard (I work with the Mallard server at Illinois State University) Mallard posts their fees and information on their Mallard Nest Site under Licensing. Their current fees are Single Server / Limited User License This annual license allows installation of Mallard on only one server. The total number of user accounts- in all courses - is restricted to the number specified. Fees range from $100 for a 50 User Maximum to $800 for a 400 User Maximum. The Single Server / Unlimited User License is $1,000 which is an annual license allowing installation of Mallard on only one server, but the total number of user accounts is not restricted. The license for a Site License / Multiple Server Unlimited User is $5,000
	NetLearningPlace and NetMath Run by the University of Illinois, which means you don't have to do the work to set up the site, but there are fees involved. It also means you can't adapt the material to your class, since it's already someone else's class. According to their web site, "For the academic year 1998/1999 Extramural undergraduate tuition is $119 per credit hour plus a $18 per credit hour fee. Courses are conducted on a school semester basis, beginning in the Fall (August), Spring (January), and Summer (May). High school students have the option of taking a course over a period of two semesters."
	POLIS Based on their introductory information, "POLIS is both a virtual classroom environment and an authoring tool for instructors. It was created at the University of Arizona as a Faculty Development project and has been operating as a campus-wide support system since Fall 1996. Licenses for local installation of POLIS are available at nominal cost to other educational institutions."
	Web CT (World Wide Web Course Tools) Web CT's site indicates that "WebCT will always be free to download, install and create courses on. License fees only apply when the courses are made available to students." Once the courses are made available to students, the license fees range from $100-$3000.

Regardless of which learning environment is chosen, cost will be an issue. Big business sees asynchronous learning as a means for reducing expenditures since "virtual classrooms and web-based courses are some of the hottest topics for reducing training costs." (Shein). That's because "businesses have done the math. They know, for example, that conventional classroom instruction costs hover at about $75 an hour, with full-week programs costing $3,000 to $5,000. Computer-based training, by comparison, costs about half that." (Mottl). Still, the technology and training needed to support AL comes with quite a price tag. The fact is "multimedia training technology requires substantial investment. Clarins USA, for instance, spent about $100,000 to install nine high-end CD-i units for employee training, group interaction and problem solving. This amount is only a fraction of Hewlett-Packard's investment in its Site Information Learning Centers. These centers are equipped with multimedia computers and headphones for private access to multimedia training materials. The New Jersey's High School of Science and Technology is another multimillion project." (Farkas).