Leadership Vision of the COLO to Shape Higher Ed Future?

"It was three decades ago that my career in higher education took a turn. I was promoted to full professor and given the golden opportunity of my career to lead our campus in the use of the internet to enhance teaching and learning. Little did I know in 1997 just how significant this enhancement in the development and delivery of learning opportunities would become. It continues to expand while the rest of higher education modes in America are threatened by the realities of new federal regulations, shifting political priorities, return on investment value concerns, flagging funding and sluggish responsiveness to the priorities of learners and employers."

"The then-new president of the University of Illinois system, James J. Stukel, saw the enormous potential of the internet in higher education. He assigned his new vice president of academic affairs, Sylvia Manning, to lead the charge to infuse the opportunities of the net across the Illinois campuses. In turn, she acquired the assistance of engineering professor Burks Oakley to help lead the implementation."

"I was the beneficiary on the Springfield campus to receive release time and funding to create an Office of Technology-Enhanced Learning to foster use of the internet in classes as a source of new information, promote an opportunity for inter-institutional collaboration and encourage the delivery of credit classes online to students who lived around Illinois, the U.S. and the world. It began a career-long collaboration with Burks Oakley, one that lasts to this day as we share information and perspectives about online higher education."

"It was a heady time when we launched the initiative. Just a few years earlier, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications on the Urbana campus released Mosaic, the first visual browser, which stimulated an explosion of growth for the World Wide Web. In 1997, we began in earnest the online learning initiative, bringing the university to the student rather than requiring the stu"

A career in higher education shifted toward using the internet to enhance teaching and learning, beginning with a promotion to full professor and leadership of campus efforts. In 1997, a university system president recognized the internet’s potential and directed academic leadership to infuse internet opportunities across Illinois campuses. Academic affairs leadership partnered with an engineering professor to implement the initiative. On the Springfield campus, release time and funding supported creation of an Office of Technology-Enhanced Learning to use the internet for new information in classes, enable inter-institutional collaboration, and deliver credit classes online for students across Illinois, the United States, and the world. The initiative launched during early web growth after the release of Mosaic, bringing the university to students rather than requiring them to attend in person.

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