Grade Change: Sloan-C's 2013 Report on Online Learning in U.S. Higher Ed

Sloan Consortium has released its 2013 annual survey of higher education administrators and is making it available for free download.

This 38-page report is titled Grade Change: Tracking Online Education in the United States, 2013 and surveys administrators specifically in the realm of higher education.

I found this snippet from the summary especially interesting: (bold emphasis is mine in last paragraph)

Are Learning Outcomes in Online Comparable to Face-to-Face?  

Background: The reports in this series have consistently found a growing majority of chief academic officers rate the learning outcomes for online education “as good as
or better” than those for face-to-face instruction.  

The evidence: The 2013 results show a small decrease in the percentage of academic leaders who view the learning outcomes for online instruction as the same of better than face-to-face instruction. 

• The percent of academic leaders rating the learning outcomes in online education as the same or superior to those in face-to-face instruction had grown from 57 in 2003 to 77 percent in 2012. The upward trend was reversed this year, with a dip to 74 percent.

• The proportion of academic leaders who believe the learning outcomes for online education are inferior to those of face-to-face instruction increased from 23 percent last year to 26 percent this year. 

• Academic leaders at institutions with online offerings remain positive about the relative learning outcomes for online courses; all of the decrease can be attributed to leaders at institutions without online offerings becoming more negative. 

Happy reading!