Assessing the Costs and Benefits of Telelearning: A Case Study ...

Conclusion
Several findings of interest came out of this case study. Based on
projected costs, revenues, and student numbers, OISE/UT will make a small 'notional'
profit of $1,962 per year for the life of the course (which is expected to run 5 years).
Similarly, based on the current course fee of $740 per Master's level course, 19 students
are needed to break-even. It is important however, to keep in mind that the costs assessed
did not include overhead costs as these were unknown. The inclusion of these overhead
costs would decrease the profit margin and/or increase the student numbers required to
break-even. A more realistic assessment then, based on the current level of 20 students
would perhaps be to say that the course will have recovered all its direct costs. Also, the
actual direct costs are probably higher than indicated because initial development time
was not known and therefore not included. This analysis shows that it is however,
possible to develop highly cost-effective online courses within a niche market, at
relatively moderate cost to learners.
The issue of unknown overheads is interesting in its own right. We know for
instance that at the University of British Columbia (UBC), direct costs constitute 47% of
all face to face teaching costs. This was a project where indirect expenses were not
known however, as OISE/UT has not done this analysis. Increased interest in and
development of online courses and programs and the desire to compare costs with those
of face to face teaching, make it increasingly important to take account of overhead costs.
Furthermore, despite the change in software from Parti to WebCSILE (which was
said to be twice as fast), the largest 'cost' of this course was tutoring and marking time
spent by the instructors. This was due to the nature of the course as the course content
was largely made up of online discussions where questions and issues were raised and
student work was evaluated. These costs could be decreased by changing the format of
the course to include exams rather than discussions but then the students would be
deprived of the hands on experience gained by 'actually' writing a research proposal
rather than simply studying how to write one. Constructivist learning however, takes time
as students must process the information and then manipulate it to fit their own project.
Interestingly, the students and instructors reported that additional skills to the course
content were learned, such as computer and writing skills. This course was an example
of low cost front end development but high delivery cost as compared to the UBC case
study (available at: http://research.cstudies.ubc.ca/nce/reports.html ) which had high development
and moderate delivery costs.
Another important finding is that students enrolled in this course have expressed a
strong need for entire graduate programs to be available at a distance. The 'residency
requirement' of most graduate degrees limits the accessibility of graduate education to
many individuals. Increasingly families are 'dual-income' out of necessity rather than
choice and the only way for these individuals to upgrade their skills is through combining
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