Over the worst or at the eye of the storm?

Abstract

Using the analogy of e-learning as “the perfect storm”, the aim of this paper is to explore the disruptive nature of e-learning in Higher Education. Taking a Case Study of a University, the paper explores the movement from an e-intensive approach to e-learning into an on-campus blended learning approach. What are the lessons for higher education and how responsive are we to the new challenges. Is blended learning creating a new stability after change, or is it placing the University in the eye of the storm, a still small moment within an ongoing change process? This paper will present findings from the ECW project looking at the disruptive effect on such a learning organisation from student, staff and management perspectives. It will conclude by moving the focus from the e-intensive ECW project to focus on the developments during the first year of a blended learning project and the disruption endemic in such a development