1. Introduction

Over the past decade, there has been a sustained increase in and a need for courses taught at a distance. Shotsberger (2000) reported that though it took radio 38 years to reach 50 million users and TV took 30 years, the World Wide Web hit that usage mark in a mere 4 years. The U.S. Department of Education reported in 1998 that 75% of 12–17-year-olds in the United States were online. The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) also reported that an estimated 25,730 courses were offered through distance education. Of these courses, 45% were offered by public 4-year colleges and universities, private 4-year institutions offered 16%, and 2-year colleges offered the remaining 39%. These institutions offered approximately 700 degrees and 170 certificates that could be completed by taking distance education courses exclusively (NCES, 1998). That was determined in academic year 994–1995, and represented 33% of higher educational institutions and over 750,000 students. Palloff and Pratt (2001) reported a December 1999 NCES study that indicated ‘‘between the Fall of 1995 and 1997–98 the percentage of all higher education institutions offering distance education courses increased by about one-third and that the number of course offerings and enrollments in distance education courses doubled’’ (p. 4). Not only are higher education institutions expanding their use of distance education geometrically, but business and industry have also entered the distance education field. Distance education courses and programs can now be found in all of the 50 states and U.S. territories (Barker & Dickson, 1996). Miller (1997) wrote that a 1995 survey in the United States showed that 62% of middle-aged workers employ computers in their work, and in an additional survey, 46% of the people interviewed listed the computer as essential technology.

Computers and online distance education appear to offer unrealized possibilities for lifelong learning in a country where corporations are investing more than $80 billion each year on education and training (Miller, 1997).