News Release

September 22, 1998

Contact: Philip Bransford, Assistant Director for Communications, (503) 725-5717
Source: Holly Zanville, Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, (541) 346-5724

Oregon Education Systems Awarded Federal Grant
to Expand Access to College Programs and Services

(Portland) The Oregon University System has received a $320,000 grant award from the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education to use a variety of telecommunications networks to increase access to college programs and services in Oregon. The award was announced Friday at a meeting of the Joint Boards of Education, a coordinating body of community college, pre-kindergarten-12 and public university policy-makers.

The multi-year grant will help support the Oregon Network for Education (ONE), a statewide collaboration of postsecondary institutions and the pre-K-12 school system that the Joint Boards endorsed in 1996. By the 2000-2001 school year, these partner organizations plan to implement a "virtual university," an online marketplace of distance education programs and services that will allow students to choose from classes, register, participate in course activities and receive college credit from a variety of postsecondary institutions.

Oregon's ONE project grant was one of only 82 applicants--out of an initial pool of 1,648 nationwide--to be selected for funding by the federal agency.

"This innovative strategy will enable Oregon's postsecondary institutions to provide access to growing numbers of students seeking telecommunicated, college-level courses and degree

programs," noted Chancellor Joseph Cox of the Oregon University System. "These federal dollars will help us amplify our efforts at expanding access to higher education statewide."

"The ONE project addresses the state's growing need for cooperative planning, policy development, and shared postsecondary courses and services in distance education," added Wayne Feller, chair of the State Board of Education and a co-chair of the Joint Boards.

The ONE project will also be a promising tool for college-bound students, according to pre-K-12 officials working to bring WEB-based information and statewide instructional support to Oregon's elementary and secondary educators. Tom Cook, director of the Web-based Oregon Public Education Network (OPEN), pointed out that "having a searchable college catalogue will provide another needed option to high school students seeking information about college courses available to them electronically."

Community college students will also have a stake in expanding electronic access to education, according to Oregon Community College Commissioner Roger Bassett. "The ONE project will facilitate distance education course-sharing among Oregon's postsecondary providers," Bassett noted. He added that community colleges will provide needed expertise in implementing the ONE project. "Oregon community colleges share a long history of distance-delivered education and therefore a strong base of experience on which to build a new cross-sector model."

Specifically, the grant award will enable ONE to develop:

• a Web-searchable "Common College Catalogue" of distance education courses, degree programs, and services available from postsecondary institutions;
• a "Common Course Marketplace" to enable campuses to share some courses for residency credit;
• a financial formula for assigning costs and revenues among campuses; and
• designation of "host" institutions to serve students seeking college degrees via distance education.

A key feature of the project will be the involvement of 14 faculty teams from Oregon community colleges, public universities, and independent institutions in shaping the development of the new

virtual university. Faculty involvement is critical to ensuring quality and equivalence among on-campus and distance education courses and degree programs.

With the new federal resources, the ONE project will build upon a one-stop Web site launched last summer. The site provides links to educational providers throughout Oregon and can be viewed at: http://www.ous.edu/one.

Holly Zanville, associate vice chancellor for academic affairs at the Oregon University System, will serve as project director. Ron Baker, director of distance education for the Oregon community colleges, and John Greydanus, program associate for distance learning programs with the Oregon University System and director of the Oregon Wireless Instructional Network, will serve as project co-directors.