HOW CAN E-LEARNING WORK FOR YOU?
In the past, education was largely confined to the classroom. As technology has changed over time, so has the process of learning. No longer do students and professors have to be in the same place at the same time. In some rare cases, the instructor has been replaced altogether by that of a computer program. Many individuals, who in the past were excluded from advanced education, now have another opportunity or option to pursue their education. The demographics of individuals who use distance learning are changing. In the past, this mode of learning was used by individuals who were immobile or had a disability. Currently, this form of education has expanded to include individuals of all backgrounds. However, the typical distance-learning student is older in comparison to students of the same education level and often has additional commitments to a job or family.
In 2000, the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) and the National Governors Association (NGA) convened the Commission on Technology and Adult Learning. Its mission: to define and encourage a technology-enabled learning environment that will result in an engaged citizenry and a skilled workforce for the digital economy. With the broad participation of leaders from business, government and education, the Commission set out to establish a vision for America's e- learning future while outlining the actions needed to make this vision come to life. The Commission's recommendations for action, which are included in this report, are directed to the nation's governors and corporate CEOs, two groups the Commission believes will play an essential role in tapping e-learning's potential as a cornerstone of individual, organizational and community success.

The Commission on Technology and Adult Learning believes that e- learning will play a vitally important role in equipping workers with the skills they need to succeed in the 21st-century digital economy. A vision of America's e-learning future foresees a future in which e- learning allows learning to become a continuous process of inquiry and improvement that keeps pace with the speed of change in business and society. With e-learning, the learner has convenient, just-in-time access to needed knowledge and information, with small content units assembled and delivered according to the learner's specific needs.. When I look at the state of online learning today, I see a world that was a mere glimmer of its present state just a few short years ago. To say that online education is ubiquitous is to state the obvious. In fact it is the most rapidly growing dimension of higher education.

According to the recent Sloan Consortium Report (2003, p.1), the most comprehensive and timely analysis of US online education, over 1.6 million students enrolled in at least one online course during fall 2002. And of these, over one third (578,000) took all of their classes online. Additional data indicate many more institutions, many more programs, many more courses, and many more students; especially, many more part time students were served by e-learning opportunities When speaking about the changing world of careers, I am even on less firm ground here then when referring to the future of electronic education. Beyond the truisms of more frequent career change, of a longer working, post-retirement life, the international movement of labor to lower cost environments, there is the changing composition of the US workforce. There has been a marked decline in manufacturing jobs, but growth in the service sector, and also in the technology, high tech, and knowledge fields.