About the Online Learning Institute

We make it easy for universities to offer high-quality online learning in digital tech and business IT topics. Online learning can be used to great advantage as part of traditional face-to-face courses, distance learning courses, blended learning courses and online courses. Our design approach means that lessons can be reused selectively and flexibly to suit your programme structure and syllabus, and they can be integrated effectively into your VLE to create a seamless learning experience.

We offer this service because providing effective online learning can be difficult for universities. Creating an engaging and effective online learning experience calls for specialist skills. There is a steep learning curve for academic staff, who may be overloaded and resistant to new technology. Time spent on building online courses is time taken away from research and publication!  

We help universities incorporate excellent online learning lessons into their courses while avoiding the pitfalls.

Digital tech/business IT is an important topic. Employers want graduates to have workplace-ready skills in professional IT subjects. But teaching these skills in a credible way requires up-to-the-minute professional knowledge and, ideally, first-hand experience of practising the relevant skills in the workplace. That kind of knowledge and experience does not come from a textbook.

So, universities face a dilemma. Should they:

1. hire teaching staff with the IT industry experience and knowledge needed to teach digital tech/business IT effectively, or 
2. instead, recruit academics with potential for research and publication? 

Of course, universities often choose the latter option. Universities expect academics to have a track record of publication and funding. But this makes it very unlikely that teaching staff will have the required skills and knowledge in professional IT to teach it credibly. And it’s very difficult to find people with both sets of skills.

We offer universities more leeway about staffing. Our online learning content is produced in cooperation with expert IT professionals who have up-to-date skills and knowledge. This gives universities the ability to offer credible, professionally-oriented digital tech/business IT courses while recruiting research-focused academics to generate the all-important publication and funding outputs. 

Contact us for more information.