Arkansas Higher Ed Combatting Online Course Offerings

Arkansas colleges and universities have been offering online classes for years, but as many as 73 out-of-state post secondary schools with aggressive advertising campaigns have been eating into local market share.

State higher education leaders say they are working to expand online offerings and even develop a portal to make Arkansas schools more competitive.

Rob Moritz with our content partner, the Arkansas News Bureau, reports:

Arkansas Department of Higher Education director Shane Broadway said a number of Arkansas institutions have expanded offerings for online, and he said his department is also developing a website that will allow students to access online degree programs and courses more conveniently at the state two- and four-year schools.

Ultimately, he said, a student in one region of the state will be able to take courses online from several different state schools across the state at the same time.

“We’re developing a website that would be housed through us and would link a student to all our institutions that offer courses online, so that a student can go to that institution,” Broadway said. “There are discussions about developing just that, where you could either go through one entity for the whole thing or possibly different courses at several different institutions.”

Broadway told the committee that the goal is to try and lure back those Arkansans now enrolled in the out-of-state programs. While enrollment in state colleges and universities last fall was down slightly, the number of Arkansans enrolling in out-of-state institutions has risen in the past few years, he said.

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