Leadership in Distance Education

The recent increase in distance learners has also led to more articles and documents being written about the leadership of distance education. The International Center for Distance Learning (ICDL) Distance Education Library and the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) alone contain hundreds of such documents. Most of these documents, however, examine distance education policy, institution management, student support systems and student administration relevant to the first three generations of distance education delivery models [correspondence, multimedia and tele-learning]. Surprisingly, little appears to have been written about the academic leadership associated with distance education. I share the opinion that leadership in distance learning needs to be further examined. I also think that leadership in distance learning is very important.

Beaudoin (2002), in his essay - "Distance education leadership: An essential role for a new century," argues for the research and examination of the specific type of leadership needed in distance education leadership. Beaudoin (2002) states, "a reasonable amount of attention has been given to the planning and administration of distance education for quite some time (138)." Beaudoin (2002) goes on, however, to state that this might be considered adequate enough without discussing the more esoteric domain of leadership (138).

Lee (2001) agrees, stating, although the organizational behavior theorists and researchers have investigated perceived organizational support in many different organizational environments, higher education institutions have rarely been examined. Yet, no studies have investigated the perceptions of faculty with regard to instructional support, and whether their perceived organizational support has a relationship to faculty motivation, commitment, and satisfaction in relation to distance technology (p. 154).