The design maturity of online courses in light of marginal analysis: Is it good enough now?

In U.S., universities play a significant role and serves as a change agent in their respective community and region, and in some cases, in the nation and beyond. However, to function as a university and innovate its operations, they rely on various funding sources (e.g., donations, endowments, tuition and fees revenues, and government funding). In public universities, this suggests the more students enrolled, the more tuition and fees revenues, and the more state funding. Increasing enrollments is a leverage to grow revenues and state funding. One problem faced by state universities is the fierce competition against others at its caliber and in its same state. To address the problem, the universities turn to technology for sustainable solutions. Those institutions strategize limited resources in hopes to reach untapped segments and to anticipate the student demands in the market (Blumenstyk, 2012). Of all means sought, elearning or online learning is one common solution (Allen & Seaman, 2013). Compared to the traditional face-to-face delivery, teaching online appears to require of faculty more effort before the class delivery, such as lecture preparation (Van de Vord & Pogue, 2012).