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Distance Education Timeline

  • Pitman Shorthand

    Created by Sir Issav Pitman - Training program that brought cutting edge stenographic practices to the United States in 1852. Correspondence courses by mail represented the first phase of distance education.
  • Period: to

    Correspondence Education began

  • Study at Home

    Anna Elito Ticknor founded Boston based Society to encourage study at home.
  • First University distance learning program

    The first University learning program was offered through the University of Chicago.
  • University of Queensland, Australia

    University of Queensland in Australia established a Department of External Studies, which supported distance learning programs.
  • Radio Licenses

    Federal government issues the first educational radio licenses to deliver distance education courses. Distance teaching is introduced in universities in the Soviet Union.
  • Television programs broadcast

    The world's first educational television programs were broadcast from the University of Iowa.
  • Development of Electronic Computers

  • UK Open University

    United Kingdom's Open University was founded. The OU introduced a mixed-media approach to teaching distance learning courses.
  • Internet commercialized

  • MOOCs

    Emerged from the open educational resources movement in 2008. Became known and is building in populatiry since 2012.