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Cost and Price of Distance Education

Since the COVID 19 pandemic, distance education has become increasingly popular with IPEDS reporting that almost 64% of all students were enrolled in at least one online course in 2024. Although this is down from COVID-era levels, it is significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels. This high number of students taking at least one distance education course and the continued increasing price of higher education speaks to the need to better understand the relationship between the costs associated with creating, delivering, and assessing distance education courses and the tuition and fees that institutions charge for those courses.

WCET has long been interested in this relationship and in 2024 conducted a survey of United States institutions to better understand the costs and price of distance education. The result is our 2025 report, Distance Education’s Disconnect: Understanding the Relationship Between the Cost and Price of Distance Education.

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For more information, contact:

Van Davis

Executive Director, WCET & Vice President, Digital Learning, WICHE


vdavis@wiche.edu

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