Since its establishment in 1920, professors at The University of Memphis have organized lectures, assigned class readings and prepared exams without giving much consideration to legal issues or to the possible profitability of the class they are teaching.
But with the explosion of online courses and web-based educational programs on to the educational scene, some traditional and “assumed” policies regarding intellectual property rights at institutions of higher learning are currently being revamped to accommodate the demands and opportunities in technology-based education.
“Online courses have presented new and different opportunities that will ultimately transform the scope of higher education, but it has also presented some issues that have not been completely worked out at some institutions,” said Dan Lattimore, vice provost of extended programs at The U of M.
One such issue facing higher education officials is how to handle the rapidly-expanding and newly-lucrative market online education has created.
At some institutions, innovative developments in technology-based education have led to faculty members and their institutions jockeying to control ownership rights of the new elements in “virtual education.”
In the past, universities have rarely laid claim to original materials created by faculty for course use, such as lab manuals, according to Lattimore.
However, the emergence of lucrative possibilities surrounding online courses, spurred by the promising advances they yield to education, has many higher learning employees “clamoring” to become the primary owner and beneficiary of the created material.
In effect, some institutions and faculty members are waging legal battles for the rights to package courses and degree programs to be distributed to a much wider audience in multiple markets across the nation.
“It has created a slippery dynamic to education,” said Bill Dwyer, a professor of psychology at The U of M. “In a hypothetical situation, I could create a course at The of M, but I could also supply and teach it at Pepperdine University.”
While some universities continue to grapple with the multiple variables whirling around the issue, The U of M has yet to encounter many of the requisite problems facing faculty members and administrators in the online dilemma.
“Offering online courses is an excellent opportunity to provide more people with the necessary means to pursue an education,” Lattimore said. “We encourage the faculty to pursue creative efforts in online programs because it only enhances The University as a whole, and clamoring with the faculty over ownership of the material is not productive for anyone.”
Currently, The U of M offers 20 courses that have been sanctioned under the Tennessee Board of Regents online degree program. For these courses, ownership rights fall under the umbrella of guidelines provided by the policy drafted in June by the Tennessee Board of Regents aimed specifically at dealing with the issue.
Under the current policy, any faculty member who creates a course “generally” retains the exclusive right to reproduce, sell or transfer the acquired copyright as that faculty member deems necessary.
Within the legal scope of the provision, The University also acquires a share in the copyright if the faculty member is paid for his work as defined by “work for hire” or “working within the scope of employment.”
Nationwide, an estimated 89 percent of higher education institutions already offer some form of “virtual education,” with many of them planning to increase the courses offered in the near future, according to the American Council of Education.
Moreover, there is an increasing number of web-assisted programs and online courses that are being created at The U of M outside the shell of TBR’s program, which may prompt an immediate need for The U of M to draft its own policy dealing with the issue, according to several faculty members.
“We don’t have our own policy dealing with the issue so The University is dealing with us on an individual basis,” said Bill Shades, a faculty member at The U of M.
“It has created a little confusion, but the creation of online course materials are quickly becoming the norm, and it has not become a big issue to us because it has been handled properly.”
John Ellis, manager of systems software, said necessary measures are being taken to adequately address the delicate balance between the rights of the professors who create the courses as well as protecting the interest of students by carefully maintaining the high quality within the new learning environment.
