Virtual Get-together via Videoconferencing

Topic: "Who Owns What? Unbundling Web Course Property Rights"

Tuesday, March 27, 2001
3:00 – 4:30 p.m.
Presenter: Mr. Robert Ubell, Director of Web-based Learning at Stevens Institute of Technology

One of the most contentious issues in distance learning is the ownership of online courses. While some schools argue that e-courses are the property of institutions, many faculty insist that there is no difference between online delivery and conventional courses -- consequently, faculty own e-courses, just as they do face-to-face classes. Recognizing the explosive possibilities of the debate, many schools have resisted introducing rules governing e-course intellectual property.

This session will outline the contending issues and suggests an approach -- recently adopted by Stevens Institute of Technology -- which has been widely viewed as a fair and equitable way to deal with web rights. The Stevens approach was recently featured in the Chronicle of Higher Education (November 22, 2000). The session will also present the results of a recent study on how colleges and universities are dealing with web course ownership.

About the Presenter:

Robert Ubell is director of WebCampus.Stevens, the graduate e-learning school at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ. Ubell has held a number of positions in publishing, e-commerce, and education. He was vice-president and editor-in-chief of Plenum Publishing Corporation, editor of The Sciences, and American publisher of the British science weekly, Nature. He was also founding publisher of Nature Biotechnology and president of the website, BioMedNet.

To schedule your campus for this event, please contact your campus CAPE Operations Committee Representative who can Register Online for your site to participate.

CAPE contact person: Melissa Bartosek at bartosekm@acape.org.