The state of open and distance education

In this chapter, we compare and analyze the main findings from the 12 countries examined in the two book volumes on Open and Distance Education (ODE). Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Germany, India, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, United Kingdom, and the United States represent 51% of the world’s population. As such, the two volumes about provide a portrait, though not exhaustive, of open and distance education in a large part of the world. We discuss growing enrollments in ODE, ODE as part of educational growth at all levels of education, the ascendance of online education globally, the mainstreaming of distance education, the digital transformation of education, and growing competition in ODE. We propose that values, environment, demand and ICTs (VEDI) are the main drivers of change in open and distance education in the world today.