The origins of Distance Education pre-date the 1980s and thanks to the pandemic, new online learning words and modalities have come to the forefront. Because we serve students and receive state and federal money to support the success of students, distance education and expectations have been defined.

In accordance with § 55200 (a), “distance education” means education that uses one or more of the technologies listed below to deliver instruction to students who are separated from the instructor(s) and to support regular and substantive interaction between the students and instructor(s) either synchronously or asynchronously. Technologies that may be used include:

The internet;
One-way and two-way transmissions through open broadcast, closed circuit, cable, microwave, broadband lines, fiber optics, satellite, or wireless communications devices;
Audio conference; or
Other media used in a course in conjunction with any of the technologies listed above.

Federal Title IV and State Title 5 require that institutions CLEARLY differentiate between distance education and correspondence education with regard to use of federal funding and financial aid. -And that's where all the regulations and rules come in to define regular and substantive interaction (RSI)! A course is considered a correspondence course without RSI.