ABSTRACT
In the 1960s, the University of Central Florida (UCF) was founded in Orlando to help provide an educated workforce for the burgeoning space program. This chapter explores the development of online and blended learning at UCF was shaped by many factors. UCF’s engagement with online learning began on the university’s margins, in continuing education for teachers in school vocational programs. At UCF and statewide, enrollments in such certification programs for those teachers had long been declining. UCF’s Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning (FCTL) also has a tradition of working with educational uses of technology. For example, working with Center for Distributed Learning, FCTL staff plan and support multimedia classrooms designed specifically for active learning activities. FCTL uses a variety of resources, including testimonials from faculty, to encourage faculty to consider developing blended courses. By 2017, UCF had developed extensive infrastructure to support expanding and enriching education using digital technologies.
