ELearning Network of Excellence Objectives
The main objectives of the ELearning Network of Excellence is to:

• Establish a co-coordinated eLearning and instructional design network across the Dublin Region Higher Education Alliance (DRHEA)
• Implement online collaboration and develop peer-learning tools to support in the teaching of large groups and in the delivery of a flexible curriculum and trans institutional graduate and doctoral programmes.

Current Position of eLearning across the DRHEA
Key strengths and challenges of the current environment are:

• In general there is a high-level sponsorship of eLearning (usually a Vice-President or Director) in the institutions and for the most part eLearning functions as an element of learning/teaching development initiatives. All Institutions recognize the importance of having a progressive eLearning strategy as part of the overall institutional strategy, however it has not been fully embedded in the smaller Colleges.
• All institutions have a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE), which is used for electronic information distribution, course management and eLearning. Most VLEs with the exception of TCD are integrated with the IT systems/student database. In the majority of cases, all modules on institutional database have a space in the VLE and although use of the VLE is not mandatory for teaching purposes, in reality the level of use by both staff and students is extremely high and growing. However, the VLE in the majority of modules is used primarily for electronic information distribution rather than eLearning.
• There are 26 people in total employed to support eLearning across the eight institutions. However, there can be significant demands on support due to high expectations among staff and students especially at the start of term.
• A "working relationship" with each institution's Information Systems Services is the norm (i.e. non-formal). However, it was noted by most DRHEA partners that IT departments within institutions are not always in a position to implement new learning technology application rollouts, which leads to outsourcing of support/hosting, thus generating additional costs to expanding e-learning support and provision.

The following audit provides an overview of E Learning across the DRHEA