Reporter's Notebook

Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Investors in education industry have discovered the Internet.

Online education—or "E-learning," as it's often described these days—has been around for years, of course. But last week's Education Industry Investment Conference here, organized by the Institute for International Research, was the first such gathering dominated by interest in World Wide Web-based education businesses.

From Wall Street's perspective, the for-profit education industry traditionally has been divided into distinct sectors, such as corporate training, postsecondary trade schools, education services such as after-school tutoring and test preparation, and public-school-management companies. Recent investment conferences have been heavily flavored with interest in companies such as Edison Schools Inc. and Advantage Schools Inc. that manage K-12 charter...