District IT Leaders Examine E-Learning Companies

District officials should take a critical approach to evaluating products and services in the marketplace of for-profit online courses, experts on that growing segment of education say.

There are pluses and minuses, they say, to doing business with online-learning companies, and officials should be just as judicious as they would in purchasing any other service.

“By and large, we look at these companies the same way we would others,” said Themistocles Sparangis, the chief technology director for the 678,000-student Los Angeles Unified School District . “We ask, ‘What makes good educational business sense?’ and ‘How are we assured our investment is doing what it’s...