It's called "flexible delivery", but for a lot of people in third level it simply means the use of technology to give lectures. According to Dr Maurie Scott, senior fellow in communications and cultural studies at Australia's University of Wollongong, New South Wales, once technology is introduced as a delivery technique, there's a danger that other, often more appropriate forms of delivery are neglected, he says.

"Huge amounts of money have been poured into the use of computers and technology in third-level teaching in Australia and in Great Britain. In Australia, a couple of years ago, the government decreed that institutions would get innovative money for teaching and research technology only, and nothing else."

One danger of moving over almost entirely to electronic delivery is that it assumes everyone has access to expensive technology. "In Australia we still have places that are Third World, that have totally missed out on the IT revolution. It is poor and remote people who will fail to benefit."

Recently, Stott recalls, he was involved in a project in which only 40 per cent of students had access to home computers. However, money was found to ensure that the whole class could avail of computers and even Internet rentals were paid for.

"Too many people have gone the high-tech route and that route only," Stott says. "They don't think of all the options and what is best for students. We have to ensure that the best methods of delivery are available to students at the right time. These could be traditional teaching methods, high-tech teaching, independent or group learning," he says.

High-tech delivery is only in its infancy in Ireland. Relatively few third-level courses are delivered via the Internet. At DCU's department of computer applications, however, some courses are delivered entirely on the Web. There are undoubted benefits. "Instead of having to turn up for a lecture every Tuesday, students can take it whenever they wish," DCU's Professor Alan Smeaton explains. "Students like the flexibility and freedom, but it does place the responsibility on them."

However, Smeaton stresses, delivery through technology does not suit every student; some of them may feel isolated, he says. "As a method it has a niche, but it is limited to some subjects and some courses." A major benefit for teachers is the fact that electronic delivery frees them up to concentrate on tutorials. "I replace my classes with smallgroup tutorials, so that students get better value for my time. Tutorials are an important complement to electronic delivery," Smeaton says.

UCC holds "LectureWeb" workshops for staff on electronic delivery techniques the importance of the teacher-student relationship is highlighted. "We stress that we are not replacing human interaction," comments John Poland, UCC's Innopak implementation project assistant. "Electronic delivery should serve as a supplement to courses only."

LectureWeb, which is co-ordinated by John Cox (and is found at http://booleweb.ucc.ie/ecd), includes six practical workshops designed to familiarise UCC staff with techniques to deliver educational courses electronically. Already there's a waiting list for the UCC programme. Poland agrees that electronic delivery is more suited to engineering, science and technology courses than to programmes in the humanities. He anticipates that as a result of the workshops, more staff will be encouraged to create course websites which will serve as resources for students.

There is a concern, though, about the lack of student access to terminals. "We definitely need more computers in our library," Poland says. "At the moment we have 20 public access PCs which are linked to the Internet. Some departments have more PCs per head of students than we do in the library."

Nonetheless, there is a move in the college to expand UCC's network infrastructure. "If we want to go into video-conferencing, we need extra bandwidth," Poland notes.