V-cs try to satisfy online appetite abroad

Overseas students want to learn English, business studies and information technology online, according to research conducted on behalf of the e-university.

A call for proposals for courses in these areas - plus management, science and technology, the life sciences and media - will go out next week in a letter to vice-chancellors. This week, the e-university signed contracts for the first two of three pilot programmes, due for launch in January 2003.

Meanwhile, the Observatory on Borderless Education - a service run by Universities UK and the Association of Commonwealth Universities - has warned that "the potential of e-education as a profit-making activity has become questionable".