4. The Autopsy of Quality in Online Higher Education

The purpose of this essay is to critically and philosophically explore the role of and impetus for quality assurance regimes in online education and their most salient manifestation, the Quality Matters program. The author argues that online courses are particularly vulnerable to autopsic quality examinations under neoliberal rationality as a result of their corporeal, digital nature. This essay will also consider the implications for faculty and others who must abide by and perform quality in online higher education and will consider ways in which those facing the incursion of quality assurance in online education can resist its threats and coercions, leveraging the promise of the liberatory aspects of distance education.