Knowledge management in education and the contribution of Virtual Learning Environments

The field of knowledge management is of great importance in the commercial world, in part because technological economies are increasingly knowledge based, but also through a growing realization that intellectual capital is the key driver in organizational success, and that an organization’s people are the locus of much of its knowledge. In education, it has received little attention , 5 , although there are notable exception such as Hargreaves, the OECD and Sallis & Jones. Whilst it is not unusual for techniques of management in education to lag behind those in the commercial world, this seems surprising in this case, as education is surely all about cultivating, or at least sharing, knowledge.