1 Mobility Without Leaving Home - Online Higher Education Opportunities in India: It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time! Australian International Education Conference 9-12 October 2018, Sydney, Australia Brigid Freeman, Karen Barker, and Oeendrila Lahiri Australia India Institute, University of Melbourne Introduction During last year’s AIEC conference there was a palpable, growing realisation that unthinking reliance on one dominant sender country, China, was problematic. Australia’s export education sector was severely overexposed, while at the same time, questions were being raised about institutional autonomy, academic freedom, and intellectual property (see Ziguras, 2018). More generally, cautionary tales have emerged about faculty and student rights and obligations, “strings” attached to external monies, restrictions on knowledge generation, and the implications for international student numbers. The answer seemed both obvious and relatively straightforward for Australia’s export education sector. Pivot to the second main sender country (India), and for good measure, leverage disruptive technologies to extend market opportunities into online learning and innovative transnational education. India is a large democracy with a shared commitment to the rule of law, many English language speakers, and unmet demand for education. The numbers and figures purportedly involved are seductive. What could go wrong? Growing interest in online learning At the Australia India Institute at the University of Melbourne, we have been looking at the opportunity presented by expanding online learning in terms of higher education qualifications recognition, and quality assurance. We would like to share why this “seemed like a good idea at the time”. Why there’s a big “but” to this pivot. Why going in “eyes open” and committing to regulatory and moral obligations in terms of transparency and honesty would be a good idea. For Indian students, for Australian higher education institutions, and for the reputation of Australia’s export education sector more broadly. Firstly, we know that online learning is of interest. Globally, online education has grown exponentially, encompassing many platforms, technologies and providers (e.g., Coursera, Udacity, edX, FutureLearn, Google MOOC.org, Udemy, ALISON), and related offerings (e.g., test preparation, certifications). Australian public education institutions have long been encouraged to diversify revenue generation streams in the face of diminishing government funding (at least as a proportion; if not in absolute terms in all instances). Australian universities have extensive histories of distance education (i.e., correspondence courses) and contemporary expertise in international education, both onshore and offshore. They have enthusiastically adopted education technologies including MOOCs, gamification, blended learning, and learning management systems (e.g., OpenLearning, Open2Study, Online Education Services Australia). And they are growing capacities in technology-enabled learning (e.g., flipped classrooms, academic data analytics, smart classrooms, and personalised learning). Online learning is regulated (see Tertiary Education Quality Standards Agency, 2017) and supported by benchmarks (see the Australasian Council on Open, Distance and E-Learning Benchmarks for Technology Enabled Learning). Web content accessibility is encouraged (see the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0). Clearly, there is both interest in, and support for, growth in online learning opportunities, students and revenue generation.