Pearson Steps Up Development of Online Education Network

Business Wire, March 6, 2000

Business Editors

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 6, 2000

Pearson plc, the international media company, announced today a series of agreements that will accelerate the development of its online education network.

Pearson and America Online, Inc., the world's leading interactive services company, have reached a preliminary agreement to serve as a framework for developing a relationship. It is envisaged that the relationship would establish Pearson's education network as the preferred supplier of educational content and online learning tools with AOL providing carriage for Pearson's education network on the AOL service and other America Online, Inc. brands. The two companies will also investigate opportunities to collaborate on the development of a curriculum architecture and a range of select education tools. The Pearson education network will also be available through the Internet at large.

Pearson has also announced today the first of a number of strategic alliances with, and equity investments in, leading Internet educational companies which will further strengthen the development of its education network. The alliances are with:

-- SCORE! Learning Inc., at www.eSCORE.com, a national provider of after-school
learning centers and online learning services.

-- Copernicus Education Gateway, at www.edgate.com, which provides customized,
local, online access to education resources and activities for kindergarten to
12th grade.

-- Blackboard Inc., at www.blackboard.com, a leading Internet infrastructure
company. Its software platform powers online teaching environments at over
1,800 colleges and universities and in 70 countries.

Marjorie Scardino, chief executive of Pearson, said: "Around the world, public and private resources devoted to education are rising rapidly as individuals, companies and nations strive to be part of an increasingly brain-powered world. The Internet personalizes learning to individual needs in a way that has never been possible before. We aim to create an online learning environment that transforms the educational opportunities open to all of us at every stage of our lives, wherever we live in the world."

The education network, to be launched this year, aims to be the leading online learning portal. It will supplement in-school activities from elementary school through to adult learning, with both ongoing education and professional training. The portal will draw on content, tools and distribution channels from Pearson businesses, and incorporate content from other leading print and Internet educational and consumer publishers, both within and outside Pearson.

The network will earn revenues from a mix of individual subscriptions and site licences from schools and e-commerce and advertising revenues in the open access part of the network. Advertising will not appear on the site when accessed from schools. The overall development of the education network is being led by Pearson's in-house digital publishing company, San Francisco-based Headland Digital Media. The brand identity for the network will be announced at a later stage.

Pearson's education network

The education network will extend the ongoing learning activities of its participants. For example, the elementary-school teacher portal will include lesson planning software and teacher training materials. Parents of school-age children will have access to a fully integrated site that ties back directly to the components of the student's experience, thus establishing a genuine home-school connection. The college student portal will provide detailed, subject-specific learning materials for key academic disciplines. The adult-learning portal will provide information and resources relating to personal and professional development. Each portal will integrate the components that the online environment makes possible--fast communication, easy access to peers and tutors, a set of always accessible organizational tools, self-paced learning and assessment opportunities, and a host of subject- and grade-specific learning resources.

SCORE!

Pearson is also forming a strategic alliance with, and has agreed to take an equity stake of at least 9%, valued at around $20 million, in SCORE! Learning, Inc., a subsidiary of education and career services company Kaplan, Inc., and a leading national provider of learning programs and educational resources. This alliance extends the relationship already in place between Pearson and SCORE!, wherein more than 100 neighborhood SCORE! after-school centers already use adaptive digital curriculum created by Pearson's Computer Curriculum Corporation. Pearson and SCORE! will work together to develop the technology required to create new services for Internet delivery. These services will be available at SCORE! centers as well as directly over the Internet via eSCORE.com, making SCORE!'s educational coaching available live on the Internet. eSCORE.com , a leading provider of online learning and resources for children, will also be prominently featured within Pearson's education network, making it possible to offer online coaching and support to students whose teachers and parents use the network.