One parallel to tenure is the accreditation and monitoring of university educational programs by committees of faculty from other universities. Such assessments imply that feedback from sources outside academe is not necessary. However, when the environment changes quickly, a closer connection to the environment is needed in order to understand these changes and to react to them. In response to the changing telecommunications and computing environment, universities are attempting to become more virtual. A virtual university is one in which its members are relatively free from space and time constraints.
Students can, for instance, learn at home on the weekend.
The university retains its primary goals of passing the culture. In the last years of the 20th century in the USA, these goals are specifically augmented by those of increasing the number of students that can be served, improving the educational outcomes for students, and reducing the per student costs. To achieve these ambitious goals the university must empower further its students and its community and must exploit technology where possible. The concept of the virtual university has caught the attention of the world. European governments are investing large sums of money in new educational networks and encouraging universities to enter into new experiments with distance education.