Unlocking the gates: how and why elite universities are opening up access to their courses,by Taylor Walsh, 2011, Princeton,New Jersey,Princeton University Press, 296 pp., $29.95 (hardback), ISBN 978-0-69-114874-8

This paper presents a case study of the nature of an online community that exists amongst students in a full‐time teacher education program delivered at a distance. Students differentiate between two principal areas of their community—learning and support—and appear to act differently in relation to those areas. The nature of those differences is explored through the students' words as a way of enriching understanding of the complex nature of online learning communities.