TCM is an authoritative tool for analyzing costs. TCM's procedures include standard definitions of cost categories that allow institutions and multi-institutional agencies to: a) analyze the costs of instructional approaches that make heavy use of technology; and b) legitimately compare cost data for different instructional approaches.

Development of the Technology Costing Methodology (TCM) Project was funded by the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for Improvement of Post Secondary Education (FIPSE) and is a joint endeavor between the Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications (WCET) and the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems ( NCHEMS ). TCM began in September of 1998 with a goal to develop and pilot test an authoritative costing methodology (and related procedures) for calculating costs:

Within an institution to determine if proposed instructional approaches that make heavy use of technology actually do serve to contain costs; and

Across institutions, allowing data to be compared legitimately for different instructional or technological approaches, which will benefit legislatures, state-governing boards, state coordinating boards, and federal agencies.

A CD ROM of the products developed is available.