KANSAS CITY - A tour of Kansas City’s newest university begins and ends in a carpeted hallway above a Gap store.

Away from the cubicles lies a room with two desks, a ladder and four racks of blinking computers. "This," says your guide unlocking the door, "is the virtual school."

It’s the data center of Grantham University. Many expect little rooms like this to house higher education’s delivery system in the 21st century.

In coming weeks, millions of Americans will flock to four-year institutions for the "traditional" experience. Sitting in classrooms, studying in dorms, cheering on teams.

None of it happens at Grantham, a nationally accredited, for-profit college that teaches all courses online. The university moved here after Hurricane Katrina destroyed its Louisiana facilities.

"Online universities" are spreading as the traditional student becomes an exception, not a rule. The National Center for Education Statistics finds that fewer than 20 percent of students enrolled in U.S. colleges are full-time undergraduates, ages 18 to 22, living on campus and having face-time with professors.

The rest of America’s college crowd includes part-timers, midcareer graduate students, working parents and military people seeking degrees however they can.

About 2 million now do so at home, online. In most cases they never meet instructors or fellow classmates.

Last month federal data collectors noted a milestone: The Web-based, for-profit University of Phoenix leapt over the most-heavily populated campuses to boast the largest student body of all U.S. colleges. Enrollment in Phoenix’s online program had tripled since 2001 to encompass 115,794 "distance learners."

At Grantham, chief financial officer Patrick Campbell is a former president of the NASDAQ stock market. One vice president holds a Harvard degree in political science; another graduated Columbia Law School.

Top dog is Grantham Education Corp. Chairman Tom Macon, 49. A former Coca-Cola salesman, his only diploma came from Lafayette High School in Ballwin. In the late 1990s he realized three-quarters of U.S. workers lacked college degrees and "the traditional university construct was not set up for working people.

"This was our mission: to democratize education for working adults."

Their mission grossed $17 million in tuition last year, according to Missouri records - still less than $2,000 per student.

But is this college?

Absolutely, says the U.S. Department of Education. It recognizes the accrediting commission of the Distance Education and Training Council.