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Moderm European Science and culture evolved in the process of emancipation of various national languages from medieval Latin. At present, this development from monolingualism to multilingualism seems to be reversed in several scientific disciplines and in higher education. The former linguistic diversity turns gradually into a modern monolingualism of scientific English, especially in the natural and some social sciences. A short-term consequence is that researchers and Professors with other first languages need extra time and sometimes money to prepare their publications and lectures in English. Long-term consequences are, among others, that all languages exept English are devaluated as media of science and learning and, thus, a diglossia might develop if only English be used for the important domains and other languages be limited to the domains of private communication and folklore. The way out can only be through a cultivation of at least bilingualism of researchers, Professors, and their students in the natural sciences and trilingualism in social sciences and the humanities.
Formal learning in higher education creates its own challenges for didactics, teaching, technology, and organization. The growing need for well-educated employees requires new ideas and tools in education. Within the ROLE project, three personal learning environments based on ROLE technology were used to accompany “traditional” teaching and learning activities at universities. The test beds at the RWTH Aachen University in Germany, the School of Continuing Education of Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China, and the Uppsala University in Sweden differ in learning culture, the number of students and their individual background, synchronous versus distant learning, etc. The big range of test beds underlines the flexibility of ROLE technology. For each test bed, the learning scenario is presented and analyzed as well as the particular ROLE learning environment. The evaluation methods are described and the research results discussed in detail. The learned lessons provide an easy way to benefit from the ROLE research work which demonstrates the potential for new ideas based on flexible e-learning concepts and tools in “traditional” education.