Even the fabled New York Times (NYT) is feeling the pinch of a tight economy. Like so many other newspapers, the Times is struggling to balance sagging advertising revenues with operating costs. But unlike other newspapers, the NYT is still a powerful ‘brand,’ and the paper’s management is starting to cash in on this in a surprising arena – online education.

Two years ago, the New York Times Company made its first overture into the brave new world of online education when it made a deal with Epsilen, an online course delivery and networking platform. In this deal, the NYT agreed to provide tech, marketing and archival content to college professors for use in non-credit courses.

Now the Times is staking out a greater share of the online education frontier. Starting with the Spring 2010 semester, the NYT in partnership with a handful of colleges, will begin awarding certificates to students who sign up and pay for its online courses. This move by a global information powerhouse like the New York Times send a clear signal that online education is revolutionizing the world of academe.

At Indiana’s Ball State University, the undergraduate College of Communications, Information, and Media is starting a six-week on video storytelling in partnership with the Times. This course will be the first of nine courses that students will be required to complete before earning a certificate in “emerging media journalism” stamped with seals from both the Times and Ball State.

Three other colleges have partnered with the Times on certificate programs, and their programs all go beyond the subject of journalism. Thomas Edison State College in New Jersey is launching two programs, one in paralegal studies and the other in nurse paralegal studies. City University of New York is partnering to offer a certificate in immigration law, and Rosemont College in Pennsylvania has signed on to offer a six-course certificate in entrepreneurship.

As currently structured, professors from partnering colleges will provide class instruction in the courses and the Times will provide the full rage of educational resources of the New York Times Knowledge Network. This will include NYT archived news content from 1951, a full set of content-specific content models to enhance the coursework, and virtual guest appearances of NYT newsroom talent with course-specific expertise.

“If you look at the content of the pages of New York Times,” says Felice Nudleman, NYT Director of Education, “we probably have as much depth and breadth as a good liberal arts curriculum.”