DOCUMENT RESUME
ED 428 649
IR 019 310
AUTHOR
Aoki, Kumiko; Fasse, Richard; Stowe, Sonny
TITLE
A Typology for Distance Education
Tool for Strategic
Planning.
PUB DATE
1998-06-00
NOTE
7p.; In: ED-MEDIA/ED-TELECOM 98 World Conference on
Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia & World Conference on
Educational Telecommunications. Proceedings (10th, Freiburg,
Germany, June 20-25, 1998); see IR 019 307.
PUB TYPE Reports
Descriptive (141)
Speeches/Meeting Papers (150)
EDRS PRICE MF01/PC01 Plus Postage.
DESCRIPTORS
Classification; Clearinghouses; Colleges; *Computer Assisted
Instruction; Computer Mediated Communication; Consortia;
*Distance Education; Educational Technology; Futures (of
Society); Higher Education; Information Technology;
*Instructional Design; Interaction; Models; Online Systems;
*Strategic Planning; *World Wide Web
IDENTIFIERS *Course Development; Cyberspace; Educational Brokerage;
Virtual Classrooms; *Virtual Universities
ABSTRACT
The prevalence of the Internet and the World Wide Web in
higher education has been transforming higher educational institutions in
various degrees. There are a wide variety of terms indicating such
phenomenon, ranging from "web-based instruction" and "online courses" to
"cyber degrees" and "virtual universities." These terms are often used
without clear definition. This paper presents a taxonomy of higher education
institutions in cyberspace that includes the following six categories: online
course catalogs/clearing house, university brokerages, virtual university
consortia, virtual universities, online campuses, and unaccredited online
campuses. Three elements of online courses (course material
presentation/distribution, communication, and assessment) are discussed in
order to give a framework to designing online courses. Competency-based
assessment and the future trend of educational institutions are also
addressed. (Author/DLS)
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A Typology for Distance Education Tool for Strategic Planning
"PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS
MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY
G.H. Marks
TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)."
Kumiko Aoki, Ph.D.
Department of Information Technology, Rochester Institute of Technology, U.S.A.
Richard Fasse, Ed.D
Educational Technology Center, Rochester Institute of Technology, U.S.A.
Sonny Stowe
Educational Technology Center, Rochester Institute of Technology, U.S.A.
Abstract: The prevalence of the Internet and the Web in higher education has been
transforming higher educational institutions in various degrees. There are a wide variety
of terms indicating such phenomenon ranging from web-based instruction and online
courses to cyber degrees and virtual universities.
Those terms are often used without
clear definition. In this paper, six different categories of higher educational institutions in
cyberspace: online course catalog/clearing house, university brokerage, virtual university
consortium, virtual university, online campus, and unaccredited online campus, are
discussed to provide a big picture of current trends in distance education. Then, three
elements of online courses are discussed in order to give some framework in designing
online courses.
Lastly, the future trend of higher educational institutions
is also
discussed.
1. Introduction
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
Office of Educational Research and Improvement
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION
CENTER (ERIC)
O This document has been reproduced as
received from the person or organization
originating it.
o Minor changes have been made to
improve reproduction quality.
Points of view or opinions stated in this
document do not necessarily represent
official OERI position or policy.
As the Internet and Web technologies are becoming the popular vehicle of instructional delivery,
we have begun to see the plethora of words referring to such mode of instructional delivery (e.g., web-
based instruction/course/distance education, Internet courses/university, online instruction/course/campus
/university, cyber class/course/school/university, virtual classroom/campus/university, etc.). Though these
terms share some common concepts; some instructional components delivered through computer networks
and some degree of time and distance independence, a precise nuance of each term differs, reflecting the
diversity of such offerings.
First of all, the spectrum of these terms ranges from a traditional classroom-based course, which
uses the Internet/Web to supplement classroom activities.
Such a course may use the Internet/Web to
deliver class materials such as syllabi, homework assignments, lecture notes, exams, and Q&A sessions.
At the other end of the spectrum is a degree-granting program offered completely through online activities
without requiring students to physically attend any classes. All of the terms listed above fall in somewhere
between the two ends of the spectrum.
Traditionally educational systems in most countries had required in-class instruction by teachers
and in-class attendance by students. When distance learning programs started to appear in the early 20th
century under the more commonly known name at that time, correspondence courses, their major purpose
was to serve the population who could not afford to have higher education otherwise, such as
geographically remote students. The primary communication mode between an instructor and students was
regular mail.
In the early 1970s, as television became the common household media, some distance learning
programs which started to utilize this telecommunications media.
However, television is an expensive
medium for production and distribution and in order to recoup such cost, those distance learning programs,
which utilized television for instructional delivery, followed the model of mass education utilizing satellite
broadcasting or cable television. In such a model, instructional delivery tended to be one-way (i.e., from an
instructor to students) and interactivity between the instructor and students or among the students was
lim ited.
In 1980s, the prevalence of VTR made it possible to utilize asynchronous mode of instructional
delivery via television, which provided students with flexibility in time in addition to place. But, the model
of instruction still tended to be unidirectional, leaving few opportunities for a student to interact with the
instructor or other students.
Today's sophisticated interactive communications technologies allow distance educators and
learners to go beyond this transmission model of instructional delivery, allowing a high degree of
interactivity between a teacher and students and among students at a reasonable cost. The interactivity is
defined in the educational context as "..a process whereby students are systematically encouraged to be
active participants in their own learning.
It is achieved by teaching approaches that engage students in the
construction of knowledge."[Center for Interactive Learning, 94]. In the context of the use of information
technology in education, there are two kinds of interactivity: interactivity between a student and the
material as seen in computer-based training (CBT) and interactivity among people including instructors and
students as seen in computer conferencing. The latter form of interactivity is the culmination of the new
mode of teaching and learning. The benefits of having more interactions in effective learning have been
discussed and attested in various educational communities.
As culminated by the Kenneth Bruffee's
writing on peer interaction in the classroom, constructivist theorists argue that people construct their
knowledge through social interaction with others.
Based on this theory of social construction of knowledge, effective distance learning programs
should facilitate social interaction among students and between instructor and students. With today's
technologies such as the Internet and various computer network applications, it has become easier to
implement interactivity into a distance learning program. Electronic mail facilitates personal interaction
between an instructor and a student and computer conferencing facilitates class-wide interaction among
students without being constrained by time and distance.
With the prevalence of today's Web technology, there is a danger that the old transmission model
of one-way instructional delivery will be repeated, ignoring the importance of students' interaction and
leaving students autonomous and isolated. An instructor can utilize the Web to place his/her course
materials for students' retrieval, but still the Web may be a primitive media for creating an interactive
learning environment. In that sense, the term, web-based instruction/courses/distance education, may not
be the right term yet for this emerging model of distance education delivery.
Apart from the Web, there are a number of collaborative technologies or so-called groupware,
which support various degrees of interactivity. Some of them are proprietary, but the current overall trend
of such technological development is the more integration with the Web. Taking advantage of the wealth
of information available on the Web, such a collaborative technology is becoming a great vehicle for
effective instructional delivery. However, the mere use of a collaborative technology in distance education
programs may not guarantee that it will facilitate learning. Its effective incorporation into a distance
learning course requires careful design and the instructor's time and efforts. The role of an instructor in
this model will be more of a facilitator of learning than a presenter of a fixed body of information.
In this study authors conducted an extensive survey of current distance education programs in a
variety of universities with emphasis on those with some online/Internet/Web components built in, to
develop a taxonomy of current distance learning systems and to identify important dimensions that need to
be considered in designing a distance learning system. The long history of distance learning programs
reflects a variety of modes of distance learning programs.
Still a number of programs rely on the
communications mediums of one-way presentation. On the other hand, the number of distance learning
programs which take advantage of more interactive communication mediums, namely computer networks
and the Web is increasing dramatically. This study examined such recent phenomena and categorizes those
newly emerged distance learning programs in order to provide a clear picture of higher education in
cyberspace. (The listing of institutions under the following categories and matrix of technologies used by
each institution can be found at http://ritdl.rit.edu/Research/higher-education.htm.)
2. Taxonomy of Higher Education Institutions in Cyberspace
Buzzwords such as virtual university, virtual college, virtual campus, online campus, electronic
university, and electronic campus are being used without putting much thought, and a variety of online
degrees are being offered by unaccredited institutions (see "Is the Internet Becoming a Bonanza for
Diploma Mills?" Chronicle of Higher Education, December 19, 1997).
Though the idea of providing
anytime/anywhere learning environment is notable and many reputable institutions offer such alternative
learning programs with quality, for a prospective student such diversity of distance learning programs is
rather confusing.
After closely examining more than 80 online distance learning programs, the author came up with
six different categories: online course catalogs/clearing houses, university brokerages, virtual university
consortia, virtual universities, online campuses, unaccredited online campuses.
2.1. Online Course Catalogs/Clearing Houses
Online course catalogs or clearing houses catalog online and distance education courses offered by
universities and colleges and create searchable database to make such information readily available to
public. They are solely information sources and they don't offer any courses or degrees themselves though
some of them call themselves as "university", "academy", or "campus".
2.2. University Brokerages
University brokerages are those institutions which do not have any faculty members of their own
and do not offer any courses but do award degrees to those students who have taken required number of
credits from specified universities and colleges.
This seems to be the emerging trend of distance learning
programs as two such organizations, Regent College and Western Governors University, are newly formed
and have been attracting a great deal of media attention. They are mainly comprised of universities and
colleges in a specific region and aim to provide students with flexibility and mobility to take courses from
different institutions in the region.
This form of degree offering may become popular in future once
policies and academic support systems have been worked out in a wider scale.
2.3. Virtual University Consortia
Virtual university consortia are similar to university brokerages in the sense that those are the
associations of multiple universities/colleges.
The difference between university brokerages and virtual
university consortia is that the former offer degrees of their own while the latter do not.
For example,
SUNY Learning Network is a good example of virtual university consortia as it is an association of eight
colleges, and students can take courses from any of the eight colleges. However, the degrees are awarded
only by either one of two existing colleges: SUNY Empire State College or SUNY New Paltz.
2.4. Virtual Universities
Virtual universities are identical to universities and colleges in the traditional sense as they have
their own faculty members, they offer courses to their students, they provide students services, and they
award degrees. The only difference between traditional universities/colleges and virtual universities is that
in virtual universities students don't have to commute to the campus and physically attend classes to earn a
degree. There are universities of this type catering to masses as the distance learning format allows them to
expand their markets regardless of their geographical location and reach as many students as possible. An
example of this type of universities is University of Phoenix. The university is a for-profit organization and
claims itself to be one of the nation's largest private accredited institutions for business and management.
There is the other type of virtual universities, which can be called "niche universities". The ability to reach
millions of people beyond geographical limitations allows educational institutions of a special kind to exist.
Examples are: The American College of Prehospital Medicine, California College for Health Sciences, and
ISIM University.
This kind of virtual universities are more likely to increase in the future as the
competition among different universities/colleges become fiercer and universities/colleges struggle to find
a way to survive.
In addition to such distinction in terms of audiences they serve, there are two types of virtual
universities in terms of their course format.
Many virtual universities that rooted in traditional
correspondence schools do not have classes; in other words, they provide no support mechanisms for
students to communicate or collaborate with fellow students to ask questions or to discuss issues.
The
students have to study on their own in somewhat isolated environments with a little guidance from an
instructor or a tutor. Though those institutions can be also called "virtual universities", as they do not have
physical campuses but have faculty members, offer courses, and award degrees, those institutions should be
distinguished from the other kind of virtual universities; virtual institutions that emulate traditional
universities in providing class-based learning environment. The former type has an advantage; it offers
true asynchronous learning experience as it usually allows open entry (meaning a student can register and
start a course any time he/she wants) and it allows self-paced learning. However, without the opportunities
to interact with other students, the learning experience it can provide may be somewhat limited.
2.5. Online Campuses
Online campuses are online version of traditional universities/colleges campuses. It means that
those institutions in this category are universities/colleges which exist in physical campuses and have been
offering courses and degrees to on-campus students. As the recent popularity of the Internet, many of such
universities and colleges have started to move some portion of the courses or some part of their degree
programs online. There is a wide variety of such offering, ranging from universities and colleges which
utilize the Web as supplement to on-campus course offering to those offer complete certificate, associate,
bachelor's master's and doctor's degree programs online.
In offering those degree programs online,
inevitably the institutions have to create not only the courses online but also a learning environment for
students to register for classes, pay tuition, order books, seek academic advising, and search for resources.
2.6. Unaccredited Online Campuses
As mentioned previously, there are unaccredited institutions that offer courses and degrees online.
As long as those institutions are clear in their goals that they don't intend to offer degrees in a traditional
sense but to offer training and workshops for career development, this type of online campuses become a
good supplement to higher education.
However, some institutions (most notoriously Columbia State
University) are not clear about their accreditation and offer degrees that may not be recognized by other
institutions and organizations. Due to the ease of setting up a virtual campus in comparison to a traditional
physical campus, these kind of unaccredited online campuses may proliferate.
Prospective students must
be wary of such "diploma mills" and should thoroughly examine the mission of the institution before
enrolling and paying their tuition.
3. Elements of Online Courses
Virtual universities and online campuses usually have a nice Web interface to some or all of the
following components of a university or a college: course catalog, registration, academic calendar, library,
financial aid, student advising, career counseling, bookstore, and user support.
At a micro level, the components of a virtual university and an online campus are individual
courses. The use of the Web and computer networks in the courses has potential to be advantageous in four
ways. First, the nature of its platform independence and easy sharing of data enable collaboration among
distant peers. With the computer conferencing tools, students in disparate places and in disparate times can
attend virtual classrooms where thoughtful ideas and comments may be exchanged and heated discussions
may be held. Second, the hypertext links allow integrating disparate sources of educational materials and
disparate formats of information into one place. Connecting ideas and presenting information in different
formats are easier and students will have easier access to the wealth of information. Third, the updating the
information is easier on the Web and not like print-based or computer-based training materials, the
information on the Web can be constantly updated and adjusted as the class progresses. Lastly, the Web,
especially the next generation of HTML called XML (eXtensible Markup Language) will provide the
potential to dynamically customize the content of the course materials according to the skill and knowledge
level of the student.
The courseware tailored to an individual learning style will make the learning
experience more efficient and effective.
Each course consists of three parts: course material presentation/distribution, communication
between an instructor and students or among students, and assessment of students' coursework. In distance
learning, different technologies can be used for each course component.
3.1. Course Material Presentation/Distribution
The most common approach to online course is putting syllabus that will serve as the navigational
tool for the content of the course.
The course syllabus page usually contains the links to the lecture
materials presented in the HTML format or PowerPoint format, and links to other resources.
Many sites
require a student to log in with his/her user ID and password so that the course materials are not available
to those who have not registered for the course. Some colleges and universities provide a template for the
course web page so that all the online courses in the institution have a consistent look, which may be less
confusing to students.
The most technologically advanced course material presentation and distribution would be the
Stanford Online project, which digitized and compressed the videos developed for Stanford Instructional
Television Network (SITN) courses using VXtreme streaming video technology and then stored them on a
video server, making those classes available to company-sponsored students as well as campus students in
an on-demand, video-streaming environment Though it would be nice to utilize desktop videos for course
material presentation and distribution, currently this is limited to a corporate environment or on-campus
environment where students have access to high-speed lines directly.
Another advanced course material
presentation example can be found at USC ITV Distance Learning Online. It uses the RealVideo steaming
video technology with the synchronized slide presentation in another frame of the web browser window.
3.2.
Communication
Communication should occur between an instructor and students and among students. It can be one-
to-one and can be one-to-many, and can be synchronous (i.e., real-time) or asynchronous.
The authors
strongly believe that one of the major advantages of online courses is the facilitation of interaction between
an instructor and students and the high level of student involvement in their learning. As this component of
online course is rather intangible compared with the presentation aspect of online courses, it is often
overlooked or underestimated in implementation of online courses. The key to a successful online course is
the creation of virtual microculture [Aoki, 95].
Virtual microculture is a unique group dynamics, which
arises as a result of frequent interaction and collaboration toward a common goal.
There are a number of tools which are designed to facilitate interaction and collaboration in an online
course [Aoki, 98]. But tools are just tools; tools themselves do not create a successful online learning
experience for students, but instructors who utilize those tools to moderate, direct, and facilitate online
discussions. Those tools enable more thoughtful discourse, as interaction is not bounded by time.
3.3 Assessment
There is always a suspicion among educators who are just starting to put their courses online, that
in online courses an instructor cannot tell the person who is taking the exam or quiz is actually the person
who claims to be. In traditional distance learning programs proctored exams have been widely used as the
method of assessment as in proctored exams the authentication is rather easily done by checking the
student's picture I.D. Online quizzing seems to be gaining its popularity recently because of the availability
of tools, which make the creation and administration of such quizzes relatively easy. However, only few
courses actually utilize such online quizzing systems as a primary means of assessing a student.
Instead,
most online quizzing systems are used for students to self-test their learning.
The concept of competency-based assessment of learning has been implemented in some virtual
universities, including Western Governor's University. The concept tried to assess an individual's skills and
knowledge instead of clock hours spent in courses.
The concept is noble as most learning may actually
occur outside of formal educational settings. However, it is still uncertain to what extent such competency
can be standardized and measured across a variety of disciplines in such a rapidly changing world. As the
major focus of the Western Governor's University's mission is to develop such assessment tools, we will
see how they develop the assessment tools.
4. Conclusion
As the Gutenberg's printing press made education more accessible to masses centuries ago, computers
and the Internet has the potential of transforming public education into the learning opportunities for
everyone at anytime in anyplace. We have started to see some of such a trend in higher education in a
fairly subtle way, but still the transformation has not been realized to its full potential yet. As Jack
Crawford mentioned in his article [Crawford, 95], "for the most part all we have really done is used the
new technology to 'speed up' the old way of doing things rather than to reform it." This is an easy trap that
many institutions may fall in as it is much easier to use technology to extend what they have been doing
than fundamentally transforming the nature of institutions. The beauty of the global Internet is that it
enables people to participate in professional dialogue regardless of their location, gender, social status, and
national origin. Abundant resources, which were not accessible to public before, are now available on the
Internet. In a way, microcomputers and the Internet can put more education into the hand of students; in
other words, it can make education more student-centered. A student can now be more in charge of what,
when, and where he/she learns. Along the line, higher education institutions will no longer be the center of
power and control of dispensing information and knowledge, but service organizations that cater to
students' needs for guidance and leadership. The higher education institutions that will thrive in the next
century may not necessarily be the ones who have adopted the most advanced technologies, but the ones
who have made the shift in the role of educational institutions to enable truly student-centered learning.
6. References
[Aoki, 95] Aoki, Kumiko. (1995). Intercultural Telecollaboration: A Field Experiment Based on a Heuristic
Model of Collaborative Writing. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Hawaii at Manoa.
[Aoki, 98] Aoki, Kumiko. (1998). Tools for Online Education
[Crawford, 95] Crawford, Jack. (1995). RENAISSANCE TWO: Second Coming of the Printing Press?
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by the Office of Distance Learning, Rochester Institute of Technology, in the
form of one quarter course release of one of the authors, Kumiko Aoki, from teaching in the Department of
Information Technology, in Winter 1997-98.
In
D
U.S. Department of Education
Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI)
National Library of Education (NLE)
Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC)
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