| Subject: Re: A HYPOTHETICAL - SCRIPT - broad issues! |
Author:
Policy analyst
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Date Posted: 04:09:42 11/01/99 Mon
In reply to:
Chairperson
's message, "Re: A HYPOTHETICAL - Drama-tech SCRIPT!" on 03:57:12 11/01/99 Mon
Thank you chairman. Since my presentation of an internal discussion paper in my office 2 weeks ago and media coverage on the matter this week, I've had some reactions over the phone and the daily newspapers. I welcome all reactions. I am here to continue the debate and hopefully to clarify my position on the topic of "higher education without campus". I'll limit myself to the lay description of basic issues surrounding the topic and then I want you to react. If I do not answer your questions fully, I hope your own discussion in small groups following the general audience and reaction here will do the issue justice. If not, this is not the end of the debate. We must try to fully comprehend both advantages and disadvantages of this idea. The potential impact of such an idea cannot be fully understood in the few hours of discussion here today.
So what do I belief? Perhaps I should go through quickly with you the rationale for this concept. (Here, he produces some overheads and drags the overhead projector to the center. He goes through explaining the contents of the 9 slides he has produced for demonstration. Then he continues without the slides in the following).
I am convinced that total access to higher education in the country is possible within the next 10 to 20 years. I believe that 100 percent of eligible and willing citizens can participate in higher education. Is it possible given our present resource constraints? The answers are 'yes' and 'no'. First, the answer is 'no', if we continue to use the same ways of resource allocation and utilization, the same methods of teaching and learning and the same ways we finance higher education as we're doing now. We just don't have the money to build more institutions and maintain them based on the same assumptions about higher education and how to conduct the education business. The answer is "yes", because we don't have to build more expensive institutions of higher education. In fact, we can have higher education without colleges and universities. So how is this possible? Briefly, it is possible through an "affordable and effective access to the Internet" and other modern electronic, communication information technologies.
WHAT ARE THE BROAD ISSUES TO CONSIDER? You have just heard the chairman provide an initial litany of issues arising from this agenda. Let me list some more of the issues but I know there are also other valid ones that you can each bring up. I have the following broad categories of issues: economic, sociological, political, philosophical, academic, pedagogical/instructional, technical & administrative, and legal just to name some. I will speak briefly to a few of these categories.
WHAT ARE THE ECONOMIC ISSUES TO THINK ABOUT? Obviously, establishment cost, cost of maintenance, and cost of equipment for individuals are a few that immediately come to mind. At the same time, I don't believe the government will have sufficient funds in the near or long-term future to continue the present system of higher education to meet the demands of all willing and able citizens. We have a growing population at the rate of 2.3 percent annually. A question is, should all responsibility for providing higher education in the country be borne by the government? I think not. I am suggesting that the role of government is not so much as a provider of higher education but rather that of a facilitator of quality higher education. Its role is to ensure that higher education is provided and that the quality of such higher education is of acceptable standards. Who then can be the provider? I believe that organizations and individuals who want to provide higher education or who want to make money out of higher education should be allowed to get into the higher education enterprise. This may sound outrages but I venture it for your reaction.
WHAT ABOUT SOCIAL CONSIDERATIONS? It is also because of social considerations, (e.g., unemployment, law and order, vandalism of private property, etc.), that we should rethink ways of providing higher education in a congenial environment. We know that student activism on campus is often propagated by a few at the price of many silent students who want to go on with the business of learning. If one is thinking about the loss of face-to-face interaction, that is something to balance out that an individual learner (and parent) has to consider and should be given the option to decide. We know that many young people who cannot continue their education migrate to our big cities to find jobs that require more than high school diplomas. As you know, crime rate in our largest cities is growing and most crimes are committed by young people who should be in college or universities. As you know, this has a direct impact on actual investments in our country. The idea is to reach out to our clients (prospective students) rather than our clients searching in vain for higher education located in only a few locations of the country.
WHAT ABOUT THE POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS? When we talk about the politics of an issue, we are talking about who has the power and control and who doesn't. There will be political tensions among faculty and faculty, faculty and administrators, faculty and student, different public agencies and private organizations, among international institutions and local colleges and universities. Questions of autonomy, identity, accountability, and relevance, etc will be raised by institutions and educators. One may ask for example, who is and who should be in control of learning - the professor or the student. If students take courses through distance education both from overseas and locally, who would be responsible for final certification of the diploma and degree? Who is to determine the quality of educational programs taken by students spread throughout the country and abroad? These are valid questions for us to discuss today and to continue to find answers for.
WHAT IS THE PHILOSOPHICAL STANCE TO BASE MY BELIEVE IN HIGHER EDUCATION WITHOUT CAMPUS? I do not have a particular philosophical author right now to associate my convictions with. But I am convinced that our faith in the systems we have is our own creation. We create our own cultures and a belief in an education that takes place only in an environment where there must be teachers who know it all and students who know nothing. We feel more comfortable with the idea that creditable and recognizable "real education" is one that is fully structured, conducted within four walls with other students around, and controlled by a few specialists. Our learning processes depend on these few. We even have employing organizations make sure that we follow this route because "they need to know" the credentials of those they are to employ. In other words, our whole social structure has come to expect that there is no other way to assure them of the quality of knowledge from an "educated person". I am convinced of the greater influence than is admitted, of the power of "implicit learning" which in a way is broader than how we understand education now. I have a simple belief in the capacity of individuals to learn useful skills and create things for themselves every time they are confronted with a situation. I believe they can receive quality higher education through the Internet and at a distance only if they can have access to the technology. I have a belief in the ability of the persons to adapt to changing times, situations and new tools. I believe in the "wave of fast technological changes" sweeping the globe in its wake. For example, in my lifetime we used slates and slate pencils or stones when slate pencils were broken or missing. We used fingers and sticks to learn counting. These are still available in abundance. We moved to books and pencils and pens. Only in the last decade or two did we have computers in our universities. Complex calculations can be done easily now with computers. Pocket size CDs at affordable prices, which can contain information once only available in thick volumes of encyclopedia, are now available and can be accessed easily with the right hardware. And while the commercial organizations in the country have moved along with computer and information technology, institutions responsible for preparing future employees of these organizations are in a poor state to provide suitable programs that can address the requirements of the commercial organizations. I am also convinced of the inability of the state to provide sufficient resources for higher education to support structures and institutions already quickly deteriorating. The idea of a "global village" is such that for example, we can now access news from any part of the world in "real time". We can have access to educational journals and order books instantly. These are some of the assumptions upon which the concept of higher education without campus is hinged.
I will pause here. I know I haven't covered other issues. However, I can stand here and justify all day, my perception of this issue and go away feeling happy about myself that "I've told them what I think", but I will not have progressed the idea further than myself. So, I want to have you discuss or ask me questions before we have a break.
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