University Continuing Education Association
92nd Annual Conference, April 2007
Vancouver
Pre-Conference Workshop on the Future of Learning Technologies
11 April 2007
New Learning Technologies: Mirage, Miracle or Muddle?
Sir John Daniel
Commonwealth of Learning
Introduction
Welcome to Vancouver! It is a pleasure to be at a UCEA conference again. I go back a long way with UCEA - or NUCEA as you used to call it before you dropped the term national, perhaps as part of a fantasy that it would transform you into global organisation and prove that America rules the world! Or maybe it was simply an assertion of national unity over states' rights!
Looking back through my old speeches I see that two jobs ago, when I was at the UK Open University, I gave a keynote to your 1999 annual conference in Washington with the title
Lifelong Learning, Systematic Scepticism and Decent Democracy. Looking through that speech I see that in the previous year I had taken part in an NUCEA conference in Aspen called
Post-baccalaureate Futures. Before that my CV tells me that I gave a keynote address to your conference in Reno, Nevada, back in 1983. I may well have made other appearances at NUCEA but I found long ago that life moves too fast for me to remember to put all my conference appearances on my CV.
My speech in Washington on
Lifelong Learning, Systematic Scepticism and Decent Democracy had some political content, as the title implies, but I shall limit my political comments today to a few remarks on borders - as in national borders.
First of all, welcome to Vancouver and to Canada. We are delighted that you are meeting here. I hope that you all had a reasonably easy passage across the border and through immigration. What I can say with certainty is that even if it was expeditious and reasonably pleasant, your passage across the border this week was more of a hassle than it would have been ten years ago. Nearly forty years ago, when I first came to Canada, both Americans and Canadians used to talk proudly about sharing the longest unguarded frontier in the world. I benefited from that because my wife is American and we crossed the border frequently when her parents were alive.
Those times, sadly, are gone! And it is sad. How fast things can change. Twenty years ago going to the USA was a breeze but going to Russia was problematic. Today going to Russia is a breeze but going to the USA is a pain. I was startled to find, when I came to the Commonwealth of Learning here in Vancouver three years ago that some of my colleagues, when they had to travel to Australia or New Zealand, would take the much longer route via Hong Kong to avoid being insulted and messed around by transiting through the USA.
Maybe things have got a little better since then, but as we mouth our brave words about globalisation and drop the word 'national' from the titles of organisations in an attempt to be universal, we must remember that the physical crossing of national borders is more hassle now than it was a hundred years ago. Which is all the more reason to thank you all again for bothering to get passports so that you could come to Canada for this meeting.
In this spirit of welcome and friendship let me alert you to two little games that Canadians may play on you to test your cultural awareness and sense of place. First, if you see Canadians listening to you intently with notepad in hand they
may be concentrating on the content of what you are saying. But they may also be counting the number of times visiting Americans say, 'in this country' when they mean the US! Second, when Canadian speakers welcome you by saying 'it's good to see so many people from south of the border', they are indeed welcoming you, but they are also watching to see how many of you will turn round to look for the Mexicans.
My title today is
New Learning Technologies: Mirage, Miracle or Muddle. If you want a sub-title it would be
Technology is the Answer: What was the Question? Some technologies are miraculous - if not in the biblical sense then at least in the sense that they can create quantum changes in the scope, scale, efficiency and effectiveness of human endeavours. But we are in a muddle about learning technologies because we do not pause to define what changes we wish to effect. That leads us to head for any technological prospect we see on the horizon without asking if it is a mirage.
Hence my sub-title - what was the question? I shall suggest two important questions arising from the major challenges facing higher education in the USA and the rest of the world. Can learning technologies answer these questions and help us rise to these challenges? Here I shall encourage us to take a broad view of technology and identify the fundamental characteristics of technology. Having set the stage in this way I shall end with a critique of the most fashionable current application of learning technologies, namely eLearning, and suggest how an unsatisfactory situation might be turned around.
That is the plan; so let's begin at the beginning. What are the questions?
Challenges for Higher Education
In the USA one question dominates all others. How much longer can the price of American higher education defy the laws of economic gravity? The figures are startling. Taking the long view, I understand that the average cost of tuition in US postsecondary institutions has risen by inflation plus 2.8% annually since 1910 - that is to say for almost a hundred years. Looking at a shorter and more recent timescale, the average cost of tuition has risen by 385% in the last 20 years.
The consequence, of course, is that these escalating costs are putting higher education out of the reach of poorer Americans. Today only 10% of Afro-American boys and 7% of Hispanic-American boys go on to college. These are the kinds of participation rates you would have found in Europe in the 1960s, before the great expansion of higher education took place.
We have here quite literally a secular trend - it has been going on for a century. There are other inflationary trends around the world that also seem to defy the laws of economic gravity, such as real estate prices in England. There the doom-mongers keep forecasting a crash but the boom goes on. Might not the same be true of tuition in the US?
I have the temerity to suggest, timorously, that the US case might be different. English real estate prices reflect the fact that it is a small densely populated country where no new land is being created and planning restrictions are quite fierce. The situation of US postsecondary education is different. It seems crazy to use words like monopoly and monopsony about a system with so many suppliers and buyers of postsecondary education, but it is hard to escape the conclusion that there must be an element of collusion, implicit rather than explicit, subconscious rather than conscious, in this inexorable rise in prices.
What could change this? Clearly it requires a source of supply that is prepared to break with the cosy high-price cartel. Such a new source would first have to slash its costs - but I shall argue that technology can do that. Second, it would have to
want to slash prices. I shall argue that idealism about providing cost-efficient postsecondary education to the disadvantaged is not dead in America but is re-emerging from an unexpected source.
So much for the US, but what is the crucial question in the rest of the world? Here the problem is not that postsecondary education has priced itself out of the reach of ordinary people, but that it never priced itself in. In the countries where most of the earth's population live - and where the large majority of its young people live - less than one in ten of the postsecondary age cohort has access to college. As a yardstick for comparison, here in Canada where we have the world's highest participation rate, six out of ten proceed to postsecondary education.
Until very recently most people in developing countries simply assumed that was the way things had to be. The elites of these countries made the assumption - either cynically or self-deludingly - that the combination of competitive entry and zero tuition would produce socially equitable outcomes. This was cynical because the elites knew that they could get their children through the competition and enjoy the free ride of free tuition. It was self-deluding because it ignored decades of research showing that the combination of tuition fees, loans and bursaries produces wider socio-economic participation than free tuition.
The normative challenge to this status quo of low participation rates now comes from developing country governments as they realise that before they can consider their economies 'developed' they need participation rates in postsecondary education of at least 30%, which, for most of those countries, is more than three times their current rate.
The practical challenge comes from management researchers who grapple with the challenge of bringing to the four billion poor people in the world the products and services that we take for granted. I think particularly of C.K.Prahalad, whose book
The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid has sparked quite a controversy about whether consumption or production is the route to development for the world's poorest.
As often in such controversies, the answer lies somewhere between the extreme positions. However we should take to heart Prahalad's challenge to 'develop radical innovations in technology and business models' with the ideal of 'highly distributed small-scale operations married to world-scale capabilities'.
So there are the two questions: how might the price bubble of US postsecondary education finally burst; and how might tens of millions of people in developing countries gain access to higher learning?
Technology: what answers?
Technology is the answer; what was the question? We have two questions: what answers can technology provide? We must start with a definition of technology that focuses on fundamentals rather than the fashionable fad of the moment.
My preferred definition of technology is: 'the application of scientific and other organized knowledge to practical tasks by organisations consisting of people and machines'. This is both broad - we are talking about tacit knowledge and even common sense as well as science - and modest. We are not looking for the perfect method of learning and we are reminded that organisations consist of people.
What does technology do and how does it work? Scanning the range of human activity to which technology has been applied suggests four key characteristics: technology cuts costs; it increases scale and volume; it produces more consistent and usually better quality; and it creates new capabilities. The Olympic motto,
swifter, higher, stronger, was created for human performance but technology can give us completely new capabilities.
How does technology work? It replaces human effort with mechanical and electrical energy: first muscles by steam and today neurones by silicon chips. Very importantly it also organises work differently. This was described 250 years ago by Adam Smith when he compared producing pins by hand and by mass production.
The features of mass production, especially specialisation and division of labour, are just as important today for the mass customisation of services as they were for the mass production of goods. In other words, technology refers to new ways of combining inputs to produce outputs as well as to particular devices.
Let us apply this thinking to postsecondary education. In terms of Adam Smith's comparisons of pin production, postsecondary education is still a cottage industry making handcrafted products. This partly explains why its price follows such an inflationary trajectory. How could technology change this pattern? Step number one is to use technology's ability to achieve economies of scale.
The book was the first technology to do this and subsequent technologies, audio, video, computers, the Internet, iPods, Open Educational Resources and so on have continued the tradition. Production costs vary with the medium used but distribution costs have declined steadily.
In other places I have made the simple distinction between two ways of learning, independent learning, where you study alone with a book or some other medium, and interactive learning, which involves another person. Most people like a blend of both and, rightly or wrongly, learning that lacks contact with other people has always lacked prestige.
Independent learning lends itself readily to economies of scale, good reach and consistent quality. Interactive learning is more of a challenge, but by division of labour, specialisation, and shared use of infrastructure it is now possible to cut costs significantly and still increase relevance and quality.
This is not the place to give a history of the use of technology in education from St Paul's invention of distance learning to today's collaborative course development on Wikis. However, generalising considerably, I assert that the commercial, for profit sector made the early running in correspondence education whereas the public sector led the thrust to multi-media distance learning. Today I observe that the pendulum is swinging back to the for-profit sector, which must, in particular, be a large part of the answer to the challenge of expanding postsecondary education in developing countries.
However, I also see signs that the for-profit sector is now setting the trends in the US. I am thinking less of large-scale but relatively orthodox operations like the University of Phoenix and more of the new initiatives being launched by Best Associates.
The first is the American College of Education which has many interesting features, starting with reducing the tuition costs for a Master's of Education by over 50%. It does this by blending independent learning - online with distinguished faculty lecturers - and interactive learning with a network of supporting professors.
But perhaps the key innovation of the American College of Education is to have teamed up with school districts and to deliver its programme through them. This does two things. First, it slashes infrastructure costs because the school district provides the campuses. Second, it raises quality by tailoring its programmes to the needs of those school districts, applying the results of research on learning to the real challenges they face. Not yet two years old, this institution will soon rank in the top ten teachers colleges in the US in terms of enrolments.
The second of Best's innovations is the Whitney International University System, which brings a similar technology-based approach to the international arena. Through wholly owned colleges or partnerships in a range of countries, Whitney combines remote classroom technology with interaction through a network of supporting professors. Infrastructure costs are cut by using existing facilities and a radical reduction in the price of tuition is a fundamental principle of Whitney's operation, whose declared aim is to respond to Prahalad's challenge of serving the poor at the bottom of the economic pyramid with affordable postsecondary education of quality.
All this is quite a change from most uses of technology in conventional postsecondary education. For the last part of this talk I shall critique the way that we are using the currently hot technology of eLearning.
What is eLearning?
What is eLearning? The term came into regular use around 2000. Distance learning has a history of terminological confusion and eLearning is continuing that ignoble tradition.
For Wikipedia, eLearning 'is a general term that relates to all training that is delivered with the assistance of a computer.' Others deny that the 'e' stands for electronic and argue that it stands for concepts like
evolving,
everywhere,
enhanced or
extended. This leads them to a fuzzy definition of eLearning as 'a learning environment supported by continuously evolving, collaborative processes, focused on increasing individual and organisational performance'. For yet others eLearning is simply a sexier term for distance learning.
In exploring the place of eLearning I shall assume that it does have something to do with electrons and computers and use four animal metaphors to explore the different approaches to eLearning.
eLearning as Sacred Cow
The first is eLearning as a Sacred Cow. A Sacred Cow is something that is immune from criticism, often unreasonably so. I apply it to the tendency to suspend our critical faculties when the term eLearning is used.
The starry-eyed visions of eLearning promoted during the dotcom frenzy in 2000 have since gone cloudy. Internet enthusiasts claimed then that the future of education lay in front of a computer screen. All other teaching methods would be consigned to the dustbin of history.
Those who believed it and created pure Internet teaching either went bankrupt or quickly added other media, even books, to their materials mix. Even today, however, some people ask you if you are using eLearning in a tone of voice implying that a negative response means you haven't yet joined the 21st century. If you are faced with this question, my advice is to ask what the questioner means by eLearning. The reply will be so convoluted that you may never have to answer the original question.
eLearning as a Trojan Horse
Second, there is eLearning as a Trojan Horse. A Trojan Horse is a subversive device placed within enemy ranks, referring to the hollow wooden horse in which Greek soldiers hid to gain entrance to Troy so that they could open its gates to their army. We apply this analogy to eLearning in three ways.
First, like the Trojan horse, eLearning has been welcomed into the academic city. Computing technology strikes closer to the heart of intellectual endeavour than media like TV or radio, so academics have embraced it more readily. But in doing so they may have prevented eLearning from being a subversive device. Using eLearning to best effect calls for some fundamental rethinking of pedagogy.
In research the challenge of fundamentally rethinking a paradigm would attract a large team; but in teaching academics mostly develop eLearning as lone rangers. Thousands of teachers acting separately are less likely to develop a new pedagogy than a more concerted approach.
Second, because it has been absorbed into the cottage industry of campus teaching, eLearning is having less impact than it might. Historically, educational media, especially the mass media, have made possible the revolution of distance learning, which has simultaneously increased access, improved quality and cut costs.
The power of eLearning should be harnessed to distance education; as is being done impressively by large institutions such as the UK Open University. In smaller institutions, however, those who might have developed eLearning as a tool for extending access have been drawn into using it to offer a richer experience to existing students. The eLearning pioneers were captured as they jumped out of their Trojan Horse and could not open the gates to let their army occupy the city.
Third - a more subtle point - the Trojan Horse of eLearning carries a problematic stowaway called Digital Rights Management. If I buy a book or a CD I may not copy it but I can lend it to others, one at a time. However, if I buy an electronic book, the seller often digitally locks the book so that I have to open it with a code, such as my credit card number. This prevents me from lending my electronic books to my friends. In some cases Digital Rights Management even makes the book expire and become useless at a certain date.
DRM is a problem in eLearning. It allows no equivalent to the second-hand market for textbooks. Learners will need to pay the full price each year. All we can do here is flag the problem. Publishers and software producers need to get together to solve it, otherwise we shall see large-scale pirating.
My institution, the Commonwealth of Learning, is investing considerable effort in helping governments and institutions through the copyright maze and I shall mention one solution in a minute.
eLearning as Scapegoat
Third, there is eLearning as Scapegoat. A Scapegoat is one that is made to bear the blame of others. Aaron confessed all the sins of the children of Israel on the Day of Atonement over the head of a live goat which was then sent into the wilderness symbolically bearing their sins.
eLearning is sometimes used as a scapegoat by those who might expand learning opportunities through distance education, but claim they cannot do so because they do not have the equipment, the bandwidth or the expertise for eLearning. The digital divide is used as an excuse for inaction.
This attitude, which is linked to the tendency to rename distance education as eLearning, is unfortunate and unnecessary. It is perfectly possible to offer distance learning of good quality at scale without having all the paraphernalia of eLearning. After all, St. Paul lacked bandwidth but used distance learning to launch the amazing growth of Christianity!
eLearning as Easter Bunny
Finally, on a more cheerful note, we come to eLearning as the Easter Bunny. In ancient times the rabbit was a symbol of fertility, equated with springtime and the renewal of life. The Easter Bunny makes her visit every year, scattering brightly-coloured eggs as she goes. What brightly coloured eggs are being scattered around our educational garden by eLearning? We identify three.
First, eLearning allows online access to a huge array of resources: the libraries and museums of the world and much more. The challenge to teachers is to help students to use these resources wisely and purposefully. After all, pointing students in the direction of a conventional library does not, of itself, always lead to useful learning.
Second, eLearning speeds up communication, which is usually a good thing. Research shows that students benefit from timely feedback. Electronic submission of assignments removes delays in transmission, although it does not guarantee that teachers will correct and comment on the student's work quickly. The fact that contributions to discussion (e.g. in chat rooms) must be made in writing is also helpful. It slows down communication and gives people more chance to express their points clearly. This is particularly helpful to those who are working in a second or third language.
Finally, the most brightly coloured egg brought by the Easter Bunny through eLearning is a global intellectual commons of learning materials that can be shared and adapted. These are called Open Educational Resources.
People are contributing eLearning materials to common repositories under licences that allow others to use and adapt them provided they acknowledge the source and put their adaptation back into the system for onward use.
Open Educational Resources are an antidote to all three of the bad effects of eLearning as a Trojan Horse: academics need not re-invent every wheel of course content; the cost of developing learning materials, which is a major obstacle to distance learning, is slashed; and the use of open content licences removes the spectre of locking up knowledge under Digital Rights Management.
I am proud to say that a major meeting of the Wikimedia community, which is at the heart of these developments, is taking place at the Commonwealth of Learning, here in Vancouver, as we speak.
Conclusion
It is time to conclude. My title was
New Learning Technologies: Mirage, Miracle or Muddle. I have argued that technology does have the potential for a quasi-miraculous impact on the way we conduct education. However, we use it in a muddled way today because we haven't clarified the serious questions that we want technology to answer. Instead, we focus on the fashionable technology of the moment and are misled by the mirages that it presents to us. I hope that my brief exploration of eLearning through animal metaphors made the point.
References
Bassindale, A.R. & J.S. Daniel (2000), Recasting Post baccalaureate Programs as Learning Systems, in
Post baccalaureate Futures: New Markets, Resources, Credentials, ace Oryx Press: pp. 121-135.
Commonwealth of Learning (2007) Copyright Law and Education,
wikieducator.org/Colcopyright
Daniel, J.S. (2000) Lifelong Learning, Systematic Skepticism, and Decent Democracy,
Continuing Higher Education Review, Vol. 63, pp. 7-23
Daniel, J.S., A Kanwar & S. Uvalić-Trumbić (2005)
Who's Afraid of Cross-border Higher Education? A Developing World Perspective : presented at the Final Plenary Session: Quality Assurance in Transnational Issues, (INQAAHE), Annual Conference 2005 - Wellington, New Zealand (1 April 2005)
http://www.col.org/colweb/site/pid/3617
Daniel, J., A. Kanwar & S. Uvalić-Trumbić (2006) A Tectonic Shift in Global Higher Education,
Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, Vol. 38(4) pp. 16-23
Prahalad, C.K. (2004)
The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits, Wharton School Publishing
Prahalad, C.K. & S. Hart (2002) 'The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid',
Strategy+Business, Issue 26.