The Vision
GLOBAL UNIVERSITY SYSTEM: GLOBAL LEARNING IN THE 21st CENTURY
Professor Tapio Varis
University of Tampere
MUHAMMAD ABDUS SALAM
(1926 - 1996)
"Servant of God, Who is Peace"
"Ideals and Realities - Selected Essays" (1966)
"Notes on Science, Technology and Scientific Education in the Development of the South" (1990)
A SHARED HERITAGE OF MANKIND
Chinese, Indian, Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Afghan period
Western science & technology (after 1100)
Central Africa, Maya, Aztecs etc
The Greek Commonwealth
Science and technology are cyclical
GLOBAL UNIVERSITY
(Soedjatmoko 1985)
Intellectual problems (what to teach, what curriculums?)
Institutional problems (global lecture hall)
Pedagogic problems (multimedia)
THE ROLE OF THE MEDIA
Lazarsfeld & Knupfer (1945): "media of mass communication can be used to build up something like an educational campaign"
International authority (identity,loyalty)
Global learning (Ploman/UNU 1985): learning about global issues and processes; and learning as a global, or total process
EDUCATION IN THE GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
World Bank ("knowledge gap")
Unesco (vision and action)
ITU (Global Telecommunication Training Institute)
EU (telematics for Education and Training)
ILO (telework), WHO (telemedicine)
The media (open learning environment)
THE GOALS
Like Plato´s Academy and the Lyceum of Aristotle, like the first presidents of American universities such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, the stereotypical modern university must make pre-eminent the question, what sorts of people do we want our graduates to become? (GATE 1998)
Higher humanity (Sitaram 1998)
MAIN OBJECTIVES OF HIGHER EDUCATION
(Marco Antonio R. Dias 1998)
The generation of new knowledge (the research function)
The training of highly qualified personnel (the education function)
The supply of services to society
The ethical function, implying social criticism
CENTRAL FUNCTIONS
(Majid Tehranian 1996)
Professional certification
Moral education
Scientific socialisation
Social criticism
Elite recruitment
THE INGREDIENTS OF KNOWLEDGE FOR DEVELOPMENT (World Bank)
How-to knowledge, such as nutrition, birth control, engineering, or accounting
Knowledge about attributes or characteristics, such as the quality of a product, diligence of a worker, or creditworthiness of a firm
WHY THE GAP?
Investing in science and education, transfer of technology etc
C.P. Snow: "…There is no evidence that any country or race is better than any other in scientific teachability: there is a good deal of evidence that all are much alike. Tradition and technical background seem to count for surprisingly little…"
VISION AND ACTION (Unesco)
Unprecedented demand for and a great diversification in higher education, as well as increased awareness of its vital importance for sociocultural and economic development
Expansion: student enrolments worldwide increased from 13 million (1960) to 82 million (1995)
The Vision
THREE WAVES OF ELECTRONIC DISTANCE EDUCATION
(Takeshi Utsumi)
First wave: conventional analog terrestial/satellite TV broadcasting/videoconferencing
Second wave: digital video compression (often ISDN systems)
Third wave: asynchronous, "just-in-time", individualized, interactive and collaborative educational services with the use of World Wide Web (www)
THE NEW INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES (NICT)
"Collaboration" and "asynchronous education" reflect more the necessities of the evolution of society than purely educational reasons
Asynchronous learning
"Meta-university" to provide support for existing universities
CONTENTS, METHODS, RESOURCES
Risk of the hegemony of one single language to the detriment of multilingualism
Risk of the hegemony of one single culture to the detriment of plurality
Future lecture rooms: the challenge of digital sites, virtual seats of learning
Teacher becomes the mediator of knowledge
TOWARDS DISTANCE LEARNING
The didactic quality of distance education still subject of debate between "traditionalists" and "specialists"
Distance education thinking by many education experts before the rapid development of NICT tends to resist technological change
Distance learning
ASYNCHRONOUS EDUCATION
Emphasis at one´s own pace with no constraints as regards time
Global university: geopolitical vision
Computer-mediated education and distributive learning
BROADBAND INTERNET AND VIRTUAL UNIVERISTY
Internet-university: "meta-university" which sells logistic apparatus (software and the Web)
Virtual university: advanced technology approach (Internet); new paradigm. Reduces the boundaries between primary, higher and vocational studies
Virtual campus: open community
GLOBAL UNIVERSITY SYSTEM
Technology basis: broadband Internet
Global projects
Regional projects (Pacific/asia - North/South America - Europe/Africa)
Example: Pilot project for Ukraine
INGREDIENTS OF VIRTUAL UNIVERSITY
Use of NICT
Teaching: asynchronous learning, new inter-actor relationship, continuing education
Participatory vision of education
Academic proposals in main languages
THREE MODELS OF EDUCATION
Traditional: focus on teacher, the role of the student is passive, technology blackboard/TV/radio
Information: focus on student, the role of the student is active, technology PC
Knowledge: focus on group, the role of the student is adaptive, technology PC + network
CHANGE OF PARADIGM
Time
Space
Cost
Teacher-student relationships
Information/ knowledge
Market
Competition & collaboration
Assessment
Distinctions between various types of education less important - emphasis on continuing education
PRECONDITIONS FOR SUCCESS
Regional diversity
Co-development
Scientific excellence
Intellectual property
Portability of teaching material
The quality approach
COMPONENTS OF INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE
Digitalisation
Telecommunication system capacity
Terminals
Information content and communication services
Interdependence among information infrastructure components
DIGITAL PATHWAYS
Computing power
Smart software
Memory
Telecommunications
CONVERGENCE OF INDUSTRIES
The Future of Distribution
and Convergence
Market convergence, industry convergence, technology convergence
It is unlikely that the converging industries will converge into a single "mega-industry"
There will be many cross-industry alliances, new forms and genres of content, and new delivery systems
GLOBALIZATION AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES
Makes it possible for distance teching institutions to strengthen their position in the educational landscape
Paves the way for lifelong education for all and at the same time is spreading to traditional universities, more and more of which use distance teaching methods in their activities
VIRTUAL UNIVERSITY BENEFITS
Learning without any restriction as to time or space
Courses based on modules with flexible time schemes, which take individual learning needs into account
Greater responsibility taken by students in the learning process
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
Jürgen Habermas: "In a sense we are talking about universal skills of communication. We are born with the potential to use them to create a better society.
Communicative competence = several means of using language to create concensus and agreement between two or more speaking and acting subjects.
Cognitive, performative, temporal and spatial skills
MEDIA LITERACY
"The ability to communicate competently in all media, print and electronic, as well as to access, analyze and evaluate the powerful images, words and sounds that make up our contemporary mass media culture. These skills of media literacy are essential for our future as individuals and as members of a democratic society" (Center for Media Literacy)
MEDIA COMPETENCE
Key qualification in the information society (Bertelsmann Stiftung: Kommunikationsordnung 2000)
Problem solving
Information/knowledge management
Walter Benjamin
"Es ist niemals ein Dokument der Kultur, ohne zugleich ein solches der Barberei zu sein." (Gesichtsphilosophischen Thesen 1892-1940)
SOURCES
From traditional to virtual: the new information technologies. UNESCO ED.98/CONF.202/7.6, Paris, August 1998
Tapio Varis (toim.): "Avautuminen tietoyhteiskuntaan." Tampereen yliopiston täydennyskoulutuskeskus TYT julkaisuja 1998
InterMedia No 2, May 1999
Marco Antonio R. Dias: Higher Education: Vision and action for the coming century. Prospects, vol. XXVIII, no.3, September 1998
Majid Tehranian: The End of University? The Information Society, vol. 12, no 4. October-December 1996
GATE (Gloal Alliance for Transnational Education), vol.II, no 3, 1998
World Development Report 1998/99. The World Bank 1998 (http://www.worldbank.org/wdr/wdr98/index.htm
Paul Lazarsfeld & Genevieve Knupfer: Communications Research and International Coöperation. In Ralph Linton (ed.) The Science of Man in the World Crisis. New York, Columbia University Press 1945.
Tapio Kosunen & Marjariitta Viiri (eds): Networks of Skills and Competence. Conference Proceedings. North Karelia Polytechnic, Joensuu 1999.
Michael Prosser & K.S. Sitaram (eds): Civic Discourse: Intercultural, International and Global Media, Vol. 2. Ablex Publishing Corporation 1999.
K.S. Sitaram and Michael Prosser (eds): "Ciciv Discourse: Multiculturalism, Cultural Diversity, and Glaobal Communication" Vol. I, Ablex Publishing Corporation 1998
Ploman, Edward W. "Communication, Education and the Management of Change," in "Coping with Change, The Democratic Way, University of London 1985
Soedjatmoko "The International Dimension of Universities in an Interdependent World" Eighth General Conference, International Association of Universities, University of California, Los Angeles, 12 August 1985
