Ian C. Reid [HREF1] , Flexible Learning Centre, University of South Australia, Holbrooks Road, Underdale, South Australia, 5032. Ian.Reid@unisa.edu.au
Universities are being pressured from a range of forces to move into delivery of courses via online methods. While the literature is replete with promises for the use of IT in the teaching and learning environment of Higher Education institutions, it is difficult for those institutions to take a strategic and informed approach to its implementation. This paper details the difficulties that can arise in selecting and implementing online delivery solutions, seeks to survey various approaches that Universities can take to address these difficulties from different theoretical perspectives and proposes key questions that must be answered if Academic managers are to be strategic in their selection of IT resources for teaching and learning, in order to best add value to their teaching and learning environment. Amongst the critical issues that need to be addressed are scaleability, interoperability, consistency and flexibility. A progress report of an implementation of a strategic institution-wide approach to online delivery at the University of South Australia, UniSAnet[HREF2], that addresses these key questions is then presented.
In considering IT for teaching and learning in the University context, one can conceptualise the decisions to be made in terms of technical, pedagogical, organisational, economic or a range of other dimensions. These dimensions can be seen to intersect and interact in dynamic ways that will change rapidly, depending on the development of IT systems over time, the characteristics of the institution in question, its organisational and financial profiles, and its strategic aims.
Nunan (forthcoming) sees the use of IT as an enabling mechanism for effecting flexibility in the teaching and learning arrangements, claiming that information technologists are creating a new educational paradigm that will cut across and transform forever every aspect of an institution’s operation. In claiming that "…information technologies and the market are often seen as defining characteristics of post-Fordism and their impact upon distance education has meant that flexible ‘responses’ are now a feature of distance education" Nunan links the use of IT with the market approach to educational services and the notion of flexible delivery.
Turoff (1997) agrees with this broad proposition and conceptualises technology as a channel for the social and economic forces that are reshaping Higher Education. In this conception, the use of IT can be both good and bad, and enables the merging of face-to-face teaching methods with those of Distance Education.
Less sanguine approaches propose the vision of Higher Education overtaken by commercial interests via IT companies, a loss of Academic control and detrimental effects on the nature of academic work where academics are reduced to vendors of standardised "educational products" (Noble, 1998; Margolis, 1998). DeLong (1997) raises the spectre of the reduction in monopoly control that the Internet will provoke, thus forcing Universities to compete on a global scale and enable the dismantling of artificial disciplinary barriers.
The literature is replete with promises for the use of IT in the teaching and learning environment of Higher Education institutions, however it is difficult for those institutions to take a strategic and informed approach to its implementation. There are a number of reasons for this difficulty.
Firstly, there are issues relating to the rate of technical change. Technical tools and services change so rapidly that the traditionally slow organisational processes of universities cannot keep up. The hardware and software solutions available are changing and proliferating so fast that universities cannot hope to fund purchases of the latest products. This creates significant problems for institutions which aim to link directly with the practices of graduate employers and attending to issues of lifelong education, since students and their employers often require leading edge technologies to be taught to assist their competitive advantage in the employment and business marketplaces, respectively.
Secondly, issues of skill development need to be addressed. The level and diversity of the information technology skills and experiences of the student body are rapidly outstripping those of most academics. The need for academics to keep up to date with their discipline itself is increased by the impact of information technology, which can make it more problematic for them to remain up to date with learning technologies. On the other hand in some other areas, technological skills enable both staff and students to achieve goals (such as information retrieval and analysis) more efficiently than was possible in the past.
Thirdly, issues of communication are important. It is becoming increasingly difficult for information technology specialists on the one hand and managers of higher education institutions on the other to communicate effectively with each other. The cultures of the technologist and the manager are diverging at an ever-increasing rate. As technologists deal with increasingly esoteric technologies and with interconnected global networks rather than merely institution-based systems, and as managers become more engrossed with management systems, competitive pressures and the bottom line, the space for each group to communicate is narrowing dramatically. The technologist’s informal networking can appear to be ‘playing’ to the manager, while the manager’s focus on outcomes can appear to be a straight-jacket to the technologist. This is occurring at a time when the future of universities undoubtedly relies on a close interdependence between the technologist and the manager.
The fourth set of reasons institutions are having difficulty with information technology strategy involve technical expertise. Universities are now increasingly unable to keep staff with cutting edge technology skills. It is becoming difficult to pay the sort of salaries available to technologists in industry, and it is also difficult to provide the sort of leading edge environment in which these specialists need to work, as they once were able to do. Whereas in the past leading edge information technology research and development was almost the sole domain of universities, the places with the funding, and the ideas, are now increasingly hardware and software companies. Thus universities are experiencing a drain of talent in the application of information technology to teaching and learning.
Finally, the nature of the computer industry causes difficulties. The strategies of information technology companies are often counter to the institutions’ best interests. In a low margin industry companies require high volumes and will sell products that are customisations of business products rather than develop products specifically intended for the university environment. Also, in order to develop a long-term relationship with a university, these companies frequently use the traditional entrepreneurial approaches to lock in a customer to using its product exclusively. One such approach is to sell at a loss in the early stages of a relationship, while making the university customer reliant on its product and thus ensuring future sales at a higher price. The sale of online teaching software packages is a prime example. The vendor of these packages often convinces academics to lock up their intellectual property in a proprietary system, and then requires the payment of a license fee for the privilege to access that material, with the academic then at the mercy of future price rises in the fee.
This paper seeks to survey various approaches that Universities can take to implement IT in teaching and learning from a range of theoretical perspectives and proposes key questions that must be answered if Academic managers are to be strategic in their selection of IT resources. Among the many possible approaches that can be invoked to analyse the place of IT within University teaching and learning are business models, IT models and organisational models. Examples of these models are now considered.
Porter (1985) describes the effects of ‘third wave economics’ giving rise to highly flexible and rapidly changing business environments. Businesses which are becoming agile and virtual organisations are described by Goldman, Goldman and Nagel, (1995) as an example of a response to a range of forces including:
Within this model, according to Goldman, Goldman and Nagel, mass produced, standard products are replaced by mass customised products, product management is replaced by skill and customer management, businesses compete on value to customers and competencies of teams rather than on cost and quality alone, products are increasingly information-rich, product runs are shortened and products are customised at the point of delivery rather than during the production phase. The development of online teaching in universities is clearly impacted upon by the above forces, and the teaching and learning resources, viewed as ‘products’, and the methods of their ‘production’ within this business paradigm, will need to have these characteristics if the university is to compete with other institutions within this highly fragmented and interconnected marketplace.
From the IT perspective, Stoner (1996) provides a conceptual framework for considering the integration of learning technologies in terms of systems analysis and design methodologies. This presents student motivation issues and quality assurance considerations as forces that interact with a recursive cycle of analysis, technology selection, design integration, implementation monitoring and adaptation. Within this view the challenge is to ascertain the customers’ requirements and to implement a technological solution to best meet their needs. Whilst IT models such as these are appropriate to invoke in the development of systems with mid to long-term life spans, the development of learning technologies, in such a dynamic environment as that in which universities find themselves, needs to be framed in a more dynamic and ephemeral paradigm.
A number of organisational frameworks for the consideration of online learning interventions have been proposed. Two such models, those of Bates from Canada and Yetton from Australia, are now considered. Bates focuses on institutional strategies, while Yetton uses institutional types as organising principles
Bates (1995) develops an ACTIONS model (Access, Costs, Teaching functions, Interaction and user-friendliness, Organisational issues, Novelty, Speed of course development / adaptation) for selecting technologies and translates these choices in his 1997 paper into 12 organisational strategies for change. These are:
- A vision for teaching and learning
- Funding reallocation
- Strategies for inclusion
- Technology infrastructure
- People infrastructure
- Student computer access
- New teaching models
- Faculty agreements and training
- Project management
- New organisational structures
- Collaboration and consortia
- Research and evaluation
Bates claims that the timing and coordination of these 12 strategies are imperative if technological changes in teaching and learning are to be successful. He accepts that the type of institution will inevitably affect the emphasis placed on each of these strategies, and that the integration of these strategies could take ten years to achieve. It could be argued that the agile and virtual environment described by Goldman, Goldman and Nagel in which universities find themselves, requires them to move more rapidly than this time scale.
Yetton (1997) has identified 3 major approaches to the introduction of technology in the delivery and administration of Higher Education in Australia. The three models are compared following the technique developed by Hicks and George (1998) in their analysis of strategic approaches to supporting learners. The factors compared are the online strategy, product selection strategy, the aims supported, the competitive edge provided, the role of Professional Development, its advantages and its disadvantages.
Model 1:
IT (Information Technology) is used to enrich its elite learning community. This model, based on maintaining the established base while funding independent new ventures, creates a number of small entrepreneurial ventures based on unique and different competencies. Successful ventures grow, while 'feeding' the established university campus with their innovations in teaching, learning and research. The ventures have the ability to select expertise with few constraints, including terms and conditions of employment. This attracts high status academic risk takers and innovators. The administrative IT system will be flexible and user-friendly. (Yetton 1997:4)
The online strategy employed by this form of University basically comprises a cottage industry, where specialist online products are developed for a particular market. The particular aims of the academic sponsoring (and often constructing) the application are of prime importance, and total control of intellectual property is assured. The difficulties of this approach are that it can be difficult to translate these specialist products to a wider audience, thus making it difficult for the approach to contribute to the institution’s competitive position, and the result is a costly venture. Professional development has no place within this model, other than that required by individuals to author particular products.
Model 2:
IT supports the success of semi-autonomous faculties. The devolved powerful faculties, enabled by a powerful central IT infrastructure, each have different competencies and strategic foci. This form is more complex to manage given its scale, but relies on the focused innovation and particular competencies of its academic divisions to manage and limit that complexity. Each division would have its own IT support, and to some extent develop its own appropriate set of technologies, management processes and skills and roles, which focus on the division’s core competencies in particular areas of applied research and teaching. (Yetton 1997:4)
Within this approach, each autonomous Division would select a single product for its online delivery. This is often an adaptation of a Business-related product. This product is then mandated for use across the Division, and only those academics or faculties with funds gain support from the initiative. This provides some competitive advantage for those wealthy discipline areas and has low startup costs, but ongoing support costs. The only professional support required is usually of a technical nature. It can be difficult to expand this approach to the entire University, due to the inefficiencies of different products being selected by different autonomous Divisions. In addition intellectual property is often locked up in a proprietary system for which annual fees need to be paid in order for it to be used.
Model 3:
IT is central to and critically underpins the strategic agenda. A new 'subsidiary' delivers IT-based teaching and learning, undertaking its innovative IT-based development in a separate, centrally resourced unit, and building new core competencies. IT enabled teaching and learning, designed to deliver quality and reliability to a large number of students, is the key driver in this model. In such a 'greenfield' site, highly skilled experts can be selected as required, with a focus on the motivation and ability to work in multi-functional teams. Administration will be primarily management based. (Yetton 1997:4)
This form of institution applies a mass production approach to online delivery. The University selects a particular online delivery product and supports all academic staff to develop using the product, requiring high levels of student and staff support. By supporting the institution’s strategy in teaching and learning, it can assist the institutions competitive position, but requires high resource commitment and considerable pedagogical input is needed. It provides a low startup cost and can produce materials that have a consistent ‘look and feel’. However the approach can involve the loss of control of intellectual property, as in model 2, and the single product model can reduce flexibility.
The comparisons of Yetton’s three models are summarised below in table 1
|
|
Model 1 |
Model 2 |
Model 3 |
|
Online strategy |
Cottage industry |
Single product approach |
Mass production approach |
|
Product selection strategy |
Specialist products developed |
Individual academics or divisions select and use a particular product |
The University selects a particular online delivery product and supports staff to develop using the product |
|
Whose aims are supported |
Individual development for academic |
Supports academics or faculties with funds |
Supports the institution’s strategy |
|
Support for competitive edge |
low |
medium for particular discipline areas |
Requires high resource commitment |
|
Role of Professional Development |
none |
Technical support with little pedagogical input |
high |
|
Advantages |
Control over IP |
Low startup cost |
Institution-wide strategy with considerable pedagogical input required Low startup cost Consistent look and feel |
|
Disadvantages |
Costly Not scalable |
Blackbox problem Not scalable Inefficient |
Not flexible High staff development costs Loss of control of IP |
All of Yetton’s models of university organisation with respect to IT integration have disadvantages when considered in the light of the economic and technical pressures presented by Goldman, Goldman and Nagel. Technical developments which allow highly scalable and interoperable solutions to the development of online learning resources, in conjunction with the capacity to respond to economic pressures to compete on a global scale with flexible management practises require a new advance on model 3 to be established &endash; a mass customisation model. Such a model involves the establishment of templates and frameworks, developed inhouse to retain control over intellectual property and the manner in which it is presented, and requires institutional agreement on a strategy that, while providing basic tools that can be devolved to the level of the individual academic with minimal technical training, nevertheless provides a flexible structure within which highly innovative and experimental ventures can be mounted.
If one agrees with Bates (1997) that ‘The new technologies will be exploited best by those that lend themselves to the new post-Fordist environment’ then rather than prescribing fixed structures and processes for IT implementation, it is better to propose a range of criteria which should be met by any proposal for the development of online resources. These criteria should be driven by the sorts of business, IT and organisational principles discussed above, but should be flexible enough that Universities can respond to them in dynamic and flexible ways. The responses to these criteria can then change rapidly over time depending on the economic, social and technical environment. The criteria developed here have their genesis from the integration of the business, IT and organisational models discussed above. They prescribe questions to be answered rather than solutions. The solutions within this framwork will change rapidly depending on the very economic, social and technical exigencies that Universities need to address in dealing with online strategy. They are now discussed in some detail.
The protection of intellectual property requires that student and staff access to online materials have appropriate security applied. Decisions need to be made about
This will facilitate student and staff use of materials by minimising the difficulties in accessing online materials, and allow the University to address mission-critical applications such as online enrolment and fees payment.
Online delivery is predicated on the understanding that students will be able to access materials independent of time and space, in an international context. Decisions need to be made about:
This will allow students to have seamless access to materials which they need to carry out their studies and developers to be able to author materials in a timely and flexible fashion
Academic staff are responsible for the development of subject materials including those placed online, but IT support staff are crucial to the success of online delivery. The University needs to decide how these two skill sets will interface in order to achieve efficient subject development. While control over content will remain with the Academic responsible for the teaching of the subject, decisions need to be made about:
The focus should be on allowing Academic staff to be able to maintain online teaching materials with sustainable technical and professional support.
Universities make considerable investments in Corporate IT systems, and online delivery initiatives should ideally use or at least interface directly with these systems wherever possible in order to add value to these investments and to provide extensibility, interoperability and efficient use of resources. Decisions need to be made about:
In order that there will be a consistent online dimension for all subjects and courses in the University, and that all relevant staff are able to customise these online materials with minimal lead-time. This implies that that the systems used are integrated with corporate information management systems to provide both efficiency and flexibility in preparation for future developments in delivering materials online, with respect to both client and server applications.
Standard tools for building online delivery systems need to be agreed in the areas of
Universities have a range of expertise at their disposal for the development of online applications, notably from
In this model, application developers need to comply with certain standards if they are to be supported by University resources. In particular they should only have access to corporate systems and information that they need for the development of the particular application and with the appropriate approval of the supervising staff member for the area in which the application will be deployed. In the context of curriculum developments, this means that decisions in this area need to be aligned with the institution’s strategic directions and implemented via its line management structures.
Decisions need to be made about functionality on the one hand and interoperability and extensibility on the other. Products need to be selected on the basis of the questions in the following priority order:
Priority 1: Does the system interoperate with all corporate systems?
Priority 2: Will the system extend to use by the University as a whole?
Priority 3: Is there maximum functionality in the system?
This is a critical shift in the traditional view of educational software, where functionality has in the past been the major determinant for product selection.
Online materials for teaching and learning need to have a consistent, simple and easy to read look and feel. Interactivity is a key requirement for online learning.
Decisions need to be made about
The establishment and maintenance of an online learning environment is significantly affected by
In this model the University’s online environment needs to require little staff development for entry-level developments, while providing support for staff as their skills develop in developing learning materials online. The use of standard hardware and software, with consistent, simple to use learning tools will further diminish the complexity for staff and students teaching and learning online.
Due to the rapidly changing technical and economic environment, these decisions need to be reviewed on at least an annual basis.
These criteria, if met, enable the development of a mass-customisation model for the development of online teaching and learning environments that is both sustainable by an institution’s infrastructure and flexible enough to adapt to the emerging technical environment. This strategic approach has been exemplified in the UniSAnet development of an online environment at the University of South Australia. UniSAnet comprises the linking of both existing corporate databases and purpose-built data stores linked to web pages. These can be operated upon via standard web interfaces via web forms and wizards. Thus full extensibility and interoperability is provided for. For example information about subjects is stored in one database and is utilised in the production of a range of print and online products. Whilst this reduces, to a small extent, the degree of functionality provided for, the strategic decision has been made that ‘boutique’ types of products are best provided for in specialist contexts which can then be linked directly to from the standard interfaces described here.
UniSAnet concentrates on a functionality that can be accessed via a standard browser interface without the need for the installation by the user of specialist software, particularly plugins. This platform, whilst including text-based materials, online discussions and interactive quizzes, can then be used to extend the richness of the resource base for teaching and learning by increasing the use of a range of multimedia forms. It provides a simple and consistent user interface for all of the University’s online offerings.
UniSAnet is being implemented in stages. Underlying these is the strategic intent to:
It needs to be stressed that UniSAnet is a University-wide initiative. As such, standards which meet the criteria listed above prevail that are consonant with the University’s mission and reputation. While it is intended to provide opportunities for staff and courses to be represented online, this is within the context of University ownership of the online presence, both in terms of its presentational standards and existing delegations which control information relating to the institution and its programs. Thus the templates and professional guidance linked to the web forms and wizards is designed with both quality standards and the institution’s teaching and learning strategy clearly implemented (Nunan, 1998).
The UniSAnet strategy is to be reviewed on an annual basis, and in the case of the first year of operation, by an external consultant.
Within this structure, two crucial dimensions must be catered for, namely those of the fundamental role of professional development, and within that, of a process by which individual academics can conceptualise online delivery in terms of their personal academic involvement.
In considering the role of professional development in Universities, Bradley (1997) has stated that
‘…the staff developer needs to understand the strategic goals of the institution, indeed be part of the development of these goals, and be able to engage in strategic application of their skills so that their impact is not marginalised or limited by individual ‘consultative’ action. Achieving this is not easy as it means re-appraising roles of both staff developers and of others within institutions.’
So staff development in online delivery from this strategic perspective is not about supporting individuals’ whims or interests, but focuses on institutional goals and plays a key role in shaping those goals. Within this role the staff developer needs to assist the individual academic to determine the level of engagement with online delivery.
The level of engagement with online delivery is a decision for individual schools within the University. The purpose of moving to an online teaching and learning environment is to afford different opportunities for teaching methodologies across the university. UniSAnet affords opportunities for academics to take a series of decisions about what the extent and role of the online dimension of their teaching programs will be. What these decisions turn on should be a realisation that the introduction of online services to students is integral to meeting the mission and policy commitments of the University. That is, to student-centred and flexible learning, to inclusivity and diversity within the curriculum, to information literacy and engagement with communications technologies, and to internationalisation of and increased access to University courses. (Nunan, forthcoming)
The level of engagement with online delivery is a decision for individual schools within the University. The purpose of moving to an online teaching and learning environment is to afford different opportunities for teaching methodologies across the university. UniSAnet affords opportunities for academics to take a series of decisions about what the extent and role of the online dimension of their teaching programs will be. What these decisions turn on should be a realisation that the introduction of online services to students is integral to meeting the mission and policy commitments of the University. That is, to student-centred and flexible learning, to inclusivity and diversity within the curriculum, to information literacy and engagement with communications technologies, and to internationalisation of and increased access to University courses. (Nunan, forthcoming)
The online environment presents Universities with a range of choices relating to technical specifications, resource commitments, staff expertise, quality control and efficiency, to name a few. The competitive environment in which Universities find themselves means that these decisions could be critical to an Institution’s survival. Choices need to be made about the competitive advantage to be gained in a global environment (Marginson, 1998). These choices need to be taken in a rapid and comprehensive manner if they are to be effective. Universities ignore the threats and opportunities that the burgeoning online learning environment provides, at their peril.
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Ian Reid, © 1999. The author assigns to Southern Cross University and other educational and non-profit institutions a non-exclusive licence to use this document for personal use and in courses of instruction provided that the article is used in full and this copyright statement is reproduced. The author also grants a non-exclusive licence to Southern Cross University to publish this document in full on the World Wide Web and on CD-ROM and in printed form with the conference papers and for the document to be published on mirrors on the World Wide Web.