A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Conclusion

Nevzar G. Stacey

At least four major concerns surfaced from the discussions on the use of technology in teaching and learning: rising costs of higher education, the importance of time and location for working students, the changing meaning of traditional credentials for employers, and computer-based knowledge and skill delivery systems.

The uses of technology are varied. How individuals use technology, how much they use it, and for what purposes are influenced by personal views of the value of technology. Given the ambivalence about what technology will do for society, and a competitive market reflecting the creativity of millions of course developers worldwide, the most appropriate action to take is to understand how computer-based education may help us improve our careers and the quality of our lives.

However, before discussing these concerns, the terms of discussion, such as distance learning, computer-based education, and learning on the Internet, need to be clearly defined. Participants in the workshop brought their own definitions, and each participant's work was clearly tied to those definitions. This raised the importance of reaching a common understanding of the intrinsic meaning of various terms in this field. For example, participants from the world of higher education were more comfortable referring to the many technologies as "distance education," implying that such learning had always been outside the main focus of the academic world, and thus was not much of a threat or concern to them. They perceived computer-based learning to be lacking in many dimensions necessary for imparting broad-based knowledge. It was also hard for them to see how this learning would ever replace traditional learning. If the participant was from a high-tech firm, the term used was "computer-based training." The employers were interested in teaching their employees new knowledge and skills as quickly and efficiently as possible. They were not interested in transportability of credentials. How employers would provide their employees with knowledge and skills to remain competitive in the world market was the important question. Most importantly, employers were clearly seeking a quick way to assess competencies in hiring new workers. Therefore, the problems were not simply definitional problems, but carried with them participants' experiences and values.

The workshop attempted to respond to the concerns raised by the National Institute on Postsecondary Education, Libraries, and Lifelong Learning. For example, what are the financial implications of computer-based education? Learners and policymakers, who are concerned about the rising cost of higher education, see computer-based education as an ideal means of cost containment. Tuition costs have been increasing steadily and college loans have become burdens to college and university graduates. Given the increasing demand for higher education, debts accrued by individuals who pursue graduate or professional education may increase significantly. If these trends continue, and the cost of computer-based education keeps going down, then students may be increasingly interested in a certain trade-off between a degree earned on campus and a degree earned through computer-based education, which may cost much less. There are already other significant changes in the American landscape of colleges and universities, such as increased part-time enrollment, that could create greater demand for computer- based education. What are the costs of maintaining an infrastructure for computer-based education, and how cost-effective is it? If computer based education can provide the latest information in the most economical way, how can traditional institutions compete with that? If there are fewer and fewer traditional classrooms in colleges and universities, will traditional institutions lose money? How will the teaching staff be affected?

Is it more cost-effective for employers to have their employees take courses at their workstations, without going to training sessions? A second concern is the question of time and accessibility. As noted above, increasing numbers of learners are attending colleges and universities and working simultaneously. Scarcity of time is an important issue for these learners. It would not be surprising to see that these students turn to computer-based education for acquiring knowledge and skills on their own time and at places more convenient to them. Even if they cannot afford to have private computers, alternative settings (e.g., libraries, work settings) might assume a new function by turning their facilities into classrooms for adults. Do such courses address the problem of accessibility for people who have to travel long distances to get to educational institutions, or for people who are too tired to leave their homes after a day of work? How important is accessibility to employers who are interested in providing education and training to their employees? If highly scientific education is mostly provided through high-performance workplaces, what will happen to individuals who are unemployed or who are working for less sophisticated firms?

Another concern deals with the ambivalence about the nature of computer- based education. For some, computer-based education is simply an additional tool to augment traditional learning. For others, computer-based education is the only way to keep up with the most recent developments in the field. Employers who have used high school diplomas and college degrees as signaling devices may be looking for alternatives. Traditional credentials and certificates appear to be losing their values for employers. Computer-based education may become more and more attractive and may become an alternative to them. As computer-based education becomes more and more universal, and more students from diverse backgrounds learn from it, it may provide a larger pool of candidates for employers to select from. If employers, who have used educational credentials for recruiting employees, now realize that more and more learners are relying on what is provided via the Internet, how will this affect their hiring processes?

And finally, there are concerns about the nature of the technology. If one acquires a degree through computer-based education, does one become a member of a graduating class of unknown size? Do you become a member of a "club?" Alumni of traditional educational institutions keep in touch, providing references and helping to make the "right" connections for jobs. But all these concerns may be irrelevant since many prestigious universities have already started to market their own computer-based courses; among them are Stanford University, the University of Pennsylvania, and a growing number of state universities. Is there a difference between a degree received from a university by sitting in the classroom and a degree received from the same university through taking courses that are offered through the Internet? Are the credentials the same? How do we assess competencies acquired through computer-based education and the role such credentials play in the education and the labor market? What are appropriate roles for universities, industry and boards of standards vis-à-vis assessing courses on computer-based education? More importantly, at the high end of the learning experience, will only the learners who have access to sophisticated software packages be able to design cutting-edge projects?

Other questions need answers as well. No doubt technological change will continue at an astonishing rate and technology will keep reinventing itself. The workshop confirmed the need for data and research. Other significant gaps in our knowledge included:

• The problems rising from the fact that most computer-based training is organized in a modular fashion, and the designers creating the training programs leave out broader important information that does not fit well into a particular module thus narrowing the scope;

• The inability of computer-based learning to teach "soft" interpersonal skills and high-level analytic skills;

• The comparison between the traditional education environment and the computer-based learning environment;

• The problems associated with the scarcity of certification, nontraditional institutions' lack of accreditation and status and the transferability of computer-based learning credentials; and

• The need for further empirical investigation of the types of skills that can be effectively taught through computer-based education.

This workshop, in a small way, opened the door to further discussions and shed some light on issues that appear to have multiple meanings. We hope that the reader has found this information helpful in both clarifying some issues and identifying what needs to be done to get a better understanding of the promise and problems of computer-based education.

[Summary of the Workshop]

[List of Participants]