In today's Inside Higher Ed, two former governors, Jeb Bush and Jim Hunt, are strongly recommending that distance education become the means to systemic reform in higher education: “today—right now—college and universities must embrace new digital and online delivery tools to make educational content available to degree-seeking students wherever they are, whenever they need it.” Bush's and Hunt's "New Higher Education Model" is premised on their personal experiences with state politics and higher education--both served multiple terms and attempted large-scale reforms of education in Florida and North Carolina, respectively.
Their arguments are supported by substantial evidence. First, they offer a report from the U.S. Department of Education entitled “Review of Online Learning Studies,” which found that students participating in online courses were, on average, performing better than traditional students who received face-to-face instructions. Then, they cite a 2010 study by Shacher and Neumann, which found that 70 percent of distance learning students outperformed their traditional counterparts.
In addition, the authors offered the University of Texas system as an example of “high-quality instruction” delivered through well-designed technologies that are produced by public/private partnerships. Bush and Hunt believe that “public universities must adopt a new business model that will allow them to return to sound financial footing while addressing the variety of other challenges they now face. Online education may not remedy all that ails the system, but we are convinced that a good dose of it would go a long way.”
A related but cautionary article entitled “Online Higher Education’s Individualist Fallacy,” was written by historian Johann N. Neem, who believes the online case is persuasive to a point. But, “[a] close reading of [the] arguments…makes clear that [they] share what might be called the ‘individualist fallacy,’ both in their understanding of how students learn and how professors teach.” While recognizing the American tradition of autodidacts like Ben Franklin, Neem believes that the college campus serves as more than just a meeting place--or, as economist Richard Vedder claims, a mere social venue for “making friends, partying, drinking, and having sex.”
Neem argues that the “institutional culture” of the campus is much more: fundamentally, it involves “developing an attitude toward knowledge.” Furthermore, Neem considers the college environment to be an essentially social experience akin to religion: “Conversion is social, and so is learning.”
If you accept Neem’s premises, his arguments make sense. And, given the extreme forms of personal autonomy that often dominate our civic discourse, perhaps the college campus—for all of its anomalous and deviant behaviors—may be one of the last public spaces where citizens have the opportunity to experience the value and benefit of genuine learning, becoming citizen-scholars, so to speak. Citing Arum and Roska’s Academically Adrift, Neem concurs that “students learn more on campuses where learning is valued and expectations are high. If anything, we need to pay more attention to institutional culture because it matters so much.”
Neem is no Luddite, and he recognizes the benefits of technologies in delivering certain instructional components. But, he argues, “technology is a tool, not an end in itself.” And, while the internet and first-rate delivery systems should be used to the full, the “star professors” and “great courses” delivered over the next wave of technology are often found on a campus of scholars. “In short, there would be no star professors absent an academy of scholars committed to research… Even as we expand online, therefore, we must deepen our commitment to those institutions that cultivate a love of learning in their students, focus on the liberal arts, and produce the knowledge that online and offline teaching requires.”
Their arguments are supported by substantial evidence. First, they offer a report from the U.S. Department of Education entitled “Review of Online Learning Studies,” which found that students participating in online courses were, on average, performing better than traditional students who received face-to-face instructions. Then, they cite a 2010 study by Shacher and Neumann, which found that 70 percent of distance learning students outperformed their traditional counterparts.
In addition, the authors offered the University of Texas system as an example of “high-quality instruction” delivered through well-designed technologies that are produced by public/private partnerships. Bush and Hunt believe that “public universities must adopt a new business model that will allow them to return to sound financial footing while addressing the variety of other challenges they now face. Online education may not remedy all that ails the system, but we are convinced that a good dose of it would go a long way.”
A related but cautionary article entitled “Online Higher Education’s Individualist Fallacy,” was written by historian Johann N. Neem, who believes the online case is persuasive to a point. But, “[a] close reading of [the] arguments…makes clear that [they] share what might be called the ‘individualist fallacy,’ both in their understanding of how students learn and how professors teach.” While recognizing the American tradition of autodidacts like Ben Franklin, Neem believes that the college campus serves as more than just a meeting place--or, as economist Richard Vedder claims, a mere social venue for “making friends, partying, drinking, and having sex.”
Neem argues that the “institutional culture” of the campus is much more: fundamentally, it involves “developing an attitude toward knowledge.” Furthermore, Neem considers the college environment to be an essentially social experience akin to religion: “Conversion is social, and so is learning.”
If you accept Neem’s premises, his arguments make sense. And, given the extreme forms of personal autonomy that often dominate our civic discourse, perhaps the college campus—for all of its anomalous and deviant behaviors—may be one of the last public spaces where citizens have the opportunity to experience the value and benefit of genuine learning, becoming citizen-scholars, so to speak. Citing Arum and Roska’s Academically Adrift, Neem concurs that “students learn more on campuses where learning is valued and expectations are high. If anything, we need to pay more attention to institutional culture because it matters so much.”
Neem is no Luddite, and he recognizes the benefits of technologies in delivering certain instructional components. But, he argues, “technology is a tool, not an end in itself.” And, while the internet and first-rate delivery systems should be used to the full, the “star professors” and “great courses” delivered over the next wave of technology are often found on a campus of scholars. “In short, there would be no star professors absent an academy of scholars committed to research… Even as we expand online, therefore, we must deepen our commitment to those institutions that cultivate a love of learning in their students, focus on the liberal arts, and produce the knowledge that online and offline teaching requires.”
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