United States Distance Learning Association

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INTERVIEW Here Come the Marines! An Interview With the Dean of the Marine Corps College of Continuing Education Julie A. Prommasit and M. Denise Orndorff INTRODUCTION Since the establishment of the Marine Corps College of Continuing Education (CCE) in 1998, Professional Military Education (PME) in the Marine Corps has been undergoing an overhaul. The infamous “box of books,” as it has come to be known, is no more. Independent Guided Study (IGS) is the formal name for the rudimentary form of distance education that had been the accepted educational construct for 80% of the aspiring upward mobile Marine officers for many years. It’s a basic self-paced correspondence course, with all the materials and a multiple-choice final exam delivered neatly in a box to your doorstep. Marines would work on the course as time permitted and motivation prompted; the only constraint being a 5-year completion window. But, senior officers routinely recognized that, when compared to the other 20% of their peer group (those who Julie A. Prommasit, Freshman Academy English Teacher, West Florence High School, 221 N. Beltline Dr., Florence, SC 29501. Telephone: (843) 664-8472. E-mail: jprommasit@fsd1.org M. Denise Orndorff, Human Performance Engineering, Lockheed Martin Simulation, Training & Support, 12506 Lake Underhill Road, MP 810, Orlando, FL 32825-5002. Telephone: (407) 306-3128. E-mail: denise.orndorff@lmco.com Volume 4, Issue 4 Distance Learning 87
attended a residential version of the course) these Marines simply did not stack up. Comprehending what they were supposed to be learning and then effectively employing that learning on the job was consistently observed as less than expected. Even when the box of books was augmented with seminars, there remained a distinct difference between the two groups. But, the supplementary seminar presentations were voluntary and the format was more or less a lecture at a distance that may or may not have been relevant to the individual student; they were still, by their very nature, not equal to the residential program. Enter the U. S. Marine Corps’ Son of Seminar. It hit the ground running in October 2007. Based on the Socratic method, this new delivery format will be centered on highly seasoned instructors positing well-directed questions and limiting their lecture time in deference to the facilitation of student-to-student discussion. The program will consist of eight courses to be delivered over a reduced 2- year construct. Active student participation is a requirement in the seminars that will be offered both on-site and online. Rubrics will be used to assess student contributions, writing, speaking and performance in exercises. One of the people heading up this transformation in Marine Corps distance education is James I. Van Zummeren, dean of academics, Marine Corps College of Continuing Education, Training and Education Command (TECOM). In a recent interview, he gave his views on the direction of distance e in the Marine Corps. PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH DISTANCE EDUCATION IN THE MARINE CORPS PROMMASIT: What experience did you have with distance education as a Marine officer VAN ZUMMEREN: I did two nonresident courses. I did the Amphibious Warfare School for captains. I did the traditional box of books, nonresident; we call it Independent Guided Studies, IGS. I did that as a lieutenant, and then as a captain went to the resident school. I also did the Naval War College, what they call the off-campus program. It’s a nonresident, seminar-based 3-year construct. I did that, but then I also went to the Marine Corps Command Staff resident experience. So I did two nonres and two resident of similar courses. ORNDORFF: Can you expound a little bit on what your view of the difference is between education and training, and how that relates to what you’re doing with the Marine Corps distance education program VAN ZUMMEREN: You know it’s always fun, because when we get into conferences or meetings, at a training and education command or anywhere really in the world of academics, there’s always a conversation on whether that’s really training or that’s really education. Some of us have a perspective that there isn’t all education and/or all training. It’s really a combination. In some there is going to be a little bit more emphasis on critical thinking and creative thinking, and some is going to be a little bit more emphasis on a process of doing something within an approved set of procedures. So the training and education to me is somewhat blurred. For example, our Command Staff College Distance Program is more about education because it deals more about thinking about things, learning about strategic thought, and coming up with solutions that not only are critical based on doctrine and constructs, but also creative. That’s the whole point—bring in your own perspective to solve or provide a solution to some kind of emerging issue. The training aspect is more like our Expeditionary Warfare School, School of Captains, in which we are looking for them to 88 Distance Learning Volume 4, Issue 4
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DISTANCE LEARNING FEATURED ARTICLES
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DISTANCE LEARNING MAGAZINE SPONSORE
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SPOTLIGHT ARTICLE Barriers and the
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THE EMERGENCE OF A NEW ECONOMY A de
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Table 4. Rank Order of the 10 Facto
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ORGANIZATIONAL PERSPECTIVE STRATEGI
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Table 5. Solutions to Barriers to D
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Table 5. Continued Social Interacti
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management. In L. Lau (Ed.) Distanc
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compensation, incentives and releas
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Pedagogy --Course Development --Cou
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Quality in Distance Education A Tri
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ability to understand and apply tec
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CONSTITUENCIES IN DISTANCE EDUCATIO
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control and responsibility for the
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Kirtley, K. E. (2002). A study of s
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Distance Education in the Public Hi
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distance education courses and Inte
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need, in a distance education class
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Using IT-Based Distance Education f
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Page 46 and 47: Online High School Courses Preventi
Page 48 and 49: students. Fourth, a program that in
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Page 52 and 53: tion. Both classes had a 100% compl
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Page 58 and 59: tional delivery. The knowledge that
Page 60 and 61: APPENDIX B: WIMBA LIVE CLASSROOM IN
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Page 78 and 79: Learning Objects What Are They, and
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Page 84 and 85: INTERVIEW The Perils and Promise of
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Page 98 and 99: Ends and Means Developing a Digital
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Page 102 and 103: New Media, New Learning School for
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United States Distance Learning Association

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