Distance Education in Transition - Master of Distance Education ...

The Transformation of the University Into an Institution of Independent Learning
� discussions in colloquia, seminars, classes and practical courses with the aim of
active participation in the scientific process,
� free academic discourse,
� preparation for and participation in oral examinations,
� informal talks with other students and with other members of the university.
Two possibilities for combining the learning activities of these three basic forms of
academic learning spring to mind here, an additive and an integrative method. In the
additive version the university enables students to develop those learning activities that
are possible on the basis of their private circumstances and employment obligations.
The priority here is to reach those persons as well as those who have been prevented
from studying because of the traditional organisation of university education (egalitarian
function). But what is of special interest is the integrative version, because here students
can put together their own personal ‘menu’ of learning activities from these three areas
(pedagogical function) depending on their own interests, preferences and practical
requirements. When doing this students construct particularly effective combinations in
which, among other things, the deficiencies of one form of studying can be compensated
by the strengths of other forms. The interplay of learning activities from distance
teaching, studying in a digital learning environment and traditional face-to-face teaching,
which is planned from a pedagogical viewpoint, could generate such optimum study
conditions that cannot be found in any one of the participating forms of study by itself.
We would then refer to a mixed-mode university.
On the whole, the university of the future will have to be the result of a fundamental
process of transformation in which it changes into a university which mainly enables
self-studying in all its forms oriented towards the research process, supports this and in
the end makes it into the foundation of its curricula and teaching. A strict orientation
towards research must in fact be presupposed for all three forms of learning. ‘Learner
empowerment’ (Baron & Hanisch, 1997, p. 1) is the decisive overriding and comprehensive
educational category.
The educational structure that results from the combination and integration of the three
basic forms of academic learning constitutes a fundamental change in university study.
We should not recoil from this, in particular as two of the planned basic forms have
already proved their value.
Focus Points: Self-Learning, Online Learning and ‘Social Intercourse’
If we attempt to imagine a university that is able to do justice to the new demands
referred to above, and in which studying takes place in the framework of the three basic
forms of academic learning outlined here, we can be quite certain that we would not
imagine a traditional university. In the information and communications society it is
possible to take part anywhere in teaching programmes, even when travelling. And
professors and lecturers can teach, advise, discuss and examine from any location. Even
more: ‘The global network of students will follow on the global network of scientists’
(Casper, 1996, p. 21). This means that the localisation of university teaching is practically
obsolete. ‘Distance is dead!’ announced Nicholas Negroponte, Director of the Media Lab
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