Back to the Future Redux: Research Directions for Distance Learning
Research Questions
The purpose of this paper, then, is to articulate a possible approach to a research agenda that, while not as ambitious as that of Hilbert, is similar in tone in that our proposed research agenda asks the reader to lift back the veil and speculate what it is that we need to know in issues pertaining to distance learning. We offer six topics of possible research. Each of the suggested topics of research contains a series of questions that may serve as a starting point from which any potential researcher may want to depart. We end our paper with both a warning and a summoning to our colleagues to engage in research in our field so that one hundred years hence, our future colleagues may echo the words of Bernard of Chartes and say, "If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."
Topic 1: Who Are We?
It seems logical that a starting point for a research agenda in any field begins with an agreement on the terminology. Without starting from the same basic reference point, the likelihood of reaching common understanding diminishes. An often citied definition of distance education is provided by Willis (1994): Distance education (or distance learning) takes place when a teacher and student(s) are separated by physical distance (perhaps miles apart or in today’s Internet world, the separation may only be a room apart), and technology (i.e., audio, video, data, and print) is used to bridge the instructional gap. Is this definition appropriate? Is too broad? Or do subsets in our field warrant a more specific definition? Given that this definition is close to ten years old, does it still ring true, or do we need a new definition(s)?
Topic 2: How Do We Define Distance Education?
Perhaps the real question is simply, “Do we even need a definition for distance education?” A decade ago practitioners and researchers tended to emphasize how different distance education was from a mainstream university instructional mission. Faculty on campuses agreed and, for the most part, wanted little to do with this emerging area distance education. Today, campuses are advocating mainstreaming and providing seamless education, with or without technology, and distance education practitioners can’t seem to take “yes” for an answer. (Green, 1997). We in this field possibly suffer from a type of academic schizophrenia when we ruminate with our ‘traditional” colleagues in that we want to be accepted and yet judged as fundamentally different at the same time. We compete among ourselves on campus in trying to decide where distance education should be housed, while the main campus accelerates the integration of technology into all aspects of campus instruction. How will we know when distance education has “arrived”? In response to that question, this sentiment is often heard that when we do not call it distance education anymore, we can feel relieved. Education is education, regardless of how, where, when, and at what pace it is delivered.” Are we truly a profession or simply trying to justify our existence along the continuum of a highly “compartmentalized” higher education system? Or is distance education an area that should be discipline specific?
Topic 3: What is the Role of Distance Education in Academia?
Given its existing definition, distance education hardly sounds controversial, yet it is. Advances in global digital communications and increasingly sophisticated learning technologies are expanding distance education options and, as such, are contributing to the rise of emerging competitors to traditional institutions of higher education. According to data released in 2001 by the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) , 90 percent of public 2-year and 89 percent of public four-year institutions offered distance education courses, yet about half of the institutions that offered distance education courses offered 30 or fewer courses.
If we take this a step further, the question that emerges is how much competition is enough competition? Today, institutions that want to be considered “progressive” and “mainstream” feel the need to get into the distance education game. It should be remembered that in the United States we have fifty states developing and implementing broad-based educational policy. Add up the institutions, public and private, in each state and the landscape gets pretty saturated. Duplication runs rampant and the fact of the matter is higher education doesn’t know how to collaborate in the broader context around distance education, and so we seldom stop long enough to ask how can we build strong state and regional partnerships that increase access and reduce duplication with technology? More often that not, going it alone has been the motto for institutions engaged in distance learning, and this is certainly not a very sound approach in an era of limited economic resources to higher education.
Some of the controversy stems from distance education’s impact on the more than three thousand traditional higher education institutions in this country. To assume, however, that competition is the only issue raising concern when it comes to distance education is to be naïve. Yet, we should question how we can promote access and how to view competition by distance education as an opportunity and not a threat. Distance learning technologies are influencing higher education’s landscape in the 21st century in more ways than just creating additional institutions or expanding the markets of existing ones. But in what ways? Will we look back in 100 years and see with the clairvoyance that “predicting the past” provides that distance education was “wolf in sheep’s clothing” if you would, calling some fundamental assumptions about higher education into question for the first time since the evolution of modern universities in the 12th century.
If distance education has a basic responsibility and built-in asset off expanding instructional options, then accreditation is a looming issue. Should it be? Accreditation may not seem a pressing research issue for distance education, but formally accrediting an institution should raise some basic questions– should distance education programs be accredited according to the same process as traditional programs, and, perhaps even more fundamentally, what is the purpose of accreditation and does that purpose have some sort of a relationship with existing and future distance education programs? Is a blended accreditation approach that examines distance education within the broader institutional contexts needed? If Plato’s Academy was to be resurrected and made available to the world vis-à-vis distance education, would it be appropriate to ask questions, such as where did Aristotle or Socrates attain their terminal degrees? Or could a Bill Gates type personality claim, simply by virtue of his accomplishments and overwhelming resources, to be the new harbinger of education to the huddled masses?
Topic 4: Who Are Our Students and Why Do They Come?
Pressure for change in universities is not solely linked to emerging competitors to traditional institutions. A national survey on what the adult public wants from higher education (Dillman et al., 1995) concluded that:
- Higher demand for lifelong education and training means that colleges and universities have many more potential customers than in the past.
- Distance education methods offer one means of meeting the demand for lifelong learning.
- Colleges and universities must change how they do business to meet the needs of lifelong learners.
Most of the adult public is not going to attend traditional institutions with mostly residential students. Pressure for access to education is, in some respects, coming from the masses and some restructuring is needed. Policy-makers and administrators, both on campuses and in the political arena, often lack an understanding of what constitutes quality in distance education. How can distance education meet the needs of a diverse and dispersed population? And how do we inform and share knowledge of best practices with those who implement policies?
But once the doors are thrown open to all who want to attend college, who will these people be? A significant proportion of existing resources on a typical land grant college is dedicated to helping new students make the transition from high school, or the military, etc. to an essentially sequestered campus environment. Do distance education students require a transition to the virtual campus? To even answer such a question, we need to know what a typical distance education student looks like. Furthermore, to effectively understand the distance education learner and ways to design appropriate learning environments to facilitate their learning, we need more research and to obtain more insights from practice. While a “typical” distance education student has been described as a non-traditional, older student, that definition is rapidly evolving. Who will be the students who swell the numbers of the virtual hallways? How are we preparing for them? Does the traditional “Welcome Week” model fit?
Topic 5: What Is the Role of the Distance Learning Instructor?
Faculty at traditional institutions know how to teach in face-to-face settings and often value the human, real-time interaction as the most important variable in their teaching equation. Many of these faculty may use technology to enhance student learning, but they see it as a tool that augments classroom-based instruction. Why is real-time, face to face interaction viewed as fundamental to the act of teaching? What is it about seeing faces and watching body cues that make some teachers so sure they have to be in the same physical space as their students? Are we intrigued by the possibility of classroom spontaneity and interactions? If good teachers according to Palmer “join self and subject and students in the fabric life” (p. 11), do we think that such connectedness is restricted to real-time experiences? As Aristotle wrote, “Teaching is the highest form of understanding” and so it behooves us to question what are the various paths that exist to help us reach that highest form.
Topic 6: What is the Role of the Technology?
We also have to question whether we are discussing teaching strategies or communication skills and while it may be hard to directly separate these two activities, we should be able to discern some fundamental differences. Some virtual campuses are already replicating the “teacher of the year” award for distinguished faculty. When artificial intelligence, coupled with the holodeck, makes it possible for distance education students worldwide to view a debate between Pericles and Winston Churchill over the dilemmas of democracy, will it make sense to present such distinctions as exceptional merit to faculty for arranging such a debate? While this question may seem too far fetched at this time, note that Hollywood is already wrestling with the question of who will be the first CGI character to receive an Oscar, and is a character such as Gollum of Lord of the Rings fame worthy of the traditional token of highest achievement in the film industry?
In short, where do you draw the line on replicating many of the unchallenged assumptions of traditional institutions? While this again may not strike the reader as a burning topic for research, it does not diminish the need for a studied examination of much of the protocol that is currently taken for granted in traditional settings and is being ported “en masse” to a distance education environment.