Meeting global educational needs: What kind of distance education can we afford? Greville Rumble...
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Meeting global educational needs: What kind of distance education can we afford? Greville Rumble September 2002
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Transcript of Meeting global educational needs: What kind of distance education can we afford? Greville Rumble...
Meeting global educational needs: What kind of distance education can we afford?
Greville RumbleSeptember 2002
Global problems Projected increase in World population Knowledge obsolescence Extension of the age of learning Deficiencies in basic educational (literacy, health) Teacher shortages Lack of funds (public and private) Poor quality provision is all too common
Educational challenges 135m primary-aged children not in school 1bn adults/adolescents illiterate or under-
literate 2bn individuals need retraining/ re-skilling of
some kind World population projected to grow from 6.1bn
(2001) to 9.5bn (2050) Nearly 1 in 2 people earn under US$2/day
Basic cost structure of early forms of DE
Con.Variable
DE Variable
DE Fixed
Con. Fixed
Students
Cost
Unit cost behaviour in early forms of DE
Con.
DE
Unit cost
Development costs per Student Learning Hour (Hülsmann)
Print £ 350 Internet £ 700 Audio £ 1,700 CD-ROM £ 13,000 Video £ 35,000 TV £121,000
HEALTH WARNING: Don’t put too much trust in these figures! They need interpretation. But order of magnitude differences OK
Arizona Learning Systems: developing a 3 unit course e-course (US$) Simple course outlines/assignments: $6000 Text provision: $12,000 Text and reference materials, $18,000 With images, $37,500 With audio and video, $20,000 With simulations, $250,000 With virtual reality, $1,000,000
Costs of e-delivery Provider’s document delivery costs come down
Library of Virginia costs for delivering 4 pp document: Surface mail customer US$19 Personal request at the Library US$12 Electronic delivery of existing electronic version US$0.90
Student’s costs go up Needs hardware/software platform Needs Internet access Pays cost of printing
Comparing course costsAverage cost per student (Inglis), (1999)
Students Print (Aus$) Online (Aus) 50 169.84 217.71 100 125.38 171.63 150 110.56 156.27 200 103.15 148.59
0
50
100
150
200
250
Cost/student AUS$
50 100 150 200
Students
Online
Korea National Open UniversityCosts per student (US$) Variable TV Radio Web # students 1000 1000 30 Production 80k 35k 13k US$ per student 80 35 434 Drop-out (%) 60% 60% 10% US$ finisher 200 88 482
Solving the problem:UK e-University business proposal
Course fees - related to development costs Students buy own textbooks etc. Students fund own equipment and web use Students pay for library access provided through
firms such as XanEdu and Questia Students pay firms such as Tutor.com for tuition and
support, on usage basis Students pay to register to take examinations
Solving the problemLowering the costs of e-education
Produce print and e-version simultaneously MS Word 7.0 HTML via MS Front Page 97
Use HTML - accessible through Macintosh, Windows and Linux operating systems
Use Bulletin Boards rather than e-mail/computer conferences reduces call on tutor’s time
Distribute materials on disk/CD-ROM (eliminate expensive student connect time)
Use freewareJulian Monge-Nájera, Universidad Estatal a Distancia, Costa Rica
