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| November 28, 1994 Dale Harris, Executive Director, Center for Telecommunications Andy DiPaolo, Director, Stanford Instructional Television Network Joe Goodman, Chairman, Department of Electrical Engineering Stanford University Proposal Submitted to and Funded by the Sloan FoundationABSTRACTWHAT'S NEW? - This project will be accomplished with off-the-shelf technology augmented by pre-commercial prototypes available to Stanford. There are at least two aspects of the proposed project which will be novel contributions. Current virtual classroom experiments are based on use of standard telephone lines or ISDN. These formats limit quality in terms of video and convenience. The proposed project will introduce the use of high-speed communication links (prototypes of the future information superhighway) which will remove communications as the bottleneck to quality. Secondly, current experiments are typically restricted to a single computer platform (typically a PC) and to a single quality of network access (either standard telephone lines or ISDN). This places significant restrictions on who can participate, where they can participate from, and the quality of the experience. We propose to provide a much more universally available and flexible service. In our demonstration, students will be able to use PCs, Macintoshes, or UNIX workstations. They may connect by standard telephone lines, the internet, or by high-speed "information super-highway" links. Thus, anyone with a properly configured computer can participate and they can do so from work, home, a hotel, or even an airplane. The only restraint will be a necessary tradeoff between the type of connection available from the chosen location and the quality of transmission as limited by bandwidth. In short, our demonstration will extend the quality of distance education as limited by technology and will provide the most flexible and ubiquitous access to distance education yet demonstrated. We expect to extend knowledge of and experience with both the technologies involved and the dynamics of teaching/learning in asynchronous distance education. Our final contribution, and far from the least important one, will be the study of the economics involved. We will methodically study the cost/benefits to both the student and the education provider of asynchronous distance education. It is expected that asynchronous education similar to that demonstrated in this project, will become technologically possible on a large scale in some locations within two years, and universally available within the United States within 10 to 15 years. In California, for example, Pacific Bell plans complete deployment of broadband technology everywhere in California by 2010, and half the state by 2000. More aggressively, they plan complete deployment in Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Diego by the end of 1996. In Silicon Valley, the Smart Valley project has been chartered to foster early deployment and applications of the emerging information infrastructure. This organization, which is supported by Silicon Valley corporations, schools, civic organizations, and municipalities views the demonstration proposed here to be important to its goals (Appendix A). In its complete manifestation, the virtual classroom will liberate both the teacher and the learner from both geographical and temporal constraints. Instruction will become a process which can occur at any time and at any place, at the independently determined convenience of the teacher and the learner. INTRODUCTIONTHE NEED - The virtual classroom could not have become a possibility at a more opportune time. Three educational trends are currently on a collision course. Firstly, education has become and will continue to become increasingly important for occupational and personal success. Second, increasing demographic and occupational diversity are rendering many long-held assumptions about the education process obsolete. This in turn is creating increasing pressure for alternatives. And lastly, education has become increasingly expensive, with cost increases leading inflation by a significant margin. There is now increasing pressure to re-engineer the educational process to be significantly more cost effective.THE TECHNOLOGY - There are three classes of technology which we will be using in our project to make asynchronous education possible. The first, and possibly most important of these is the increasing power of the desktop computer. The desktop computers used in this project will have sufficient power to process multimedia documents and television quality video, and to support ALN (Asynchronous Learning Network) applications. A second important class of technology is telecommunications. Bandwidth constraints, which have limited the speed at which information can be communicated, are soon to be overcome. The emerging digital infrastructure, prototypes of which will be used in this project, will have the capability of transmitting multiple streams of television quality (or better) video in real-time, and to allow the transmission of hours of classroom material (including the recorded video and audio) in a few seconds or minutes. The final technology of importance is applications software. Software to manage, administrate, and facilitate the virtual classroom is emerging. Of particular importance in this project will be available software supporting computer aided collaborative work in the domain of asynchronous education. IN SUMMARY - Education in America must accomplish more with less. With analogy to many American businesses which have restructured themselves to become more competitive, this will be both an exciting and painful process. And, automation through the successful application of the powerful new technologies used in this project will undoubtedly be one of the key success factors.
SIX PROBLEM AREAS IN EDUCATIONThe value, indeed, the necessity of introducing new technology into educational pedagogies might best be viewed in light of a document written by the Policy Task Force on Educational Technology which was appointed by the California Post-secondary Commission five years ago. A number of problem areas in education were identified as having potential technological solutions in the official report. It is worthwhile to review the six identified problem areas not only because they provide impetus for the proposed distance education project but because they also suggest specific elements of the project design in which synchronous/traditional classes will be compared to asynchronous/technology-enhanced classes.Student Drop Out - Some students who are unsuccessful in synchronous/traditional classes do well in other classes that utilize the interactive realm of the computer. It is commonly acknowledged that students have different learning styles. That is, some learn best when knowledge is presented verbally, others when knowledge is conveyed in written form and some best absorb information presented graphically. "What is agreed upon in the [educational] literature, despite some ambiguity with regard to particular practices and programs, is that teachers need to have a wide variety of teaching strategies and practices at hand to be able to respond to the varied needs of their students." The cost of dropouts to all of society is well illustrated by statistics on participation of dropouts in the labor force compared to the same for high school graduates: Only about 37 percent of 1991-92 dropouts have been actively employed. However, of the 1992 high school graduates who were not in college, 63 percent have actively participated in the labor force. Technology is capable of imparting knowledge in a multitude of formats. Therefore, it is thought that asynchronous learning will further enhance "tailoring" education to various student learning styles as each individual will have the added benefit of working at his or her own pace and when it is most convenient to study a body of knowledge, lesson or problem set. In addition, the computing technology used in asynchronous learning can easily track the progress of each individual student. This information can be used by the instructor to advise and guide the student appropriately. And finally, aspects of the technology such as electronic bulletin boards can be used to provide low cost help to the student. Lower cost help should translate into more help readily available to students who need it. Population Growth and Overcrowding - The national population will grow by 13% between now and the year 2010. This translates to a 17% growth in K-12 enrollment and even greater growth rates for post-secondary education, accompanied by rising educational costs (e.g. the expenditure per student in average daily attendance in public elementary and secondary schools rose from approximately $3,250 per pupil in 1970-71 to approximately $5,900 per pupil in 1990-91 [in 92-93 dollars]). In a few states, including California, post-secondary enrollment is expected to increase by 30% to 40% over the next fifteen years. Between 1980 and 1992, [higher education] enrollment increased about 20 percent, from 12.1 million to a record 14.6 million. Much of this growth was in part-time enrollment. These growth rates presuppose a period of physical expansion which signifies additional demand for technology in education, both from the standpoint of limiting the scope and expense of plant expansion and from the standpoint of installing the required technology infrastructure in new construction in order to render formal education more readily available to students when and where they can best absorb and utilize it. Adult and Non-Credit Education - It is estimated that by the year 2000, 75% of the work force will have need to participate in on-going and continuing education. This phenomena will arise for two primary reasons. First of all, due to increasingly specialized and rapidly changing job functions, individuals will increasingly be hired or promoted into jobs for which their knowledge profile is incomplete. For example, a study done by the Department of Education over ten years ago was already sounding the alarm: "The job market is changing so rapidly that [even] vocational curricula may never catch up." Second, rapidly changing technology and intense global competition will continuously modify the knowledge profile required for success on the job and, in some cases, will render some job functions entirely obsolete so that the need for employee training and retraining will increase. In the DOE report mentioned previously, it was noted that "As the knowledge base continues to expand, the number of traditional jobs will decline and the new jobs created will demand greater preparation and sophistication." In response to this need and in recognition of the fact that "the typical [higher education] student today is an adult who's trying to complete a degree, advance a career or change a career", there is a growing need to offer education in a form and manner that can serve the needs of all potential learners, for career preparation and/or job retraining. Another factor intensifying the need for continuing education is the increasing cultural and linguistic diversity of the work force which sometimes leads to non-native English speakers requiring second language support (as well as the same job retraining their peers require). In much the same manner as multicultural education for youth, continuing education in this instance must be presented so that each employee may learn at his most comfortable and efficient pace and in the form (oral, visual, and/or graphic) most accessible for each via technology and asynchronous courses. Low College-Going Rates for Certain Minorities - This fact and its causes have been widely studied and debated. Optimists believe that the emerging technology will have a positive influence by facilitating more viable educational experiences for all students as was described above. Learning methods, whatever their origin, may be positively addressed by technology framed to accommodate the widest possible range for rates of learning and learning styles. It must be admitted, however, that pessimists fear that the emerging technology may increase the education gap between various groups rather than reduce it, particularly if multicultural concerns are not addressed in the initial stages of technology introduction. Shortage of Teachers - The documented shortage of teachers in rural and inner-city areas has resulted in a dearth of college preparatory courses in many schools. Distance/asynchronous education has the potential to solve this problem by delivering all types of courses at virtually any level of education to all types of students in the form and at the pace each finds most feasible. Increased Financial Pressure - For many years, funding for education has increased at rates well in excess of inflation. This trend has ended for the foreseeable future. In 1990, the U.S. expended 5.8 percent of its gross national product on education while Canada spent 7.4 percent, Hungary 6.1 percent, Norway and Sweden nearly 8 percent, with Mexico and Thailand expending less than 5 percent. In the U.S., the percentage of state and local budgets devoted to education is likely to remain roughly constant with some modest increases to address the cost of burgeoning K-12 enrollments. At the post-secondary level, a large portion of the cost of additional enrollment will be borne through increased tuition and fees, as has already proven the case in the University of California system and in other public and private educational institutions across the nation. The educational delivery system appears due for restructuring in the same manner and for the same reasons that have recently transformed businesses around the world: the intense pressure to increase productivity and efficiency. Continuing Education as a Prototype Above we have argued the need for introduction of the information technologies at all education levels, including K-12 , post-secondary and graduate. The ideal site of introduction, however, is in continuing education. That is, students who are full-time employed who are seeking either degreed or non-degreed training to enhance their job performance and career objectives. There are a number of reasons why this is the ideal environment for the demonstration and introduction of new technologies. First of all, such education is paid for by the student's employer who has great financial incentive to experiment with alternative methods which might be more cost-effective. Second, the student, who is holding down a job and possibly also involved in raising a family, has great incentive to experiment with alternatives which might be more efficient or flexible in terms of time demands. Thirdly, many corporations have training departments which can assist the student in learning to use the new technology and which can work with the education provider with administration and with assessing the results. And finely, it is likely most of the required technologies which must be available to the student will be deployed at the worksite or otherwise made available to corporate employees for other business reasons; thus, the incremental cost of distance learning technology will be minimal. The experiences of the continuing education student should be transferable to students at all levels. And, as the cost of the required technology continues to drop, the techniques of asynchronous education developed first for the adult, fully-employed student will be applied in all learning environments universally.
THE PROPOSED PROJECTThe specific goal of the project proposed here is to introduce, on an experimental basis, previously stored Stanford classes "on-demand" using a variety of delivery channels. Over the course of this demonstration, approximately 14 Stanford classes will be stored on servers in a variety of formats. Appendix B shows a menu of candidate courses. Based on previous enrollments of remote students in these classes, we expect approximately 120 students to participate in this study over the lifetime of the project. The criteria for course selection will be: a) high industry interest in the course, b) courses that lend themselves to interactivity both synchronously and asynchronously, and c) taught by instructors who are enthusiastic about the project. The stored material will consist of audio, video, text, and graphics. The student will be able to access this material either by file transfer and/or real-time playback, via modem connection over standard telephone lines, via the internet, or via one of the experimental, high-speed networks to which Stanford is connected. We will gain knowledge both from the task of engineering this application and from studying its use.The proposed approach is designed to act as a model delivery system of engineering education to companies, both large and small, and to individuals at sites beyond the workplace such as homes and when students travel. The internet, modem, and high-speed networking aspects of the project will make Stanford programming available to those engineers not having access to Stanford through SITN's traditional delivery methods. The intent is to showcase these asynchronous experiments and create models which can be replicated by other educational organizations. The proposed model will also help address the educational needs of engineers who are traditionally underserved, especially in small companies or those who may be unemployed and in need of upgrading.
SITNSITN (Stanford Instructional Television Network) is Stanford's School of Engineering's television network and continuing education operation designed to deliver advanced engineering courses and degree programs to the worksite. Currently, SITN courses are not delivered to the desktop, and interaction between the student and instructor is limited primarily to standard telephone calls. Using a combination of microwave, videotape, satellite and two-way compressed digital video, SITN offers over 250 graduate level engineering courses annually leading to degrees and academic certificates. Over 3000 industry students have earned a Stanford graduate degree through SITN. In 1993 SITN was recognized as the "Most Outstanding Distance Education Network in the U.S." by the United States Distance Learning Association.The environment in which SITN operates has changed over the last few years requiring the School of Engineering to carefully examine its distance education interactions with industry. SITN's studies indicated its member companies, faced with competitive pressures causing them to address productivity issues and the educational needs of a maturing workforce, are asking Stanford to consider alternative programs and delivery systems. This increased integration of engineering education into corporate goals is reflected in requests for Stanford to be more responsive to industry education needs by offering high quality education using cost-effective and efficient approaches. The changing nature of today's industry students also causes a need for SITN to consider alternative approaches to engineering education. For example, technical professionals have increased work demands reducing time for education and training. Practicing engineers are less able and disposed to residential study or even taking courses during work hours. In addition, productive employees are increasingly more mobile due to additional work requirements and are thus unlikely to be available during hours when universities traditionally offer graduate level programs. SITN's existing asynchronous approach to education is called tutored videotape instruction (TVI). This method, pioneered at Stanford, is used with about 20 industry sites beyond the broadcast range of SITN's microwave system or those not participating through two-way video. Small groups of engineers (3-10) work with a company provided tutor or facilitator to view and discuss videotapes about one week after the actual class is taught on campus. Although SITN's evaluations consistently show the effectiveness of this approach, SITN has observed that companies are less inclined to support tutors and are asking Stanford and other universities using TVI to assume more responsibility in facilitating asynchronous interaction between the student and instructor. The proposed project extends SITN capability to include: a) delivery to the desktop, b) asynchronous on-demand access, and c) asynchronous interaction between the student and the instructor. SITN has a well established customer base of about 150 mostly high-tech companies currently paying Stanford to provide continuing education to their practicing engineers, scientists, and technical managers. Thus, the proposed experimental project will make use of existing courses and instructors, an existing pool of distance learners, and an existing administrative process. The constituency which SITN serves has repeatedly indicated their business need for a new teaching/learning paradigm in which the industry student has an option to learn independent of time and distance. They want increased control over the place of learning, speed of learning, time of learning, and even the scope and sequence of the material. In addition, they want to justify their "return on investment" in continuing education, which in turn implies increasingly strident concerns with cost. In short, the SITN constituency is similar to that of the primary, secondary, and university level educational systems in demonstrating a need for more flexible, customized, cost effective teaching and learning. In addition, the users of SITN are uniquely qualified to participate in the proposed experiments by way of their experience with and access to high technology. Thus, they may serve as legitimate leading-edge prototypes for a much larger base of potential students who may benefit from the proposed project in the future.
Access Methods and Quality of ServiceAccess to the courses stored on the SITN servers will be via high-speed experimental networks, via the internet, and via standard modems over telephone lines. These methods will result in three specific levels of service quality and three levels of ubiquity of access.
Use of High-Speed Experimental NetworksThrough the Center for Telecommunications, Stanford currently participates in two experimental high-speed network testbeds which may be used for the proposed project. One such network is Pacific Bell's BAGNet (Bay Area Gigabit Network). BAGNet supports only the OC3 (155 Mbps) interface and also requires ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) compatible network termination equipment since traffic is routed by Pacific Bell through an ATM cell switch.The second network is Sprint's B-MAN (Broadband Metropolitan Area Network) which provides access at DS1 (1.5 Mbps), DS3 and OC1 ( both 45 Mbps), and OC3 (155 Mbps). The Sprint B-MAN does not support switched circuits; therefore, transport is not limited to ATM cells or any other particular set of standard or non-standard protocols. Fourteen of SITN's largest customers are currently connected to the Sprint B-MAN and/or BAGNet. Appendix C lists these 14 companies and organizations whose employees could participate in this project via high-speed network connections. Direct terminal access to the SITN servers is possible over either BAGNet or the Sprint B-MAN. However, currently available technology limits direct terminal access to UNIX workstations since these are the only machines for which high-speed (DS3 and OC3) terminal adapters are available. Another limiting factor is that these experimental networks are engineered for speed, but not for scale. Currently, the maximum number of point-to-point circuits which can be supported at a single site is four. The maximum number of point-to multipoint circuits which can be supported from a site is 56. Thus in the proposed project, we will experiment with direct terminal access to the SITN servers, but in addition a second access mode will be engineered which will involve downloading files from the SITN server to satellite servers located at the corporate site. The distance learner would in this case access the satellite server over their corporate LAN. The platform requirements faced by the distance learner would then be dictated by their local facilities and procedures. The distance learner with direct terminal access to the SITN servers will be able to choose between two options. The first is real-time playback from the server in which the learner's terminal functions primarily as a communications interface, decompresser, and display unit. If the learner possesses sufficient local storage (approximately 675 MBytes or more), the choice could also be made to download an hour lecture directly to his or her workstation for later local playback. The advantage of using the high-speed experimental networks are two. First, they are capable of transmitting full-screen, full-motion, NTSC quality video in real-time. In fact, they can easily support high-definition formats as well. Secondly, an hour lecture (full motion, NTSC quality) can theoretically be downloaded in approximately 35 seconds. A full day of SITN courses (about 36 hours) could be downloaded in approximately 21 minutes. As a practical matter, however, current workstation technology cannot take full advantage of the network bandwidth and will slow effective transmission significantly (to about 2 minutes for a 1 hour lecture and to over an hour for a full day of SITN courses).
Use of The InternetNot all SITN corporate sites will have connections to the high-speed experimental networks. A much larger number, if not all, will have access to the internet. In the near term, we will have the ability to play-back a course from the server and compress it in real time for delivery over the internet. The quality of the video and audio will vary substantially dependent on network load and configuration. In general, quality degradation is experienced as lowered frame rate, lowered image resolution, reduced color depth, and/or reduced image size. The quality of audio and video over the internet is in most cases approximates that experienced with ISDN (Integrated Systems Digital Network). We have chosen to use the internet rather than ISDN for two reasons. First, there are experiments being done by others which focus on the use of ISDN in educations. Second, and more importantly, the number of individuals with internet access exceeds those with ISDN connections by a large margin (several orders of magnitude).In addition to direct playback over the internet, a second technique will involve downloading to a satellite server or to the users terminal over the internet. If the full motion, NTSC quality video is further compressed to the quality currently found on the typical video conferencing system, a one hour class can be downloaded over the internet in from 1 minute to over 95 minutes depending on network load and configuration. The storage required would be about 70 MBytes. The advantage of internet access is that most SITN users also have internet access, at least at their workplace. In addition, by storing multiple formats of each class on the SITN servers, distance learners may directly access the material with a Macintosh or PC as easily as with a UNIX workstation. The drawbacks to use of the internet include significant degradation of video/audio quality and the network loading required to download from the server. In fact, most corporate network managers discourage, and some prohibit transfer of files as large as 70 MBytes except at night. For those in this situation, there will also be a set of "severely compressed" files available (see the next section on modem access over the telephone lines).
Use of Standard Modems and Telephone LinesAlthough most SITN users will have high-speed network or internet access to the SITN servers, such access is not universal. In addition, even distance learners with high-speed or internet connections at work may occasionally wish to access a class when away from their workplace, such as from home or from a hotel when traveling. In all but a rare few such situations, access via modem over an ordinary telephone line is the only available option.Previous experiments by the Center for Telecommunications indicate that video, when transmitted via modems over telephone lines, is not of sufficient quality to justify its use in distance learning. However, if interest warrants, technology exists to accomplish real-time play-back in this manner. Another potential real-time playback technique which could be explored is audio only (in addition to text and graphics). This would be equivalent to an extended voice-mail message preceded by transfer of a small to moderate sized text and graphics file. Previous experiments have illustrated that audio is far more important than video in distance learning, and that when video quality deteriorates sufficiently, learners would prefer not to have it at all. We believe that access to the SITN server over telephone lines is best accomplished through file transfer. Platform specific versions will be made available for the Macintosh, PC, and workstation. Transfer of a 70 MByte file such as those proposed for internet access would require about 11 hours over the telephone lines. Thus, an additional order of magnitude compression is necessary. This will allow the downloading of a one hour lecture in a little over one hour. The required local storage would be 7 MBytes. A very good audio only version might be made available which could be downloaded in 30 minutes and require less than 4 MBytes of storage. In addition, these "severely compressed" files would also be accessible over the internet for learners whose local management discourages or prohibits transfers of the larger files.
Text and Graphics FilesEach lecture will be accompanied by a text and graphics file to be downloaded. These files will contain the material which is handed out in class (notes, reading lists, etc.) as well as any visual aids used such as viewgraphs. The size of these files can be highly variable depending primarily on the amount of material which was not created electronically and must therefore be represented as bit mapped ../images. Our experience shows that a one hour lecture will be accompanied by a few hundred kBytes up to 10 MBytes of text and graphics. There is also the question of the file format. If the files are to be printed only, postscript is a good choice. For terminal display, it will be necessary to store platform specific versions.
Computer Aided Collaborative Work in Distance EducationIn this project, the communication between the student and the instructor, and between the student and other students will also be done asynchronously. We plan to use a combination of currently available computer applications to provide students asynchronous interaction with their instructors and peers. Students will access these instructional applications via either high-speed links, the internet, or by dial-up modem. The first of these applications will be a hypertext implementation on the World Wide Web. This application will provide students with cross-references to all course materials and permit access to any information set as desired. Information sets will include course notes, reference materials, and exams. The Mosaic front-end, which currently runs on all computer platforms, will be used to organize student access to course materials. We already have some limited experience at Stanford in the use of Mosaic and the World Wide Web. We should be able to build on this experience in the proposed project.A second application will be an electronic bulletin board application which will support asynchronous discussions among students and faculty. A permanent record of all student-faculty interaction will be kept and analyzed. As an example of how this would work, consider the following. A student has a question or is confused about something. First he or she would consult the "answers" bulletin board to see if the same or similar question has been asked before. If not, the student poses the question on the "questions" bulletin board. The student may pose the question to the class, the instructor, or both. They will respond by posting their answers or comments on the "questions" bulletin board. If the question is posed to the instructor, he or she (or more likely a teaching assistant) will be responsible for generating an "official" answer to the question within the shortest possible time. This could result in an immediate answer ("on-line help") or if the "question load" is high, a slightly delayed answer. The instructor (or teaching assistant) would also be responsible for posting the question, official answer, and any useful comments from other students on the "answers" bulletin board for the benefit of other students who may have the same or similar questions. As with the use of Mosaic and the World Wide Web, we can build on some pre-existing experience at Stanford with electronic bulletin boards used in the manner described. The instructor (and/or teaching assistant) will maintain office hours for real-time, one-on-one discussions with students as required. These sessions may be by electronic document conferencing (on-line help), telephone conversations, or both. The final application will be a set of tools to support collaborative work of groups of students and faculty. The specific tools would depend on the course content but might include such things as project management, database management, quantitative analysis, and computer-aided design. Students will be able to access these applications using a PC, Macintosh, or UNIX workstation. As a part of this project, integrated communications packages such as Lotus Notes will be evaluated.. Lotus Notes is an applications program which supports document conferencing, information distribution, status reporting, project management, and electronic mail. The ability of such programs to function appropriately in a heterogeneous computer environment (PCs, Macintoshes, and UNIX workstations) must be evaluated. In addition, such integrated packages have never been tested over high-speed networks such as the prototypes used in this project. Finally, it is unclear whether an integrated package such as Lotus Notes performs as well as a collection of component applications such as those outlined above. Following the evaluation, an integrated communications program will be implemented if appropriate. Also to be evaluated is the use of a voice activated FAX-Back system for distribution of class materials. Using this fully automated system, a student can call in, and responding to voice prompts, arrange to have specific class materials faxed to his FAX machine or computer. The use of this system at Stanford is currently under evaluation. As a result of this evaluation, a FAX-Back system may be purchased in which case it would be available for use in this project. However, the purchase of such a system is not certain, nor is funding for the purchase of a FAX-Back system requested in this proposal.
Assessment of Asynchronous LearningIn each of the classes included in this project, there will be three groups of students. Those students who attend the class in the usual manner on campus (local/synchronous), those who "attend" the class using the usual SITN television broadcast (remote/synchronous), and those who "attend" the class using the on-demand systems and methods described in this proposal (remote/asynchronous). Each of these groups of students will be studied so that they may be effectively compared. They will be studied and compared along three metrics. These are objective quality, subjective quality, and cost/benefit. Members of both the College of Education and the Department of Engineering-Economic Systems will be involved in both data collection and analysis.
Objective QualityThis will be assessed by analyzing written test scores of all students and interviews (oral exams) which will be given to a subset of students.
Subjective QualityThis will be assessed by interviews, questionnaires, and observations. We are particularly interested in assessing the quality and quantity of interaction between the students and instructors. We will also assess a number of variables associated with both student and instructor satisfaction.
Cost/BenefitThis will be assessed from the standpoint of the service provider (the university), the student, and the paying customer (in this case, the student's employer). In each instance, there are two elements to be included. These are cost of equipment and productivity gains (or losses).By studying objective quality, subjective quality, and cost/benefit, we will be able to draw conclusions regarding technology developments required to enable user acceptance, the economic framework needed to justify the investment in technology-enhanced asynchronous education on a large scale, and the changes in teaching methods and course organization required to optimize the technology enabled asynchronous learning experience.
Phasing of the ProjectThe project duration will be approximately 21 months. The goal is to begin useful and interesting demonstrations early, but to phase the project so that expected technical and administrative problems are at all time manageable within the resources of the project.Phase 1 - This phase will last 3 months (January - April, 1995). During this phase, the technology will be assembled, connected, and tested. Students for the pilot demonstration will be identified, and the required administrative organization of the demonstration will be planned in detail. Phase 2 - This phase will compose a pilot demonstration (April - July, 1995). It will be modest in scale so that the technology and procedures can be field tested with the full expectation of significant problems. Although we fully expect the pilot to generate useful and interesting results, its primary purpose is to gain enough experience to properly design the larger scale demonstration. We hope to uncover the first-order technical and administrative problems so that these can be solved prior to the larger scale demonstration. Phase 3 - This phase will last 3 months (July - October, 1995). During this phase we will reengineer the project based on the experience from the pilot. Students for the full demonstration will be identified, and the required administrative organization will be planned. We will also write an interim report describing the results of the pilot. Phase 4 - This phase will compose the full-scale demonstration which will run during the full academic year (October, 1995 - July, 1996). During this phase emphasis will be on publicly demonstrating asynchronous education at Stanford, and on collecting and analyzing data. Phase 5 - This phase will last 3 months (July - October, 1996). In this phase we will complete analysis of the data and will write the final report.
What Will Be LearnedThe support of multiple access methods supporting multiple levels of service quality is aimed at providing maximum flexibility to the learner. The technical challenges of this project are primarily those of systems integration and optimization. Thus, the technical knowledge gained should aid equipment manufactures as well as those planning deployment of on-demand systems for full-scale operation. In addition, we will track usage of the different access methods and levels of service quality, and analyze this data for trends, correlations, and preferences. We will monitor and analyze student performance (test score, etc.) to determine any impact of service quality on performance. We will perform analysis to determine if the availability of on-demand distance learning increases the number of students taking the course and/or diversifies the student profile (background, current job responsibilities, etc.) of the class. Finally, we propose to do an economic analysis to see how the use of on-demand distance learning systems such as those used in this project might be expected to impact cost of course delivery, productivity of instruction, and the price of continuing education to the corporate customer.
The FutureThe most important impact of this demonstration project will be its influence on the development of a full, completely asynchronously delivered degree and/or certification curriculum at Stanford and other universities. Although not a part of the project described here, Stanford is currently studying the development of such a program for full deployment in the later part of the decade. Many other universities are doing similar studies. The project described here will serve as a feasibility demonstration and value test for the introduction of radically innovative asynchronous degree and/or certification programs powered by an increasing social need and enabled by emerging information and communications technologies.If the proposed demonstration is as successful as expected, it should lead directly to a more complete deployment of asynchronous education in the School of Engineering at Stanford and elsewhere.
Appendix A
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