Albert IP, Ric Canale

MEU, The University of Melbourne.

There are five challenges facing higher education today. Some of the challenges may have the same cause but need to be considered separately if we are to reach an understanding of how to deal with them. Our vice chancellor, Prof. Alan D. Gilbert stated that "mass higher education is here to stay" [href1]. This has serious implications for the public purse but the reality is that adequate public funding of mass higher education is not going to happen. On the other hand, neglect of mass higher education is dangerous to long-term national prosperity and competitiveness. Quoting from Dearing [href2], "the battle is about the capacity of the nation 'to sustain an economically viable economy and a cultured, inclusive society.'" Hence the first challenge is funding.

Mass higher education means we now have students coming from a broad spectrum of motivations, expectations, educational preparedness and intellectual abilities [href1]. Catering to students with diverse backgrounds requires mass customization of education content. This puts a heavy load on the already stressed higher education system. This is the second challenge: mass customization of content material.

The third challenge is the potential for competition from non-traditional higher education providers. "In this marketplace it is already possible for higher education to be offered remotely by anyone anywhere in the world, in competition with existing" institutions [href2]. Some large companies are already setting up their own staff training/development institutes. The combined resources of large Internet Service Providers (ISP) and higher education institutions with prestigious brand names makes it possible (though perhaps not practical) to provide higher degree qualifications to anybody anywhere at any time. The effective removal of distance as a factor limiting educational choices is potentially threatening to traditional campus-based Universities.

The useful life of knowledge acquired during an under-graduate course has reduced to a few years. Many researchers have recognized the need for life-long education as we enter into the information age. Life long education further accentuates the need for innovative mechanisms to re-create and modify curriculum according to the needs of a changing external environment. In other words, the faculty must constantly invest in developmental efforts of courseware to support the challenge their students will face as they enter into the workforce. Furthermore, the developmental effort must cater for diverse student backgrounds. Simply put, the development of courseware cannot be treated as a one-off capital investment. The cost implication for continuous revision of courseware is also significant.

The final challenge facing higher education today is the lack of incentive for academics to really put a sustained effort in teaching, and hence the development of courseware. In the survey conducted by Ramsden et el [href10], 51% of the respondents indicated that their department or school value "good teaching" whereas 77% indicated that their department or school value "research". Many academics think that the promotion in their institute is based on their research output instead of the commitment to good teaching. Any effort put into improving course material is in competition with the time needed for research and therefore must be weighed against their long term promotional prospects. Many academics may treat courseware development as "a project" and put in some effort in the light of getting papers published based on this effort. The need for continuous courseware maintenance and revision makes this model inappropriate. The issue of incentives will have significant impact on the quality of courseware produced.

Technology as a solution

"Faced with increased enrollment demands and declining state revenues, the western governors see distance education via technology as a potential silver bullet". [href3] A better understanding of the financial implication of Information technology is necessary. John Oberlin [href4] pointed out that

1. (Information Technology) is steadily increasing in value;
2. academic demand for information technology and computing power is virtually unlimited;
3. the unit price of information technology is declining rapidly;
4. the total cost of owning and maintaining these systems is steadily rising.

The management of information technology is an art in itself. It is sufficient for us to realize that unless properly managed and used, information technology may become part of the problem instead of becoming part of the solution. Even with a well managed IT infrastructure, the successful implementation of digital teaching technology would depend on several additional factors such as scalability, integration with the organization's structure, and so on. This paper discusses a component-based courseware development framework which addresses the scalability issues, encourages collaboration by recognising specialisation of roles, and supports continual improvement to courseware. [Href11]

A major promise of Information technology is its potential for scalability. However it is also important to look at scalability from an educational point of view. While computational scalability can be achieved relatively easy for improving the hardware and the network that deliver the educational content, educational scalability addresses issues such as whether the courseware can be delivered to a large number of students without significant impact on the quality, whether the courseware can be continually improved in order to meet the changing need of the students. The first concern here is related to the deployment. The second concern is development.

 Economy of scale (deployment consideration)

Economy of scale typically applies when we talk about deployment of an educational course. Can we expand access to larger number of students of the same course at marginally unit cast? In some design, it may not be always desirable pedagogically. For example, we know that human-intervened communication (between student and a real, human lecturer, at least before Artificial Intelligence can provide a reasonable solution) is a key issue of a quality education. There is an upper limit on the number of students a lecturer can realistically handle without significant degradation of quality. Hence any educational delivery based on some human-intervened communication may not scale adequately during deployment.

On the other hand, computer-mediated delivery of presentation material (verse attending a lecture with another 500 students) has definite advantages. When designed appropriately, it is possible to mass customise material basing on the same content. One technical pre-requisite for this is the separation of content from functionality of the delivery. The "virtual apparatus framework" described in this paper emphasis on an explicit separation of content from functionality and hence enables a partial solution to deliver alternate material to different students basing on their individual characteristics.

One of the main strength of our model is related to the economy of scope during the education course development process. By separating content from functionality, it is possible to re-use functional blocks (we call these "virtual apparatus") with minimum investment in skill development for the academic. The focus of the content author is directed to the education creativity. When there is a need to revise the courseware, an alternate content can be replaced easily. The high cost factor associated with the need of continual revision of courseware is contained.

For some good discussion for component architectures of education software, see Jeremy Roschelle et el. [Href5]

We have identified the web browser as the major environment in which web-based courseware will be delivered. We also identified a number of limitations on web delivery [href6]. The concept of "virtual apparatus" as a mean to provide interactivity on a web page was discussed and demonstrated at ASCILITE 1996 conference [href7]. We have, since, brought the implementation forward to a stage that we are now able to put components built using different technologies (such as Java Applet, Active X controls & Macromedia Shockwave movies) on the same page and have also enabled inter-component communication by using scripting on the web page.

For a tutorial on how to build virtual apparatus as Java Applet, see our tutorial at http://www2.meu.unimelb.edu.au/virtualapparatusframework/tutorial/va_Tutorial.html

For a tutorial on how to use our virtual apparatus on a web-page to provide interactivity, see our tutorial at http://www2.meu.unimelb.edu.au/virtualapparatusframework/tutorial/ve_Tutorial.html

The technical requirement for implementing "virtual apparatus" is minimal. However it lays open the foundation for building a large number of web-based inter-operable courseware components, easily used by courseware authors without high level of programming expertise. Our implementation includes the major desktop platform and the major browser using the major technologies available to the Internet. Namely, we tested our implementation in Windows and Mac OS using both Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer. We have "virtual apparatus" written in Java Applets, Active X controls^* and Macromedia Shockwave movies all integrated within the same page and communicating with each other. This will embrace most technical personnel available in higher education institutes whose the existing skill can be capitalized without retraining.

This model also facilitates adoption by academics by introducing a multiple-tier development paradigm. One end of this multiple-tier is the component developers who are people interested in technical details and create components with specific functions. The virtual apparatus can be content-free and provide interactivity for use. The other end is the content authors whose expertise are in instructional design and the content matter. The components provide functionality to build interactivity relevant to the content. This is an explicit recognition of content and functionality. While it is difficult to separate content from functionality for most components. The conceptual recognition of these two ideas helped us to recognize that today's courseware must be developed with two broad and distinct skill: education and computing. Inevitably, there may be some people between these two extremes acting as technologists providing a bridge between education and technology. However, this recognition of the need of two broad range of basically different skill in our framework can be a positive step towards an informed re-structuring of the higher education institutions organisation structure. We also anticipate that the explicit distinction between content and functions is a positive step towards reusing components for three reasons.

Firstly, the learning curve for an academic interested in creating interactive web page is reduced significant. Much of the effort can be leveraged by re-using components.

Secondly, this model addresses the "not invented here syndrome" by preserving the authoring/designing role of the academics with responsibility for delivering the course while recognizing the expertise of technical people providing the components. This should encourage larger scale collaboration between academics. As the content is separated from the functions, academics can substitute their own content material into an otherwise slightly inappropriate content for local use. When there are sufficient "virtual apparatus" to choose from, a market may be created and academics can buy components just like buying apparatus for use in their courses.

Thirdly, alternate content can be "plugged" into a web-page with well defined functions easily. This can support mass customization more effectively.

Several projects at MEU have indicated the adoption of this technical framework in their implementations. For example, the Learning Engine model will be adopting our framework as their communication model in later revision. [href12] The NALSAS project is our first real world implementation basing on the "virtual apparatus" framework.

Economy of scale and economy of scope can be appropriately exercised by using this framework. Success or failure of this approach remains to be seen. It will depend, among other things, on how the key technologies continue to develop. What is certain, is that our educational institutions cannot afford to fully integrate digital technologies and deliver the highest quality education using design and production methods that are based on crafting "tailor-made" courseware or based on standard templates for all. An approach that provides economies of scale and economies of scope along with ease of authoring or customizing is essential.

[Href 1] Alan D. Gilbert, "Re-inventing the Idea of a University, Reflections on the Dearing Agenda", online http://www.unimelb.edu.au/extrels/media/un/current/reinventingtheideaofaunive.htm downloaded 26^th august, 1997.

[Href 2] Dearing, "A vision for 20 years: the learning society", online http://www.leeds.ac.uk/ncihe/ downloaded 26^th August, 1997.

[Href 3] Carol A. Twigg, "Is Technology a Silver Bullet?", Educom Review, Vol 31, No. 2, online http://www.educom.edu/web/pubs/review/reviewArticles/31228.html downloaded 11^th June, 1997.

[Href 4] John L. Oberlin, "The Financial Mythology of Information Technology: The New Economics" Cause/Effect Spring 1996 pp21-29, online http://cause-www.colorado.edu/information-resources/ir-library/pdf/cem9616.pdf downloaded 4^th September, 1997.

[Href 5] Jeremy Roschelle, James Kaput, "Educational Software Architecture and Systemic Impact: The Promise of Component Software" online http://www.simcalc.umassd.edu/simcalc/library/S&SImpact.hqx downloaded 9^th September, 1997.

[Href 6] Ip and Canale, "Baseline Requirement for an on-line educational system" presented at Asia-Pacific World Wide Web Conference & the Second Hong Kong Web Symposium 96, online http://eddy.meu.unimelb.edu.au/papers/baselineRequirement.html

[Href 7] Ip and Canale, "A model for authoring virtual experiments in web-based courses" presented at ASCILITE 96 online http://eddy.meu.unimelb.edu.au/papers/VirtualExperiment.html

[Href 8] Kurt Rowley, "Understanding Software Interoperabiity in a Tehcnology-supported System of Education", Cause/Effect Fall 1995 pp20-26, online http://cause-www.colorado.edu/information-resources/ir-library/pdf/cem9535.pdf

[Href 9] Ip and Canale, "Supporting mainstream adoption of digital technology using the "virtual apparatus" Model for Courseware Development", 15^th August, 1997. Online http://www2.meu.unimelb.edu.au/virtualapparatusframework/papers/onlineEd.html

[Href 10] Paul Ramsden, Don Margetson, Elaine Martin and Sally Clark, "Recognising and Rewarding Good Teaching in Australian Higher Education", April 1995, online http://uniserve.edu.au/caut/commonproject/rrgt/titlepag.html

[Href 11] Albert Ip, Ric Canale, Paul Fritze, Gangmeng Ji, "Enabling re-usability of courseware components with Web-based "Virtual Apparatus" to be presented at ASCILITE 97, online http://www2.meu.unimelb.edu.au/virtualapparatusframework/papers/ascilite97.html

[href 12] Paul Fritze, Peter McTigue "Learning Engines - a framework for the creation of interactive learning components on the Web" to be presented at ASCILITE 97.