Reading

38. Read the following clippings featuring different aspects of distance learning – that is a facility to get instruction and training through your computer in the comfort of your living room. Study the subject and language for future discussions.

Distant Learning

Web-based courses are an extremely flexible facility, allowing anytime, anywhere learning. This is invaluable for busy professionals who do not have the luxury of a set time for face-to-face instruction. It also offers a supplement to classroom instruction for those learners who can attend regular classes. The computer is a patient tutor, providing the many hours of repetitive skills practice.

Another benefit of Internet-based learning resources is the potential for personalisation. Until now one-to-one learning has been largely restricted to expensive, private institutions. Through the Internet, however, teachers are able to create modularised programmes to suit individual learner's needs. The best learning sites support all levels of learners, and support self-paced learning in ways that are not always possible in classrooms.

From the perspective of the learner the greatest frustrations come with slow connection times in real-time chat and classroom sessions. In some countries, the cost of connecting is also considerable. Despite the disadvantages, however, the Web holds tremendous promise as a medium of instruction.

Going the Distance

After years of lost weekends and long-range commuting, distance-learning students can now undertake a whole programme in the comfort of their living rooms, thanks to CD ROMs, video and the Internet.

Business schools such as Harvard are at the forefront of the electronic revolution with highly sophisticated interactive applications for their full time programmes. E-mail, advanced video-conferencing and the Internet ensure a more effective contact between full-time students and tutors. Other schools are taking advantage of this same technology and philosophy to provide innovative teaching methods for distance learning.

The programme materials are available on the Internet and via interactive databases.

In addition to text, the advanced system allows students to receive and download images, video and sound. A key factor of this integrated learning environment is that distance learning students can obtain regular access to fellow participants, enabling them to exchange ideas and advice, and to pass on information. Unlike previous experience, distance learners can now be part of an international student class, just like their full-time student counterparts – but the classroom is now of global dimensions.

In the UK, business schools such as Open University and Durham Business School are also offering 'first class' conferencing, enabling MBA students, regardless of location in the world, access to networking and information conferences through this large-scale facility. Students can join from home or work, and the online resource is continuously updated.

E-learning the Way to an mba

Weekends and holidays spent on campus will soon be a thing of the past as technology gives students the freedom to study wherever they choose.

The MBA² is now the major business qualification around the world. Its full-time classroom programme involves up to two years out of the workplace, so such studies can require a daunting level of commitment from students.

For those unable to take a long career break and for employers unwilling to lose key staff, distance-learning programmes have proved popular. Originally distance learning meant years of late-night work and weekends and holidays spent on campus, but technology changes everything.

Among the most successful operators is the Open University. Based in the UK, Open University programme reaches students in more than 40 countries across Europe, the Americas and Asia. The University delivers more lectures and classes off-campus via satellite and two-way video at a fraction of a cost. Distance learning is coming on fast and this type of study could soon be the norm.

How can distance-learning programmes provide the element that many graduates rate as one of the most important features of the business school experience – the ideas and experience generated by contact with other students? People learn as much, if not more, from their peers during discussions as they do from lectures or textbook in a distance course. Whatever the benefits of being able to study remotely and to the timetable that suits the individual, mixing with ambitious people from around the world in the hothouse environment of the programme can also provide graduates with a valuable network of contacts for the future. Alumni from leading schools often admit that the address book they come away with is in itself worth the investment of time, effort and money.

A number of leading schools duplicate many aspects of their full-time programme in the distance learning option. They aim to maximise student/teacher contact through e-mail, fax and telephone. Workshops also form an important forum for direct feedback. Some schools combine online learning with classroom sessions to sustain the “peer group” element of the programmes, which feature a “virtual campus” that allows participants to work together on projects via the web. These online teams are brought together for classroom sessions held in different cities throughout the year.

Whatever the location of the physical part of the course, the creation of the virtual community of students may turn out to be the key to success. The communication facilities of the Internet may yet allow participants to learn what they need from their fellow students – even if they never meet in real life.