Virtual Worlds: Learning and Teaching in a Digital Age

Distance Learning: Case Studies in Success and Failure

Review of Alick Kitchin’s (EBS) lunchtime seminar on 2nd November 2007

Alick’s session turned out to be absolutely riveting, and drew the audience into an in-depth discussion. Alick ‘warned’ us, that the talk was neither focussed on academic issues, nor on technological ones, but an overview of what he had observed in the distance learning sector. Little did we know at this stage on what an exciting ride we were going to be.

He pointed out that the government wanted to increase levels of education in the country , simultaneously reducing costs, while ensuing lifelong learning, and thus universities would no longer be the only places of development and learning.

In fact, he pointed out, distance learning has been going on for something like 150 years, when it was conducted via letters and materials sent by post. (a method, I may add, which is still being used).

Sadly, though, distance learning does in some areas have a feel of second best learning to it, and countries like Colombia, for example, see distance learning as something inferior, where “you have learned this by distance” is a proverbial put-down of someone’s half-baked knowledge.

However, there are predominantly two basic approaches to distance learning. First, the traditional model of tutor-student interaction, which many distance learning models try to replicate by building traditional structures. Secondly, there is the new model, with the premise of distance learning being a new environment, thus the experience is and should be changed. Raising the question, naturally, how this can be dealt with and requiring thinking out of the box, to invent a new model. Alick does believe, and so do I, personally, that the second model is the more effective and creative one.

Alick then went on to talk about several case studies and the first one was the Open University. While the OU is very much established by now and seems a traditional method of distance learning, it was revolutionary when the government set up the OU in the 1960s as a green field organisation in Milton Keynes, with no students and no campus. Targeting UK adult citizens, using the TV, this had been unheard of before. This was a very brave step into a new market, with a new institution and new ways of thinking. The OU model was a great success, which reinvented the market with a constrained vision (not international). The OU did not threaten existing institutions, while always having the student experience at the centre of their vision. This is still proving true, since the OU came up with top marks in the recent student satisfaction survey.

The next case study was that of failures, of some ventures that went out with big money for big VLEs, and often in collaboration with other universities. Using the same infrastructure, but delivering different courses, these cobbled together institutions did not succeed, nationally as well as internationally. Alick’s opinion was that those did not succeed because they had no clear vision, neither of the market nor whom to target. While they had “all singing and dancing” technology, they marketed the product (e.g. VLE) and not to the student.

Without a single academic vision, convincing pedagogy and no single market, these conglomerate approaches could not succeed.

Alick turned towards a successful model, which turned out to become a focussed and intensive discussion point. The University of Phoenix, the largest distance learning provider in the world, was set up in the 1970s as a for-profit institution in the USA. The focus was on the American blue collar market, and Phoenix has now over 300000 students. They reinvented the model from the profit perspective. Phoenix did not have campuses and did not faculty (paying by the hour only), but had a hard-sell market campaign (22% of turnaround goes back into marketing) and Alick called the institution “The MacDonald’s of Education”, quoting an employee saying “we bump along the bottom of the quality envelope.” Alick admitted that he was not a great fan of Phoenix, which was met with what seemed to be approval by all members of the audience, but the model with its for-profit vision has undoubtedly worked. However, Phoenix was known for poor ethical practices and was fined for this recently.

Phoenix had stripped down and rebuilt the academic model into a for-profit model. They are, thankfully most of all probably thought, not allowed to operate outside of the USA. Ministers of Education in Europe do not want this juggernaut to destroy their own education system. US institution are certainly frightened of Phoenix, who are taking many students away. However, Bush’s “claw back of cash” meant that the US government is now refusing funding for education outside of the US, which means that for the European education market, we will most probably be losing out on overseas students.

Some of the positive aspects that were mentioned were that Phoenix has no doubt an excellent student service with 24 hours on feedback and an hour on queries. Thus they have successfully listened to “what the customer wants”, offering service, speed and value for money, while seeing education as a product.

The next case study was that of Kaplan. Set up in 1938 in the USA, it was very much ailing and bought in 1980, turning into a worse deficit, then bought in 1995 by an entrepreneur, set out to expand operation by aggressive acquisition. And indeed, very worryingly, in the last few years they have bought and been busy in Europe and the UK. Kaplan buys institutions (recently in Dublin) and puts them into their portfolio, making them more efficient, etc. While it is not possible to buy a UK HE institution, Kaplan is nevertheless getting a foot into Higher Education, by setting up centres like Study Group in eight universities, pulling in international students with the name of the university, and then taking them away with their own courses.

Kaplan, too, is entirely a for-profit enterprise, thus turning education into a profitable commodity, which is, certainly for me, an incredibly worrying trend, which I hope will not continue in the UK.

The last case study was about Edinburgh Business School, which managed to be successful in a particular niche by engineering itself around a particular market. The niche is 30-40 year old career professionals in business, and EBS wants people with experience and business skills. They are given total flexibility, no progression, and no limited time, with as many pedagogies as they wish to choose from, while the courses are strictly adhering to quality guidelines and measures. EBS, too, is an example of out of the box thinking.

The discussion then continued about what these case studies are actually telling us about success and failure, and it seems that to be successful no matter on which strategic or operational level, we need to know who to target, what our market is, have a clear vision.

To be successful, we need to find a niche, provide high quality, find out who our target students are and proceed to ensure they are content.

All in all, every participant seemed to take something back out of the session, and after a lively discussion we agreed that even for a small course we can find our target market, as long as we are clear about what we want to achieve and how, and for whom.

Nicole Cargill-Kipar

Some of the Feedback:

“Very different perspective on distance learning. Very interesting.”

“Very clear case studies. Informative. Very useful discussion.”

“Good background info regarding Distance Learning provision. Identification of niche market and targeting resources.”

“The learning setting was good – not formal, not forced participation: relaxed and interesting.”

“Keep up the series. Very useful topic. A Second Life seminar would be good.”

“Very interesting at a strategic level. Good insight into market pressures in the sector. A pity the principal wasn’t here!”

“Very good for improving awareness of high-number Distance Learning”

“Couldn’t have done anything better, all OK – informed discussion”

“Good, thought provoking discussion”

Information about future lunchtime seminars can be found on the website.