Presentation to support a workshop at EFQUEL Innovation Forum, Granada, 6 September 2012, on emerging archetypes of new-paradigm providers

1. Alternative models of (formal)
education delivery
Paul Bacsich
Matic Media Ltd
Sero Consulting Ltd
Canterbury Visiting Fellow 2012

2. A Policy Brief from IITE

3. What is IITE?
• UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies
in Education
• Based in Moscow, Russia
• “contribute to the design and implementation
of the programmes of the Organization in
regard to application of information and
communication technologies in education”
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4. Requirement
• “Alternative models of education delivery for
the formal education system”
– Primary, secondary, tertiary (HE and non-HE)
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5. Models have to be…
• Compelling IT-enabled archetypes
• Generalisable
• Scalable
• Sustainable
• Deployable in a variety of socio-economic
situations in the more developed countries or
regions of countries
• Deliverable within current operational technology
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6. Sectoral coverage (ISCED)
5A - university
5B – poly
4 - college
3 – upper secondary
2 – lower secondary
1 – primary
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7. Helicopter summary
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8. Virtual schools
• Plentiful in North America
• Significant in Australasia, Asia and Latin America; less so
in Africa and island regions
• Surprisingly many in Europe despite restrictions
• Effective and seemingly cost-effective
• “Universities and researchers should consider why virtual
schools in EU have been set up easily and cheaply in
techno-pedagogic terms, yet EU universities mostly
struggle to deliver substantial distance learning and insist
on doing large numbers of pilots and studies before
making choices” (Bacsich, EDEN 2012)
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9. Virtual universities
• Prevalent in all continents
• Many US universities also have virtual provision –
likewise in Australia – yet this ubiquity is not replicated in
Europe (Bacsich et al, Re.ViCa passim)
• And single-mode VUs remain minority and isolated
players in most host countries and balanced dual-mode
players seem unstable in the longer term, whether for
internal, regulatory (“quality”, “effektivity” *sic+,
“throughput”) or technological reasons
• And cost savings seem elusive
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10. Theoretical issues
Quality, cost and time

11. Quality
• Dangerous in an EFQUEL forum to make broad
statements, but…
– Hard to judge
– Students, governments and universities seduced by false
proxies (e.g. price, research ranking)
– Overtones of politics and the established social consensus –
the new and strange are feared – for-profits, universities of
applied sciences, out-of-country etc
– Partly codifiable (even in the non-e world) provided one is
not obsessive about it
– Increasingly has multinational overtones
– Good teaching can be recognised (to some extent)
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12. Cost
• Surprisingly little advance in costing
methodologies in the educational system –
even in the non-e world
• In the e-world it may even be going backward
since the work of the late 1990s
• Surprisingly little recognition that the costs of
education are (a) too high and (b) can be
reduced
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13. Time
• “strangely under-examined in the literature of
e-learning” (Goodyear)
• Obsession with study hours not only teaching
hours
• Very slow moves towards competency models
despite over 10 years of WGU
• The Bane of Bologna (banes,actually) and
their friends living in schools
• Very little theoretical research re learning
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14. Relevant models
Now it’s your turn

15. The archetypes must be:
• Compelling
• Generalisable
• Scalable
• Sustainable
• Deployable
• Deliverable
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16. And not politically infeasible
• So consider for each potential archetype its
• Advantages
• Disadvantages
• Implications for how current policies would
have to be changed
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17. Samples
To discuss or shoot down!

18. 1. Virtual supplementary school
• Focus on uniform high-quality provision of university-
entrance subjects across the nation
– E.g. Maths, Physics, Computer Science, Latin
• State-funded
• Each pupil has host physical school
• Existence proof: US, Scotland, virtual schools for expats
• Advantages?
• Disadvantages?
• Policy shift: need per-course not per- pupil school
funding - feasible
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19. 2. Handheld Primary
• Each pupil gets a handheld with age-related capabilities
• Teaching is focussed round it but still with teachers
• Low-cost fee-paying school providing excellent quality
provision in middle-income economies
• Socialises children into appropriate use of IT
• Existence proof: many low-cost private schools but
with no IT
• Advantages?
• Disadvantages?
• Policy shift: real acceptance that private education has
a role; move to public/private school system
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20. 3. OER C (=college)
• Massive use of OER (if there) and automated and peer assessment
to deliver “trade” qualifications at low cost but with international or
vendor certification
• Finesses the HE quality issue but still targets those skills demanded
by employers
• Regime to ensure acceptance by regular correlation of approach
with test results
• Existence proof: A number of start-ups targeting the “lucrative”(?)
HE market but making it hard for themselves by challenging or
ignoring the quality police (both strategies unwise)
• Advantages?
• Disadvantages?
• Policy shift: really just needs governments to admit that non-HE
post-secondary exists as a viable sector
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21. 4. Multeversity (Bacsich, 2011)
• Broad-spectrum yet full university range of work/features
• Multi-mode according to student demand: pure DL, hybrid e/f2f,
traditional f2f+e (if really justified); multi-site if need be
• Highly cost-aware yet transparent to clients
• Covers polytechnic (university of applied science, university
college) and post-secondary college areas synergistic (Cisco
Academy, fashion design)
• Bridges into and from upper secondary school, so as to minimise
drop-out and "lock on" to schools-level knowledge
• Generates “liberal arts” thinkers who are "(e-)business-ready"
• Links with international partners to lobby governments & set up
transnational quality regimes to finesse ranking & price snobbery
• Joins with other universities and employer groups to oversee
school-leaving exams within an increasingly international
perspective on qualifications after school (IBac, IGCSE) and after
university (HE Olympiads?)
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22. 4. Multeversity discussion
• Advantages?
• Disadvantages?
• Policy shift: governments need to
– get away from research as a proxy for
teaching quality
– get real about what the impending open access
regime means for nationally bound university-
industry links
– governments without a final-exam system for
schools will struggle to implement it
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23. References
• Time and e-learning -
http://www.scribd.com/doc/96397285/Time-
Bacsich-Final-Final-PDF)
• The VISCED Colloquium for Virtual Schools -
http://www.virtualschoolsandcolleges.info/visced
-colloquium-for-virtual-schools
• Growing the OER u -
http://toucansproject.wordpress.com/2012/04/1
6/growing-the-oeru-a-pre-conference-workshop-
at-cambridge-2012/
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24. Thank you for listening
Paul Bacsich