Abstract
Open and distance education has been playing an important role in China’s development of higher education and lifelong learning. In 2012, the Chinese government approved six large-scale radio and television universities (RTVUs) to become open universities (OUs), including the Open University of China (OUC), Beijing Open University (BJOU), Shanghai Open University (SHOU), Guangdong Open University (GDOU), Jiangsu Open University (JSOU), and Yunnan Open University (YNOU). The purpose of this study is to provide a descriptive analysis of the transition from RVTUs to OUs, and the current state and challenges of open universities in China after five years’ reform. Five topics are explored in this paper, including: the new positioning of open universities in China’s vast and differentiated higher education system; award bearing and non-award bearing program offerings; implementation of the online teaching and learning modes; the use of Open Education Resources (OER) and online mini-courses; and the development and use of a credit bank system. A summary of these topics follows a discussion of four issues of open university reform, including key performance indicators (KPIs) for open universities, cohesion and resource sharing between the national and provincial open universities, quality assurance for award bearing programs, and planning to transform China’s existing 39 provincial RTVUs into OUs. It is expected that the results of this study would contribute to knowledge about institutional differentiation in the world’s largest higher education system, and on the merits of open and distance education in the human resource development in China. This paper may also provide insight for other countries that are engaged in institutional differentiation of higher education systems punctuated by the essential role of open universities in such planning and implementation.
Highlights
Open and distance education (ODE) has been an essential part of the lifelong education system in China
The major results of this study could be classified into five aspects: (1) new position of open universities in China’s system of higher education, (2) award bearing and non-award bearing program offering, (3) online teaching and learning mode, (4) Open Education Resources (OER) and mini-courses, and (5) a credit bank system
radio and television universities (RTVUs) were deemed as the beneficial complement of conventional universities (Chen et al, 2013)
Summary
Open and distance education (ODE) has been an essential part of the lifelong education system in China. An ever-changing information and communication technology infrastructure and continuous social and economic development have enabled widespread uptake of ODE in China. The open and distance education institutions in China started as correspondence colleges housed in conventional universities in the 1950s and developed into radio universities (RUs) and television universities (TVUs) in the 1960s. After the Cultural Revolution in the 1970s, a national strategy resulted in the opening of radio and television universities (RTVUs) across the country. The most recent reform was in 2012 when a handful of RTVUs, including the Central RTVU in Beijing, were transformed into Open Universities (OUs) within the context of promoting of learning society in the 21st century in China (Hao, 2017)
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