Distance Learning University Research Articles

A decision support prototype tool for predicting student performance in an ODL environment

Machine Learning algorithms fed with data sets which include information such as attendance data, test scores and other student information can provide tutors with powerful tools for decision‐making. Until now, much of the research has been limited to the relation between single variables and student performance. Combining multiple variables as possible predictors of dropout has generally been overlooked. The aim of this work is to present a high level architecture and a case study for a prototype machine learning tool which can automatically recognize dropout‐prone students in university level distance learning classes. Tracking student progress is a time‐consuming job which can be handled automatically by such a tool. While the tutors will still have an essential role in monitoring and evaluating student progress, the tool can compile the data required for reasonable and efficient monitoring. What is more, the application of the tool is not restricted to predicting drop‐out prone students: it can be also used for the prediction of students’ marks, for the prediction of how many students will submit a written assignment, etc. It can also help tutors explore data and build models for prediction, forecasting and classification. Finally, the underlying architecture is independent of the data set and as such it can be used to develop other similar tools

Making distance learning courses accessible to students and instructors with disabilities: A case study

Worldwide, distance learning programs offer opportunities for education and career enhancement for those who have access to a computer and the Internet. However, some potential students and instructors who have access to these technologies cannot fully participate because of the inaccessible design of courses. These individuals include those with visual and hearing impairments. The University of Washington Distance Learning program and the campus unit that provides computer access for students and instructors with disabilities teamed up with DO-IT (Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology), a national center that promotes the use of accessible technology, to improve the accessibility of the University's distance learning courses. The authors of this article discuss their ongoing efforts as well as lessons learned so that others might benefit from their experiences. They also provide an overview of access challenges and solutions for people with disabilities, legislation, accommodation and universal design approaches to accessibility, and standards and guidelines.

Dimensions of Quality in Online Degree Programs

Using a qualitative case study design, this article explores the different meanings of quality that stakeholders brought to the process of planning online degree programs for a university system distance learning initiative and examines the impact of those different meanings on the resulting planning process and the resulting online degree programs.

Changes in Attitudes and Practice toward Dying People after Completion of a U.K.-Based Distance Learning Death and Dying Course

K260 is an Open University distance learning course in death and dying that incorporates historical, anthropological, sociological, and psychological approaches to death and dying. The course deals with principles and practices of palliative care, communication with dying people and their families, bereavement and grief, and moral, ethical, and legal issues involved in death and dying. Through a qualitative analysis of respondent written comments regarding how they would respond to a dying person, this study sought to determine how students felt their attitudes and practice had changed as a result of studying this course in terms of how they would respond to a dying person. Six themes emerged that individually and in combination highlight important ways in which respondents perceived their response toward a dying person had altered as a result of completing K260. These themes are awareness, understanding, and insight; individualized care and patient autonomy; self-awareness; ability to communicate emotionally; ability to communicate practically; and practical knowledge and resources developed.

Commodifying Collaborative Research

The commodification controversy is posited as a conflict between the users and creators of information products over modifying intellectual property law in the face of technological change. Commodification is said to help creators because it establishes a market for their work - a market that generates monetary incentives to innovate, measures consumer demand for new works, and facilitates information exchange. Since modern technologies of reproduction and dissemination make the public-goods character of information products more salient, it is argued that a new law is needed in order to maintain the level of exclusivity creators previously enjoyed. At the same time, however, commodification is thought to harm users because it makes it more difficult for them to acquire knowledge. Enhancing legal and technological means for privatization is therefore questioned as going beyond the mere maintenance of exclusivity, instead allowing rights holders to charge for works that formerly fell into the public domain, price discriminate, and impose all sorts of new restrictions on use. Lost in this debate is the effect of technology on the ways that information and cultural goods are actually produced, particularly on the extent to which individual creativity has been replaced by collaborative effort. In fact, the artist starving in a garret, the scientist madly experimenting in the garage, and the reclusive professor burning midnight oil are all rapidly becoming myths. In a world of increasing technical complexity and intensifying specialization, interdisciplinary investigation has become crucial to progress. With the globalization of the marketplace comes a need for multicultural input into product development. As private financing for technological start-ups increases (and public funding of basic research withers), economic factors prompt new alignments within the innovation industries. At the same time, digitization and the Internet facilitate interchange and present fresh artistic and scholarly opportunities. This new world is characterized by such phenomena as chain art, interactive websites, multi-authored scientific articles, as well as corporate joint ventures and university distance learning initiatives. As production methods have become increasingly complex, claims for creative recognition have also blossomed. By drawing attention to their contributions, graduate students, dramaturgs, statisticians, reviewers, editors, and the like have transformed social understanding of information production. Works that might once have been seen as individually created must now be viewed as the product of collaboration. This essay looks at the special challenges that commodification presents to participants in collaborative projects and examines the disjuncture between current U.S. intellectual property law and the issues of importance to collaborators. It ends with suggestions on the ways in which the law might be improved.

The University Library's Role in Planning a Successful Distance Learning Program

Summary This article examines the role a university library plays in planning the student support services that are so crucial to a successful distance learning program. The content of the paper is based on the experience the author acquired as a member of Texas Tech University's Distance Learning Council. The Council's efforts to plan, prioritize, and develop a distance learning program that will include strong support from the Library are emphasized. The work of the Distance Learning Council and its committees is discussed when it relates to the TTU Library's contribution to the program.

Planning for Distance Learning

The article examines the role that student support services plays in planning a distance learning program, especially the services offered by a university library. The content of the paper is based on the experience the author acquired as a member of Texas Tech University's Distance Learning Council. The Council's efforts to plan a program that will include strong support from the Library are discussed.

Adaptive Web site for distance learning

University distance learning is benefiting from the intensive use of Internet resources. The variety of information and services offered, together with different kinds of students, are impeding efficient use of this medium. In order to alleviate these problems and other associated ones, a Web site is being developed to facilitate personalised access to these resources. This site is based on three essential elements: new teaching materials to make the most of the medium, alternative teaching organisation adapted to the requirements of the different protagonists (students, lecturers and tutors) and an interactive system, WebDL, which facilitates personalised and adaptive access to information and communication requirements to each and every user at each and every moment. To date, the resources and material for three computer studies courses are being developed at Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia (UNED), whose delivery depends on the Artificial Intelligence Department.

Cultural Issues Related to Transnational Open and Distance Learning in Universities: A European Problem?

Open and Distance Learning (ODL) is much more than a didactic or technological issue. On the basis of contemporary approaches to culture, it is both an agent and a barometer of culture: culture influences the appearances, models and contents of ODL, but is influenced itself as well by the ODL phenomenon. Illustration of the point is made through an analysis of the historic roots of ODL in comparison with Europe's contemporary transnational and technology based ODL. The analysis results in an agenda for important cultural issues, such as the institutional character of ODL, its contribution to Europe's competitiveness, the shaping of a European citizenship, and the nature of European ODL in terms of its cultural barriers and cultural assets. The ambiguity of culture typically emerges when looking at language. European transnational, and especially technology based ODL, may be hindered by the multilingual societies of Europe, and remain so as long as language policies are imposed. It is advocated that language policies be replaced with language management, applied in a creative way (eg, by implementing appropriate technical solutions). The final question examined here, is whether these problems and solutions are particular to Europe, or whether there are good reasons for acknowledging the cultural origins, barriers and assets of a wider ODL model.

Effects of Gender on Perceptions of and Preferences for Telematic Learning Environments

This study investigated gender differences in perceptions of and preferences for telematic learning environments (TLEs). We distributed a questionnaire among 1,368 traditional and open and distance learning (ODL) university students. Although we found significant gender differences, none of the variables included in the research could be regarded as important for explaining differences in students’ perceptions and preferences with respect to TLEs. Potential reasons for these results are discussed.

Distance learning’s explosion on the internet

DISTANCE LEARNING (DL) is education’s gold rush. Many adults need convenience if they are to initiate or finish college degrees. This article, focusing on Distance Learning and the Internet, is divided into three sections. The first section consists of an introduction to the world of DL On-line and includes a four-step road map of success for DL students. The steps are: self-education about DL issues; defining personal, career, education, and financial needs; choosing a DL program; and finding and keeping DL resources and support. The second section deals with the nine different DL applications found on the Internet, the international computer network with over 50 million users. These include: DL Newsgroup discussions; World Wide Web DL information home pages; Financial Aid Web Sites; DL University Home Pages on the Web; Electronic Mailing Lists and Listservs, E-mail Resources; On-line Services; Tutoring On-line; and MOOs (Mind Oriented Object) known as “virtual classrooms.” The final section contains a bibliography of useful DL books, journals, and software catalogs for people who are interested in learning more about DL.

Postgraduate distance learning in British dual mode universities

Postgraduate distance learning in British dual mode universities

Health economics for economists. Tromsø University Distance Learning Course

Health economics for economists. Tromsø University Distance Learning Course

Book Review: La Nueva Pareja (The New Couple)

"Book Review: La Nueva Pareja (The New Couple)." Transactional Analysis Journal, 23(2), pp. 111–112 Additional informationNotes on contributorsJose Luis MartorellJose Luis Martorell, a graduate in psychology, is a privately practicing psychotherapist and lecturer on the Faculty of Psychology of the Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia (UNED/Spanish Distance-Learning University), Madrid, Spain.

Health economics for economists: Tromsø university distance learning course

Health EconomicsVolume 1, Issue 1 p. ii-ii Announcement Health economics for economists: Tromsø university distance learning course First published: April 1992 https://doi.org/10.1002/hec.4730010102AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume1, Issue1April 1992Pages ii-ii RelatedInformation

The Open University pack on coronary heart disease: reactions of Welsh general practitioners.

The introduction of the new Open University distance learning pack on coronary heart disease to a selected group of Welsh general practitioners has been evaluated. The most commonly perceived disadvantages were the amount of time required to study the pack, the cost of buying it and the work involved in implementing its study in a practice by the whole primary-care team. Despite a relatively high level of awareness among the group, only 17% declared a positive intention to introduce the pack and another 17% thought they 'probably' would. Contact with primary care facilitators and informal feedback from colleagues appeared to distinguish those general practitioners who were motivated to try innovative postgraduate learning methods in their practices from the rest of the sample. The implications of trying to disseminate novel kinds of teaching material to general practitioners are considered.

СЕРВІСИ ІНТЕРНЕТ ДЛЯ ДИСТАНЦІЙНОГО НАВЧАННЯ У ПРОЦЕСІ ПРОФЕСІЙНОЇ ПІДГОТОВКИ МАЙБУТНІХ УЧИТЕЛІВ

Актуальність матеріалу, викладеного у статті, обумовлена необхідністю впровадження нових інформаційно-комунікаційних технологій у практику дистанційного навчання у процесі підготовки майбутніх учителів. У статті описано сервіси Інтернету, які можна застосовувати у процесі дистанційного навчання студентів вищих навчальних закладів, а саме: електронна пошта, соціальні сервіси Інтернет, електронні бібліотеки, додатки Google для освітніх закладів, сервіси створення подкастів та скрінкастів, форуми, віртуальні класи, сервіси проведення вебінарів і засоби спілкування/взаємодії. Перспективним напрямом подальших наукових досліджень є інтеграція сервісів Інтернету із системою дистанційного навчання вищого навчального закладу.