UNE signs up online expert to expand distance agenda

Another reason for UNE to do the deal with Pearson was the workload faced by staff teaching in two modes. In what is possibly a first for an Australian university the University of New England (UNE) has signed an agreement with a private company to adapt courses for an online environment. UNE’s vice-chancellor, Professor Jim Barber said that deal with educational services provider Pearson was part of the universities strategic push to move even deeper into the online market. Up to 80 per cent of UNE’s current student population is off-campus. Barber said he believed the partnership was unique in Australia. Pearson’s role would be to actively market UNE’s online courses and invest in the development and support in the university’s expanded online learning program. Part of that support would be to rapidly adapt courses for the online environment and to help UNE reach students around the country who had have not previously had access to distance education services. Barber told Campus Review he thought UNE would never be viable as a fully on-campus operation. “I do not want it to be. Our strategy is to grow volume and quality on distance.” The partnership would lead to increased investment and rapid transition of more of UNE’s courses to a best-in-class level for students. It would also mean an increased ability to meet the demand from mature age students in the growing online domestic market, which is conservatively estimated at an annual growth rate of 10 per cent in the next 5 years. When the agreement was signed a few weeks ago Barber said: “This partnership is designed to allow UNE to respond creatively and aggressively in a highly competitive market that comes about at least in part as a result of the reforms that followed the Bradley Review. “This collaboration will cater for the growing non-traditional student market. It is innovative in finding ways to provide education through other than traditional bricks and mortar at a time when there is significant pressure on funding for university infrastructure.” He told Campus Review that he did not think any university had “got it right yet” in the online environment. They still operated on a linear one-size fits all approach. Carnegie Mellon had a sound pedagogical approach but it was underdeveloped and Kaplan was “all glamour and glitz”, he said. Another reason for UNE to do the deal with Pearson was because of the workload faced by staff teaching in two modes, he said. “It is now too much to expect academics to be subject experts and experts in education technology. It is too sophisticated. It is unfair, if your field is mathematics then there is another specialist who can take your stuff and put it on the online environment. “Teaching is going to be much more of a team effort than it was in the past because of the explosion of educational technology.” Pearson Australia’s chief executive officer, David Barnett, said his company was extremely proud and excited to be involved in the first partnership of its kind in Australian tertiary education. “Pearson will provide Pearson LearningStudio, its learning management system, for the delivery of UNE online programs. We will also provide academic enterprise reporting to monitor and analyse trends in student performance to improve student retention and satisfaction. In addition, we can also contribute digital course content designed specifically for online course delivery to complement the rich media experience for students. “Pearson will play a critical role in contributing to the growth of the university too. We will provide marketing and recruitment services designed to connect with students and keep them engaged during each stage of the student lifecycle from enrolment to graduation,” Barnett said. A selection of UNE courses to be offered through the partnership will be available to students in 2012. For a full interview with Professor Jim Barber see next week’s Campus Review.