African Council for Distance Education Keynote

African Congress for Distance Education July, 2008 Lagos , Nigeria Three Routes to Inclusive Education Text Terry Anderson, Ph.D. Canada Research Chair in Distance Education [email_address]

What is Inclusive Education? Right and a Benefit: inherent right to education on basis of equality of opportunity. All students can learn and benefit from education. Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inclusive_classroom

What is Inclusive Education? Adaptative: No student is excluded from, or discriminated within education on grounds of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national, ethnic or social origin, disability, birth, poverty or other status. Schools adapt to the needs of the students, rather than students adapting to the needs of the school. Individual differences between students are a source of richness and diversity, and not a problem.

What is Inclusive Education? Student Centered: The student’s views are listened to and taken seriously. The diversity of needs and pace of development of students are addressed through a wide and flexible range of responses.

The old models of education have failed to meet these basic needs

Who are the Students? By the year 2020, 40% of the global workforce will be knowledge workers, with a need for tertiary qualifications. to achieve sustainable economic development, the Age Participation Rates (APR's) in Higher Education (HE) must be in the region of 40 to 50%, as they are in many developed countries.” Angela Kanwar, Commonwealth of Learning 2007

“ In numerous countries in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa these participation rates languish below 10 percent”. Daniel, Kanwar & Uvalic-Trumbic 2006

Right to Education 2008 - Special Issue five peer reviewed Journals Article 26 of the UN declaration states everyone has the right to education, and that …technical and professional education shall be made generally available . Irrodl Special Issue www.distanceandaccesstoeducation.org/

New Educational Models The old model of providing expensive residential education for small elite numbers of the population has not worked in developed countries and is even less likely to work in developing countries. We need to re-examine older community models of education We need to insure that current models of open and distance education are operating most effectively and We need new models, new ideas, new technologies and new visions to allow learners to actively participate in the creation of their own education and learning opportunities.

1. Community Based Education Systems John Dewey (1915) pointed out engagement with the geographic spaces as ‘place-based education’ that we inhabit is critical for effective and engaged learning. "Experience [outside the school] has its geographical aspect, its artistic and its literary, its scientific and its historical sides. All studies arise from aspects of the one earth and the one life lived upon it" (p. 91).

It is the meeting of the needs of all learners in a given community, in formal and non-formal settings, without sacrificing their uniqueness, that constitutes inclusive education.” (Tanzanian, Joseph Kisanji, 1998 P. 66)

What is community education? process designed to enrich the lives of individuals and groups by engaging with people living within a geographical area, or sharing a common interest, to develop voluntarily a range of learning, action and reflection opportunities, determined by their personal, social, economic and political needs. (CeVe Scotland 1990)

Kisanji (1998) “indigenous customary education” takes learning away from individual content acquisition to social opportunity to validate, test, reinforce and challenge each other. In the process social capital is gained by individuals and groups allowing them to define and create their own futures, rather than being controlled and constrained by the often oppressive constraints of powerful elites and minorities. Saw this in the activities of the ACDE virtual conference proceeding this conference

“ The name they chose, Schools Uniting Neighborhoods, or SUN schools, reflects the belief that schools, working with their communities can do more than just teach math and reading, they transform neighborhoods.” Portland Oregon

Key Components of Community Education Shared accountability High expectations Build on community strengths Embrace diversity Strong partnerships Avoid Cookie Cutter solutions www.communityschools.org

Nigeria 923,000 sq Kms Population 148,000,000

KNet First Nations E-Supported Communities

Delivery Model – Moodle Open Source LMS Real Time Web Conferencing A teacher at every community Students must complete a minimum of 40 hours of community involvement activities. Challenges: Bandwidth – installation of wireless in all communities Funding – competes with residential school model Teacher innovation -We teach the way we were taught

Slate Falls Ka Band Satellite Dish Install

“ One project in particular demonstrated how ICTs could benefit the entire community. Shortly after Eabametoong was connected, the school started a community-based GPS map making project that documented the traditional lands of the First Nation.” http://research.knet.ca/?q=node/218

First Nations Education in Canada Despite being connected to the Internet since 1999, First Nations schools and communities are in trouble! A 2007 study of First Nations Schools across Canada stressed the need to: encourage students to be aware of and feel responsible for the lands their ancestors have occupied and better prepare and encourage the students for employment opportunities that exist within Indigenous territories and beyond. (O’Connor, 2007)

Local Context Localized Issues, Opportunities, Support, Elders Challenges Internationally Defined Standards of Accomplishments, PISA Rather than attempting to shape stakeholders to the needs of some internationally defined conception of progress .....explore ways in which schooling might take account of the aspirations of stakeholders in order that it might be meaningful to their lives and to their own development needs (Carney, 2003) x

2. The Distance Education Solution Distance education is about access - without access, there is no inclusive education - everyone is excluded! “ fully centralized, single-mode, national distance education provider, gaining greater economies of scale by offering courses to a mass market, thereby justifying a greater investment in more expensive course materials” (Simonson, et al, 2003, p. 49).

Athabasca University, Alberta, Canada * Athabasca University Fastest growing university in Canada 34,000 students 700 courses Graduate and Undergraduate programs Largest Master and Doctorate of Distance Education programs Only USA Accredited University in Canada Athabasca University

Costing/funding of Distance Education “ In 2005, Athabasca University received approximately $18 million, or about 34% of its total revenue, from provincial government operating grants. The University of Lethbridge received about 54% of its total revenue from government grants during the same period. (Annand 2005) Lethbridge 3% annual growth Athabasca 10-20% Yet both institutions have the same tuition costs

The Distance Education contribution to Inclusiveness “ Indonesia’s Universitas Terbuka, even though it had a very low graduation rate, had a total cost per graduate that was one-third of the cost in conventional universities, while the cost per graduate to the state was less than 30% of the cost elsewhere.” Daniel, 2003

Enhancing and Creating New DE Models Western Governors University “It was the first US university to build its entire academic system around a competency-based academic model that relies upon students demonstrating skills and knowledge through rigorous assessments instead of class time and grades.” WGU receives no state support yet is able to grow dramatically with one of the lowest tuitions among online universities (approximately $5,800 per year for most undergraduate and graduate programs). ( June 4, 2008)

In Malawi, use of correspondence education with tutorial support through study centers was shown to operate at from one quarter to one fifth the recurrent cost per student of that in a regular secondary school (Curran and Murphy, 1992). Africa pioneering world cost innovation in Interactive Radio: There is consistent and significant evidence that IRI can increase learning across subject matter, age, gender, and rural or urban location. Students show progressively greater learning with time. There is evidence that the benefits of IRI can be sustained over the long term and can be adapted for other countries. (World Bank, 2000) “ the developed world can learn from uses of radio in developing countries, and that the medium deserves greater attention as a means of giving educational opportunity to rural, isolated peoples worldwide”. (Berman, 2008 in IRRODL )

Community Schools + Distance Education The system's strength is that despite having to work with less able students and being starved of resources, students do learn. p. 21 Notes: Meet daily in buildings equipped for education, Study good quality printed materials,* Listen to instructional radio Benefit from the guidance of trained people Receive general supervision from a prestigious distance education institution Benefit from significant community involvement. Curran &.Murphy 1992

Distance Education Issues Self paced versus cohorts “ A likely consequence of the increased emphasis on digitized media will be to increase learner demand for autonomy, particularly self-pacing” Annand, 2007 Need to develop “optional but compelling cooperative activities within self paced programming” Anderson, Annand and Wark, 2004) Mediated versus print Putting books onto screens is not an effective instructional design Innovation and change in times of rapid growth

From Industrial to Information Production Models Industrial Models: Distance education - higher fixed costs (largely course production expenditures) Campus based - lower fixed costs, but higher variable costs (teacher salary, classrooms etc) Information Models Distance Education: OERs collaborative development, learners as producers, supplying global niche markets, learners supporting themselves. Campus based: “blended learning”, increased IT costs, increased transportation costs.

3. Opportunities for Inclusion in a Net centric World

Wayne Gretzky - The Great One! "Some people skate to the puck. I skate to where the puck is going to be.“ 61 NHL records

Distance Education: Instructivist Learner Centered Text Broadcast Structured Educ Resources Self Directed Traditional Education: Conversationalist Teacher Centered Lectures Elite Teacher developed Resources Group Based Communities Life Long LEARNING NETWORKS Trades Professions ProdUsers Churches Industry

Vision of Tomorrow’s Distance Education From Mass Education to Mass Customization Infinite amount of quality content Extensive customization by both learner and teacher Creating individual and community paths through content Adding context to create new content Creating lifelong records of learning accomplishments - e-portfolio Low cost

“ see a cultural bent in OER. Africa in particular believes in sharing, we see ourselves as our brothers' keepers and are thus prepared to share, co-own and joint-produce.” Professor Babatunde Ipaye National Open University of Nigeria, ACDE pre-conference group ,2008

A Tale of 3 books 32 Open Access 90,000 downloads 4 years after pub. - 6,000/month 350 hardcopies sold @ $50.00 Creative Commons License Free at www.aupress.ca Commercial publisher 934 copies sold at $52.00 Buy at Amazon!! E-Learning for the 21 st Century Commercial Pub. 1200 sold @ $135.00 2,000 copies in Arabic Translation @ $8.

Africa Average 5.3% - World Average 21.1% Increase of 1,030% since 2001 Nigeria increase 0f 4,900% since 2,001 EASSy

Open Educational Resources: Vision + Affordance “ At the heart of the open educational resources movement is the simple and powerful idea: the world’s knowledge is a public good in general the World Wide Web in particular provides an extraordinary opportunity for everyone to share, use and reuse that knowledge.” Hewlett Foundation Smith, & Casserly. The promise of open educational resources. Change 38(5): 8–17, 2006

“ Seventy-five percent of all phones in the least-developed African nations are cellphones -- and usage in many places is increasing by 30 or 40 percent per year.” New York Times Jan 13 2008

Ushahidi.com “ Ushahidi.com is a tool for people who witness acts of violence in Kenya in these post-election times

Being an Intelligent Community, is not a matter of technology, rather it is a matter of creating a culture of use for that technology.” Idris, N. 2006

Intelligent Community Indicators Intelligent Community Forum (2007) uses five Intelligent Community Indicators as a conceptual framework for understanding the factors that determine how competitive a community will be in the Digital Age: Broadband Infrastructure Knowledge Workforce Innovation Digital Democracy Marketing http:// www.intelligentcommunity.org/displaycommon.cfm?an =1&subarticlenbr=4

A New Type of Economic Production “ produce use-value through the free cooperation of producers who have access to distributed capital a 'third mode of production' different from for-profit or public production by state-owned enterprises. Its product is not exchange value for a market, but use-value for a community of users. Michael Bauwens, 2005 www.ctheory.net/articles.aspx?id=499

“ The use of a learning resource, through adaptation and repurposing, becomes the production of another resource. Though there is a steady stream of new resources input into the network by volunteers, this represents, not the result of an OER sustainability project, but the beginning of it.” Stephen Downes (2006)

Prod-Users - From production to produsage - Axel Bruns 2008 Users become active participants in the production of artifacts: Examples: Open source movement Wikipedia Citizen journalism (blogs) Immersive worlds Distributed creativity - music, video, Flickr

Produsage Principles produsage.org Community-Based – the community as a whole can contribute more than a closed team of producers. Fluid Heterarcy - produsers participate as is appropriate to their personal skills, interests, and knowledge, and may form loose sub-groups to focus on specific issues, topics, or problems Unfinished Artifacts – projects are continually under development, and therefore always unfinished; their development follows evolutionary, iterative, palimpsestic paths. Common Property, Individual Rewards – contributors permit (non-commercial) community use, adaptation, and further development of their intellectual property, and are rewarded by the status capital they gain through this process

OERs as Disruptive Technologies Christensen (1997,2008) studies innovation and the impact of disruptions A disruptive technology “transforms a market whose services are complicated and expensive into one where simplicity, convenience, accessibility and affordability characterize that industry” p. 11 Unless steered by very wise leaders organizations will “shape every innovation into a sustaining innovation - one that fits processes, values, and the economic model of the organization - because organizations cannot naturally disrupt themselves” p. 74

OER production as an end in itself “peer production offers a new platform for human connection, bringing together otherwise unconnected individuals and replacing common background or geographic proximity with a sense of well developed purpose ... as the condensation point for human connection.” Yochai Benkler, 2006 p. 375 Can creating OER’s be that common purpose and serve as a technique and catalyst for empowering Distance Educators globally? In production, we change from a consumer mind set.

Will Educators and Learners Produse? How to integrate OER with formal, credentialed learning? Is recognition by peers enough reward for educators? Will students use OERs with/without accreditation? How do build effective produser communities (see Keats (2003) Collaborative development of open content: A process model to unlock the potential for African http:// www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_2/keats/

OER Communities of Practice www.oerafrica.org / peoples-uni.org www.africaodl.org /

Don't Underestimate the good will of produser communities Communities need to share to grow Exploite the power of networks to make that sharing possible: Access to research (314 Open Source journals published in Africa) Collaborative learning partnerships Advice and counsel Free loaders welcomed! The more use the better the product!

You and Your Institution as Catalysts for Change Use Net tools for institutional functions develops critical staff competencies allow staff to experience new forms of learning and produser communities Creates new platforms for collaboration and production empower staff with new sense of ownership and creative capacity Create new source of credibility and leadership Develop a culture of innovation Is fun!!

INCLUSIVE EDUCATION Conclusion Community Distance Education Networks

“ "He who asks a question is a fool for five minutes; he who does not ask a question remains a fool forever." - Chinese Proverb Terry Anderson [email_address] Blog: terrya.edubogs.org Your comments and questions most welcomed!

African Council for Distance Education Keynote

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African Council for Distance Education Keynote