Tony Bates » accreditation

Another perspective on quality

Tony Bates — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 01:34:43 +0000

I have referred in another post to a paper by Maxim Jean-Louis, the President of Contact North, who was one of the participants in the recent HEQCO meeting to discuss possible areas of research that would inform the development of a new Ontario Online Institute. Within that paper, he made some interesting comments on quality in e-learning, which he has kindly agreed to share here.

The Construction of “Quality”

Our understanding of “quality” is changing. It is shifting from “meets an agreed standard” to “fitness for purpose”. Here are some of the reasons for this shift:

Traditional academic controls (e.g. process of ‘peer-review’) appear increasingly inadequate for today’s challenges and there is a need for more explicit assurances about quality. This is why some jurisdictions have moved to require inspection (Australia) and others to period independent review by a skilled and trained of peers (Maritimes Higher Education Commission).

There is also a growing use of output monitoring and measurements, and systems of accountability and auditing for quality assurance – using a variety of forms from a modification of the Baldridge Award criteria to outcome focused rubrics by program, discipline and at the level of the organization (e.g. the UK’s system for evaluating research intensity).

At the same time, discussions around “quality” have changed from a management device to a marketing device for institutions and jurisdictions alike (think of the development of BC’s quality mark in response to China blacklisting certain institutions in BC). Quality marks are appearing for post-secondary institutions in just the same way as they do for wines which carry the VQA designation.

We can imagine quality as a compilation of concepts, however, there are three that appear as quite different from each other:

Quality as ‘Excellence’- a definition that sets abstract goals for institutions and academic communities to always striving to be the best, mainly taken as having elitist undertones. In post-secondary education this could mean winning Nobel prizes, attraction of research $$ or the “best” faculty as measured by research output and teaching evaluations. The drawback here is that this tends to also exclude the work of the ‘further education’ sectors, is not applied equally between disciplines (citation counts do not exist for historians and many other subjects).

Quality as ‘Meeting a pre-determined standard’- a definition that requires only a given standard to be met, e.g. a minimum grade, basic competency, the ability to read, write, use a computer, etc. The drawback of this is that setting and measuring this ’standard’ is difficult at best and idealistic at worst.

Quality as ‘fitness for purpose’ - in this construction of quality, we have to decide the extent to which the service or product meets the goals set – does this course or program do what it says it was going to do? Such a construction of quality allows institutions/sectors to define goals themselves according to their mandate and concentrates on meeting the needs of their customers (whether this be upgrading learners, graduate researchers, industry, etc.).

These conceptions of quality and the shift towards fitness for purpose reflect a shift in the nature of public policy with respect to the management of education in the developed world – a shift from “the Third Way” to “the Fourth Way”.

Andy Hargreaves (formerly at OISE and now at Boston College) and Dennis Shirley have spent a considerable amount of time seeking to understand the meta-patterns of educational policy adopted by governments around the world. Their book, The Fourth Way – The Inspiring Future for Educational Change[1], outlines distinctive phases in which governments in the developed world have sought to tackle the question of how best to “manage” public education, most especially schools. Hargreaves and Shirley suggest that there have been three distinct phases in the past and that a new, fourth way, is emerging in the present. (While their analysis focuses on K-12 schools, it applies just as well to post-secondary education).

The idea behind these four different approaches to government thinking is that as conditions change, so must policy. They see these basic streams of policy prior to the present period: (a) innovation and inconsistency (1945-1975 circa); (b) complexity and contradiction (1975 – late 1980s) – this, they see as an interregnum rather than as a decisive and clear shift in policy; (c) the way of the markets and standardisation (to 1995, neo-liberalism); and then (d) performance through accountability and partnership (1995- present, modified form of New Public Management). More specifically, these phases (or “ways”) look like this:

The First Way

Teachers developed their own courses and programs, often collaborating with each other. They were engaged, professional and respected. Some performed well with that freedom, but others did not. Educational outcomes varied significantly within and between schools and there were incidents of teachers using their classroom as platforms for their own unique views.

The Second Way	The way of the markets and standardization – This is when, in the US, the Reagan administration released A Nation at Risk, and when the idea of school choice, a market for education and Provincial and State curriculums and teaching standards were established. The Superintendents (In Canada and the US) and OFSTED in the UK became critical vehicles for monitoring standards. This is also when teachers started to not be trusted to take responsibility for their own without guidance and evaluation.
The Third Way	Inspired by a variety of sources, but notably Anthony Giddens[2], governments began to see the market and centralized curriculum coupled with high stakes testing as a way to hold teachers, schools and school districts accountable for outcomes and expenditures. Ranking of schools and the identification of failing schools subject to special measures so that they can be subject to “turn-around” measures and the special recognition of high performing schools were all part of this mix. Compliance rather than innovation and servant artisan teachers rather than mindful professional teachers[3] characterised the third way.
The Fourth Way	As schools become recognized for their unique circumstances – each school is seen to have a degree of autonomy within which they can design curriculum and assessment. Balancing the needs of a system wide curriculum with local learning requires assessment which is professional, rather than bureaucratic, and schools which are accountable for their own action plans and performance commitments. A renewal of teacher professionalism is required to achieve the promise of the Fourth Way.

Ontario’s commitment to Open Ontario and the focus on online learning as an innovative and transformative tool in the post-secondary sector may be regarded as an attempt (subtle though it may be), to move Ontario from the Third to the Fourth Way.

Comment

I asked Maxim if I could put this in my web site, because it encapsulates very nicely my views about the role of government in higher education policy. Although Maxim has applied this to views about quality, I think it works equally well with regard to my views about faculty development and training. Most universities are still in The First Way with respect to faculty development. I would like to see it moved to the Fourth Way, where government sets minimum standards or criteria, but where the institutions themselves are responsible for developing appropriate methods and programs. The bottom line though would be that any institution that does not provide the minimum standards (which would include compulsory training in teaching for all new tenured faculty) for professional development and training would receive no government funding until these standards are met.

[1] Hargreaves, A and Shirley, D (2009) The Fourth Way – The Inspiring Future for Educational Change. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

[2] Giddens, A (1999) The Third Way – The Renewal of Social Democracy. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

[3] See MacDonald, E. and Shirley, D. (2009) The Mindful Teacher. New York: Teachers College Press.

What’s a credit worth?

Tony Bates — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 00:16:38 +0000

Kelderman, E. (2010) Credit hours should be worth the cost, House Panel members say Chronicle of Higher Education, June 16

I see US legislators are still trying to use chains and yardsticks to measure the speed of light. I don’t need to say anything about this stupid suggestion – just read the comments to the article.

The real problem is not with the credit hours per se as a measure but with the whole process of institutional and program accreditation in the USA, which needs a thorough overhaul. However, this seems to be going about it in the wrong way, or rather from the wrong end of the problem.

For a much better discussion of what this is all about, see:

Epstein, J. (2010) Method to Miller’s Madness Inside Higher Education, June 18

A marketer’s view of higher education in the USA

Tony Bates — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:27:52 +0000

For those of you not familiar with Seth Godin’s excellent blog on marketing, take a look at his latest blog:

The coming melt-down in higher education, as seen by a marketer

Now I thought this was going to be the usual ‘Let’s hammer the universities’ diatribe that we saw from Tapscott and Williams in the EDUCAUSE article, but it is more subtle than that. In particular, it suggests that the high prestige universities (at least the ones with very high fees) are likely to see trouble ahead, because their market could be undermined by lower cost alternatives that provide what the ‘market’ is seeking.

I myself have doubts whether the elite market will ever go away, any more than people with money will always buy Porsches or Lamborghinis, even though the maxim speed limit is 80 mph almost everywhere. So it could be the middle rank state universities that are likely to feel greater pressure for alternatives to a college education, because their tuition fees are still high (mainly because state governments in the USA are reducing grants to state universities).

What I take away from this is that those middle rank public state universities that change their models of organization and manage to keep tuition fees to at least a modest level stand an opportunity to make real gains in status and market, if they can develop programs that meet the needs of the market and are of high quality in terms of interactivity with faculty, and flexible delivery (although that’s not the solution Godin is suggesting – he wants something much more radical).

What I’m still struggling with is an alternative model to the current higher education system that carries any conviction. I don’t see the need for qualifications going away, if only because employers need something to hold on to when hiring, so although non-formal online education is certainly likely to continue to expand, there will still be demand for qualifications, although I do see methods of assessment changing radically (e.g. e-portfolios instead of exams). Perhaps the answer for middle-rank state universities is to start looking to technology to provide cost-efficiencies, that will reduce administrative overheads, reduce teaching costs, and therefore enable lower tuition fees, without losing quality. (Yes, I really am an optimist! It’s what Vancouver does to you).

What’s your view on this?

Godin and all the others are wrong: things won’t really change much at all and the public universities will still survive
governments will eventually bail out public universities to reduce tuition fees because of public pressure
public universities will have to adapt and those that don’t will die
it is the elite private institutions who will suffer the most
this won’t effect Canada (or your country), because we value our state-funded universities too much
something else (I’d be particularly interested in suggestions for a convincing alternative higher education system)

Distance education for teacher training in Africa

Tony Bates — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:03:34 +0000

Children in Sierra Leone © Clayton R. Wright

Clayton R. Wright, formerly Director of Instructional Media and Development at Grant MacEwan University, Alberta, is currently working in Sierra Leone.

He kindly agreed to share these observations on teacher education in Africa (and the great photo):

A junior high teacher makes US$100 per month in Sierra Leone.

In several sub-Saharan countries, a teacher dies every two hours because of HIV/AIDS.

In Lesotho, the number of teachers who die from HIV/AIDS is twice the number that graduate from teachers’ colleges each year.

In some areas, many teachers haven’t been paid for months, thus they have a second or third job.

Africa needs 3.8 million teachers by 2015 to achieve the Millennium Goal of free public education for all.

Building teacher training facilities to meet the demand for teachers in Africa by 2015 does not seem feasible from my viewpoint. Distance education is definitely one option available to ministries of education.

One of the significant benefits to distance education in a developing country context is that teachers can remain at their posts and interact with learners, family, and the community. They can apply what they are learning immediately to their situation and save the government money as teachers taking distance courses don’t need to be replaced as would be the situation if they attended regular face-to-face teacher training colleges.

Major distance education projects are being undertaken by the African Virtual University, the Southern African Development Community, and Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (TESSA).

Thanks, Clayton. If I can add my own comments:

The new U.S. National Educational Technology Plan also recommends online training for teachers, so that they are aware of how to teach online. Accreditation agencies however need to accept that teachers can qualify at a distance, and this is slow in coming. Face-to-face teaching practice in particular is seen as crucial requirement for most accreditation agencies.

If any of you have direct experience of training teachers by distance education, in Africa or anywhere else, what is your experience? Does it work? Is it a solution? Or are there major drawbacks?

Comparing for-profits with public institutions

Tony Bates — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:02:51 +0000

Sherry, A. (2010) As for-profit colleges flourish, focus turns to grads’ success and debt Denver Post, January 17

A Denver Post examination of graduation rates, loans, default rates and other federal Department of Education data found that on many fronts, for-profit schools as a group underperform their public and nonprofit counterparts.

One year update on the University of the People

Tony Bates — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:34:57 +0000

Kolowich, S. (2010) Tuition-free, online education? Try University of the People USA Today February 22

This provides a good update on the progress of the global, tuition free University of the People. So far it has just over 300 students, and is likely to have major problems getting accreditation in the USA (which might say more about US accreditation procedures than it does about the UofP). It is heavily dependent on volunteer instructors, around which there have been some obvious difficulties.

However, in my view it is far too early to judge the success or otherwise of this project. I think the key is to find an existing high quality university partner who will accept credits from the University of the People. This will then open a route for formally recognized qualifications. This partner is less likely to be in the USA, but may be one of the nationally recognised open universities in other countries.

This article is well worth reading in full if you are interested in open education.

Why technology is not disrupting the university sector

Tony Bates — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 16:06:53 +0000

Keith Hampson’s Higher Education Management Group blog has an interview with Lloyd Armstrong, the Provost of the University of Southern California, on change in universities.

Armstrong’s comments are what I should have written in response to the Tapscott and William’s article.

This interview indicates clearly why Clayton Christensen’s theory of disruptive change is not working in the university sector. I was particularly interested in Armstrong’s view that what will bring about change is the acceptance of learning outcomes as a way to measure the quality of institutions.

If we believe, as I do, universities must change, and technology is a key component, we need to focus on the ability of technology to deliver more cost-effectively better learning outcomes than the face-to-face classroom model, rather than focusing on the power of technology itself to change the system. This means tying technology to learning and teaching design. I know – YOU know that, but many don’t.

Research into online teacher education

Tony Bates — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 19:27:01 +0000

Eduventures (2009) Where Teacher Education and Online Programming Meet: Supporting Field Experiences in Online Initial Teacher Licensure Programs Boston MA: Eduventures Inc

This study by a higher education research and consulting firm examines best practice in five institutions offering online teacher education: Walden University, Nova South Eastern University, University of Southern California, Western Governors University, and University of Cincinnati.

Until very recently many licensing agencies would not accept any qualifications for teacher education obtained through distance education. However, as the report states:

Advances in technology and the increasing acceptance of alternative pathways to teaching and online education have led to the emergence of online initial teacher preparation. Our recent research study has uncovered a number of major entrants to the field in the past two years…that indicate a growing market and the beginning of a new chapter in teacher preparation. This research brief provides descriptive case studies of five different online teacher education programs and identifies trends across the programs.

Of particular interest is the discussion of the use of video for initial teacher preparation:

Online teacher education programs strongly bring the P-12 classrooms into university preparation through extensive use of video clips of exemplary classroom practice; this serves as a way to provide candidates with
consistent exposure to different classrooms and hone candidates’ observation skills.

For questions about this study and/or to inquire about obtaining a copy of the report, please contact Eduventures at http://www.eduventures.com/about/contact-us/contact-info

Do you know your online student really exists?

Tony Bates — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 00:55:49 +0000

Parry, M. (2010) Online Scheme Highlights Fears About Distance-Education Fraud The Chronicle of Higher Education, January 14

Every once in a while comes along a story about distance education that I love to read. This is one of them (the comments are also fun to read).

The scam that the woman pulled was so elaborate and netted so much cash that she should have been given a degree from the Bernie Madoff School of Business (Chancellor: Conrad Black).

I am always asked by instructors who are afraid of online learning about cheating by distance students. Any respectable instructor who knows what they are doing can tell very quickly if a student is genuine or not. There are many safeguards you can build in, such as delaying financial aid payments until the student has done actual work, ensuring that students submit work on a regular (i.e. weekly) basis, ensuring that students participate in online discussions, give them individual and group project work (with peer assessment – boy, that sorts out quickly the lazy ones), and, as one of the commentators wrote, ensure supervised local examinations by hiring staff from locally respected colleges.

The real deterrent to fraud is to make it so much hard academic work to get the financial aid or the grades that it isn’t worth the effort of trying to defraud the system. This comes down to two aspects of design: the design of financial aid systems; and the design of effective online teaching. Unfortunately though there are the bad apples in the system both in terms of cheating and in terms of institutions or instructors not willing to build in well established quality assurance procedures for online teaching.

Has the credit hour become a relic?

Tony Bates — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 18:59:50 +0000

Blumenstyck, G. (2010) Beyond the Credit Hour: Old Standards Don’t Fit New Models Chronicle of Higher Education, January 3

Blumenstyck writes:

In the era of distance education and a growing movement toward the “unbundling” of higher education to allow for study outside traditional classroom formats, has the “credit hour” become a relic?

The credit hour “is the coin of the realm, but it’s badly in need of an update,” argues Robert W. Mendenhall, president of Western Governors University, the 10-year-old nonprofit institution known for its competency-based system for awarding degrees. “It’s time we measured learning rather than time.”

This article is in response partly to the criticism of a U.S. accrediting agency for giving accreditation to a distance program based on accelerated five-week, nine-credit courses. In the U.K. on the other hand, the government is proposing some two year, ‘accelerated’ bachelor’s degrees.

The issue of ‘credit hours’ for distance courses was tackled as long ago as 1971 by the British Open University, which came up with a total hours of study per course model, which turned out to be similar, if not higher, than the average study time per full-time face-to-face student, but spread out over a longer period.

However, the issue has changed somewhat with the move to competency-based learning. I interviewed an instructor in electronics at a Canadian two-year college who had moved much of his course online. He found that 75% of the students completed a 13 week face-to-face course in six weeks to the same standard. He was then told he had to add extra classes for the rest of the semester!

For me, the issue is not trying to match distance courses to credit hours, but changing the classroom model so that learning is measured, not study time as expressed in lecture hours. As the article says, this is probably the biggest systemic issue around improving teaching. Certainly, the notion of a standard number of lecture hours as the measure for funding and accreditation is preventing real innovation in technology-based learning.

Furthermore, if we could replace the credit hour with measures of learning, then we could abolish the semester system, and allow students to work at their own pace, with some students taking less than the standard 13 weeks, and others taking longer. Technology can enable the flexibility in the organization of teaching that this requires, by creating digital learning materials that are available 24/7.