However, Distance Learning providers are lining up outside Maricopa County. They want to offer our students comparable courses at competitive prices. They want to say to our students, "Suppose you didn't have to rearrange your work schedule or pay a baby sitter or fight that six o'clock traffic to take that seven o'clock class. Suppose you could stay home and take classes on your schedule and maybe use your home computer to link you to your instructor via the Internet. What would you do?"
Just how imminent is this threat? Actually, several distance learning providers are already available: Rogers State College in Kansas and ICS (International Correspondence Schools) currently offer on-line Associates Degree programs accessible through America Online. Seattle Central Community College has just announced its entry into this market. The University of Phoenix also offers some on-line courses. Jones Educational Networks have announced their intention to create a new community college network along the lines of their highly successful Mind Extension University Network. But we still retain one considerable advantage over all of the above: their tuition averages around one hundred dollars a credit.
This year, the Independent Learning Access Committee was formed to study independent learning in general and to serve as a resource for faculty interested in providing independent learning opportunities.
To our committee, the phrase independent learning designates any mode of instruction that does not require students to sit in a classroom at regularly scheduled times. In addition, independent learning means less emphasis on the transmission of instruction and more focus on its reception. Opportunities include traditional correspondence study, on-line instruction (via Internet or modem link to a computer not on campus), and most forms of distance learning, except situations such as Maricopa's VCN which merely replicates traditional classrooms at distance sites.
The committee's primary goal for this year has been to survey all independent learning opportunities currently existing in the district to find out how prepared we are to meet the challenge of outside competition.
After a year of seeking and listening to reports from various campuses, we conclude that although as a district we are not well prepared, we are not unprepared. Two programs currently in existence and one scheduled to start in the fall are providing an early line of defense: Rio Salado currently offers an entire Associate Degree Program via distance learning (although the course selection is limited and courses all have start dates tied to the semester system). Paradise Valley continues to build an attractive Open Entry/Open Exit program that provides more than just instruction in computer applications. Mesa is scheduled to launch its Independent Learning Option next October, a program that may make available as many as twenty courses for distance learners and provide completely flexible start dates. There are several other individual innovations at other campuses as well, most notably Glendale's Flex system which offers students some degree of independence for certain courses. These are all hopeful signs.
But beyond these current and hoped-for opportunities, the District as a whole currently offers relatively little independent learning access. For students who want a way to take courses other than by sitting in a scheduled classroom, there only are a few isolated opportunities in our District. All campuses in the district currently offer some form of Open Entry/Open Exit classes; at South Mountain, such classes are called "Lab Based." At Scottsdale, such courses are called only "Open-Entry" classes. With few exceptions, however, these classes are for computer applications.
The committee has observed many forces that are pushing us to provide more independent learning access: The Pew Roundtable is asking us to become learner-centered. TQM and Quantum Quality ask us to consider the needs of the people we profess to serve. The proliferation of multimedia computers in homes and the increasing demand for Internet access suggest that new avenues of instruction are opening to us. Yet, our progress in developing independent learning access has so far been disappointing. The reason is obvious: without any meaningful competition we have grown complacent. Until the full-time faculty perceive the potential threat, change will continue to be slow.
