This week is about the imagined negative futures about technology and learning held 10 years ago or so. Here we read an article by Noble (1998) written around the time of the internet boom.
This article strikes fear and warning to faculty about adopting technology enhanced learning. He scare-mongers faculty into resistance by saying that if they accept TEL into their courses, they will lose their jobs. He says that students don’t want it and that it is being forced through by administrators and “technozealots”. His article could not be more contentious and his use of language is perfect of inciting the opinions he wants faculty to have.
And he does a good job, if I had been an academic and had read this in 1998 I too would be resistant to the introduction of TEL even for distance learners – thinking that if I gave into TEL I would lose my job. He’s given ammunition to the divide that exists between educational technologists and faculty. This is why edu-techs are working on professional courses etc to get recognised for the expertise in learning, not just in technology. For example, I would be classed as an edu-tech’t but I hold my hands up to having mediocre technical knowledge. My technical knowledge is as a user and put myself in the shoes of my DL students.
This article talks of two institutions, UCLA and York Uni in USA, where, according to Noble, administrators made the use of the internet and TEL compulsory, with no regard for pedagogical decisions, appropriateness of the media or student demands.
He says that faculty roles will be outsourced and content created much more cheaply and able to be used in anyway. In the 2009 financial climate, WBS is thinking of doing more of this to allow faculty to spend more time on research, less on teaching whilst still meeting the needs of our bread and butter markets. And for many years we have outsourced the online tutor role due to the size of the programme we offer and, yes it is cheaper, probably, than employing people to do it. Especially when any faculty members (even teaching fellows) would eventually be siphoned off to do research.
“Faculty are portrayed above all as obstructionist, as standing in the way of progress and forestalling the panacea of virtual education allegedly demanded by students, their parents, and the public.”
He sees the motive forces behind the introduction of new technologies in university as administrators wanting to achieve their perceived progress, and the need to make more money. He says that admin’rs think that elearning will be cheaper and more people can be taught, so increased income. However, he says that the real winners of the movement are the vendors of the hardware, software and content – ultimately they can sell the benefits of their products to administrators who don’t necessarily understand the teaching requirements. Once committed, admin’rs then has to persuade faculty to adopt it. But admin’rs underestimated cost of TEL – instructor time, support staff time, maintenance, equipment etc.
Says the neither instructors nor students wanted it. He says that admin’rs market TEL for being able to reach DL-ers. But he feels that campus based students are the real market of HEs outweigh DL-ers so justification for TEL is not evidence. He says later that students want the f2f education they paid for – again referring to cases where the institutions have tried to deploy technology across campus based courses; rather than starting with DL and then seeing how UG programmes etc could use it as we are at WBS.
He also blames the “technozealots” – computer as answer to everything without support for pedagogical claims of educational enhancement, without evidence of productivity improvement and without demand from students or teachers.
Technology is restructuring the instructors work so they have reduced autonomy, independence and control over their work – leaving control over access to information with Admin’rs. – Hey, but this is necessary in research lead inst – without the driving force of Admin teams, very little teaching would take place. Promotions are based on teaching, so nothing else would happen. He says that once faculty go online, admin’rs gain control over their performance and content.
Faculty lose possession of their content once it goes online. It’s transferred to the machine and the admin’rs. So less skilled workers can be used, more cheaply to deliver pre-packaged courses. ” Most important, once the faculty converts its courses to courseware, their services are in the long run no longer required. They become redundant, and when they leave, their work remains behind. “
He uses the term diploma mill, taken from Reid’s study of diploma mills in 1959. I guess the term mill is used as a metaphor of education as a factory, producing diploma after diploma. Reid characterises diploma mills as having no classrooms, nonexistent or untrained faculty, officers self seeking without qualifications to make these decisions which are the characteristics that Noble sees TEL will have on education.
Were these claims justified over the following years since 1998. It’s hard for me to say, I know that there is a distinct divide between educational technologists and faculty in general, fears that education is being technologically-lead and anxieties of technologists who don’t feel recognised for the professional knowledge. However, since 1998 part-time, practice based and distance learning has become more prevalent and many courses satisfying these markets were previously just paper based correspondence course. The DL- MBA at Warwick is a good example. It started in 1986, when TMAs were submitted by post, logged manually, posted out to tutors, posted back to the office and posted back to students around the world. The VLE changed this and has metaphorically reduced the time and distance between students and faculty. I think his predictions of the addition of elearning in campus based teaching are right, but he totally ignores the “future” DL and OL education market –students who want to study but cannot give up work, or want to go to a high quality University but cannot leave home, etcetc. Where the opportunities that elearning afford to them are vital to their learning experience.
Compared to Wesch’s video about students of today, Noble’s claims about students not wanting technology in their courses is unfounded and compared to other research there is some weight as students do not want to feel they are teaching themselves and do want contact with faculty.
Noble, D.F. (1998) ‘Digial dipoloma mills: the automation of higher education’ [online], First Monday, vol.3, no.1, http://firstmonday.org/ htbin/ cgiwrap/ bin/ ojs/ index.php/ fm/ article/ view/ 569/ 490 (accessed 4 June 2009).
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=aab89f81-d3c0-4e8a-9f51-6f175814bc7c)
