AARNet and Australian tertiary distance education

The eight federally designated Australian Distance Education Centres are members of a new national communication network called AARNet. To achieve reduced telecommunication costs and additional educational benefits through the use of AARNet for all students, including disadvantaged groups, requires institutions to work together on providing more multi‐point access and central services and to make a local commitment to networking technology.     

Collaborative schemes and the ethos of distance education: A study of Australian and New Zealand universities

Although the economic benefits of collaborative schemes and transfer of courses in distance education are clear, examples of collaboration between distance education institutions are rare. A reason is sought in theorganisational climate or ethos of each institution engaged in distance education, which inhibits joint design and use of courses or the transfer of a course from one institution to another. This theme is examined in relation to distance education in the integrated mode system of Australian and New Zealand universities, six in all. The universities are compared in terms of six features of organisational climate of particular relevance to distance education: physical characteristics, academic organisation, involvement in distance teaching, organisation of distance teaching, components of distance teaching and staff attitudes to distance education. It is concluded that the considerable variation between institutions, with respect to these features, creates difficulties for collaboration. The best prospect for collaborative schemes in distance education therefore may have to lie in the use of national or international agencies to validate courses as part of a national or international higher education programme along the lines of Britain's CNAA.     

"小组讨论"在远程开放教育中的作用

小组讨论是目前被广泛使用的一种教学形式.在远程开放教育中,小组讨论的作用主要体现在五个方面能有效改变学生的学习态度,使学生在知识获取时实现从"间接环境"向"直接环境"的过渡,帮助学生解释不同媒介信息形态,产生有价值的"议程设置",体现合作学习理念.同时,小组讨论在具体操作中仍存在一些问题,如不能激发所有学生的积极性,教师的广泛引导和评价难以展开,在时间安排上有很大的随意性等.     

Business sustainability and undergraduate management education: an Australian study

The academic literature arguing that there is an urgent requirement for businesses to become more sustainable is rapidly expanding. There is also a demonstrated need for managers to develop a better understanding of sustainability and the appropriate strategies required to improve business sustainability. In addition, there have been international calls for educators to address sustainability in their programs. The aim of this study was to investigate the extent to which business sustainability was incorporated into undergraduate business and management courses in Australian universities. The high percentage of international students enrolled in these courses suggests our findings have implications beyond the Australian context. Students currently studying these courses are the managers and leaders of the future and their knowledge and skills will influence the extent to which business sustainability will be achieved. The findings demonstrate that more than half of Australian universities did not explicitly identify sustainability as part of their business/management curricula and those universities that did address sustainability did so, in most cases, only in a limited way.     

The Australian law of copyright and its application to distance education

This paper deals with the statutory protection of copyright in works created in the course of employment with illustrations of copyright in employer institutions. Distance teachers and their employers — universities, TAFE colleges, schools and colleges of advanced education — are all subject to the law of copyright in making, reproducing and distributing teaching materials. Copyright protection under the Commonwealth Copyright Act, 1968 and Amendments (1980), (1984), is given to literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works as expressions by authors of their creativity. International copyright conventions apply in Australia. Educational institutions are prohibited from ‘authorising’ the making of infringing copies. Certain dealings by educational institutions with hard copy or software materials do not constitute breach of copyright.     

基于网格的远程教育资源共享研究

网格技术已经成为当前国际计算机技术研究的热点和前沿领域,随着其不断发展完善,必然会推动远程教育的发展.本文阐述了网格技术的概念及其发展情况,分析了现代远程教育的发展现状、存在的问题、应用网格技术的优势,研究了教育网格资源共享环境,最后讨论了一个基于网格技术的教育资源共享模型.     

Steering from a distance: Power relations in Australian higher education

Conventional liberal frameworks – in which power is seen asthe property of states, and repressive in character, and market and stateexclude each other – are unable to comprehend the recent changes inliberal government, including the government of systems and institutions inhigher education. Neo-liberal government rests on self-managing institutionsand individuals, in which free agents are empowered to act on their ownbehalf but are steered from a distance by policy norms and rules of thegame. In the universities government-created markets and quasi-markets havebeen used to advance both devolution and central control, simultaneously,and national government and institutional management are increasinglyimplicated in each other. These issues are explored in relation to recenthigher education literature, and empirically, the latter by examining thechanges in the Australian higher education system in the last decade. TheAustralian system provides an example of a quasi-market in which thedevelopment of a stronger institutional management, the introduction ofgovernment-institution negotiations over educational profiles, and the newsystems of competitive bidding, performance management and qualityassessment have all been used to steer academic work and to install aprocess of continuous self-transformation along modern neo-liberal lines.Following a change of government in 1996 there has been some movement from aquasi-market to a more fully developed economic market, but no relaxation ofgovernment control.     

当代远程教育主流模式比较研究

多种教学媒体支持的自主学习模式与课堂教学远程传播模式是当代远程教育两大主流模式。对两种教育模式的形成环境、基本特征、理论基础、教育手段、成本结构、适用范围等方面进行较为系统的比较研究，为我国远程教育的改革与发展提供较为完整的参照系。     

Australian higher education third party arrangements: an independent institute case study

Tertiary Education and Management - The marked increase in transnational higher education third party arrangements in recent years represents globalizing forms of education. Third party...     

Non-government distance education funding: the need for equity in Australian schooling

This reflection outlines the problems associated with the Australian Government’s recurrent funding policy for non-government distance education. It demonstrates the policy’s inconsistencies with stated government educational policy and with commonly held expectations of fairness in a democratic society. A comparison of the current funding of non-government distance education to various long-standing educational delivery modes demonstrates that non-government distance education is yet to be appropriately funded by the Commonwealth. The discussion concludes by indicating that this emerging pedagogy is distinct from traditional schooling, that its students ought to be given the same educational opportunities as other Australian school students, and that the current policy ought to be redressed expeditiously.     

远程教育教师行为浅析

教师行为是教师素质的外在表现,是教师专业发展水平的重要标志。关注远程教育教师的行为的内涵和表现,对于促进远程教育教师的专业发展,提高远程教育的质量具有一定的现实意义。     

Teacher education research and education policy-makers: an Australian perspective

As teacher educators, we want our research to be influential in contributing to educational policy and practice, but there remains little understanding about ways in which teacher educators might more productively engage with each other and policy-makers so as to maximise their research impact. Drawing on an empirical study and policy document analysis, this paper seeks to foster a generative ‘researcher-policy-maker dialogue’ by understanding more about policy-makers’ perspectives of what shapes their decision-making and the current role of research evidence in those decisions. Using a research utilisation theoretical framework and discourse analysis, data revealed various factors that served as barriers or enablers to using research in making education policy decisions. Results indicated that policy-makers largely position research as key to solving their policy problems. As such they sought better communication strategies to utilise research findings in a timely, free and publicly accessible, user-friendly manner. Overall, they called for a greater dialogue and engagement at all stages of the policy process and criticised what they perceived as a ‘fly in-fly out’ research approach. Recommendations suggest new collaborative approaches and genres are needed for the teacher education research community to have a greater impact in influencing policy.     

Building social capital in early childhood education and care: an Australian study

Mounting research evidence demonstrates that effective ‘early childhood education and care’ (ECEC) has short‐term and longer‐term social and educational benefits for children and families. An allied body of evidence attests to the contribution of social capital (i.e. social networks and relationships based on trust) to such benefits. The research reported in this article bridges these two bodies of evidence by researching the social capital of children, their families and community members in the context of a state‐wide initiative (in Queensland, Australia) of integrated early childhood and family hubs. Drawn conceptually from the sociology of childhood, a methodological feature of the research is a broadened focus on children, not just adults, as reliable informants of their own everyday experience in ECEC. Some 138 children (aged 4–8 years) in urban and rural/remote localities in Queensland participated in research conversations about their social experience in and beyond ECEC. Children's social capital was found to be higher in the urban community than in the rural community, highlighting the potential of child and family hubs to strengthen children's social capital in those communities with few social facilities.     

Realistic uses of AUSSAT for distance education in Western Australian primary and secondary schools

The Australian Federal Government's decision, in May 1982, to implement a domestic satellite system (AUSSAT) has stimulated educators in Australia to consider the use of emerging communications technologies. Of these, satellite technology has the potential to provide an unparalleled delivery mechanism for education. Schools of the Air, in particular, have been cited as a major beneficiary of this technology.

Despite popular opinion, the viability of delivering education to Schools of the Air (SOTA) and Distance Education Centre (DEC) students by satellite is questionable, because of the small number and particular circumstances of the students involved. Similarly, District High Schools (DHS) contain large numbers of students who suffer similar geographic educational disadvantages; these students could benefit from satellite‐delivered education. Additionally, improved professional development for rural based‐teachers would be possible.     

网格教育:现代远程教育的新浪潮

网格是继传统Internet、Web之后的新的网络技术,被称之为第三代互联网.传统的网络教育已无法适应信息社会对教育提出的挑战与要求,而基于网格技术的网格教育能够克服当前网络教育的局限.本文分析了网格的特点、网格教育的创新,预言网格教育必将掀起现代远程教育的新浪潮.