The Open University of Tanzania
(OUT)
ODC 021: Rise and Development of
Distance Education and Open Learning
• Course Description
• Course Objectives
• Part 1: Definition of Terms
Lecture 1: Definition of Terms
• Part 2:Distance Education and Open Learning:
A Historical Perspective
Lecture 2:Distance Education and Open
Learning: A Historical Perspective
2
Lecture 3: Application of Distance Education in
Different Countries
• Part 3:The Open Universities
Lecture 4: The University of South Africa
(UNISA) and the United Kingdom Open
University (UKOU)
• Part 4: A Comparison of Application of
Distance Education in Some Countries
Lecture 5: India and the Soviet Union
3
Lecture 6: Pre – Tertiary Education in
Tanzania
Lecture 7: The Open University of Tanzania
(OUT)
Lecture 8: Malawi and Zambia
• Part 5: Justification for Adopting Distance
Education and Open Learning in
Developing Countries
4
Lecture 9: Rationale for Distance Education and
Open Learning in Developing Countries
• Part 6: Challenges of Distance Education and
Open Learning in Developing Countries
Lecture 10: Challenges of Distance Education
and Open Learning in Developing Countries.
5
Course Objectives
• Define and use correctly terms like
correspondence education, home study,
independent learning, distance teaching,
distance learning, distance education, open
learning, etc.
• Discuss the historical background to the rise
and development of distance education and
open learning.
6
• Explain the rise and development of distance
education and open learning in developing
countries in general and a specific SADC Member
State in particular.
• Provide a justification for the adoption of distance
education and open learning as a delivery mode
of educational and training programmes.
7
Part 1: Definition of Terms
Lecture 1: Definition of Terms
• Different terms have been developed to
describe distance education and open learning
as a method of teaching and learning.
• Each term, offers a description of the method
within a specific context.
• Relevant terms include:
8
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Correspondence education
Distance education
Distance teaching
Home study
Independent learning
“Three – way – teaching”
Open learning
E - learning
9
Correspondence Education
• Prior to 1971, the term “correspondence
education”, was used to describe a method of
teaching and learning which came to be known as
“distance education” or “distance teaching”.
• Its features included studying through printed
materials sent by post to students; students sent
back assignments to their tutors by post; tutors
marked and returned assignments by post
(correspondence).
10
Distance Education
• It is any form of organized educational experience
in which teaching and learning take place with
teachers at – a- distance from the learners for
most of the time.
• Unlike in correspondence education,
communication is supplemented by other media
like Radio, TV, CDs, DVDs, Telephone and face to
face contact sessions.
11
• Distance Education consists of Distance
Teaching and Distance Learning
Home Study
• In distance education, “teaching and learning
take place with teachers at-a-distance from the
learners for most of the learning period.
• Actually, learners are taught and consequently
learn while at home or even at work places.
• Distance Education is Home Study.
12
Independent Learning
• In Distance Education, learning is not guided
by rigid time tables as in conventional schools
and colleges.
• Independent learning means studying at one’s
pace and leisure while adhering to flexible
time tables.
• Time Tables are there, however, they are
flexible.
13
“Three – way – Teaching”
• Consists of face-to-face contact, correspondence
education and educational broadcasting.
• They were merged into “three way teaching” in
the 1970s, with the rise of UKOU.
• It marks the rise of distance education and the
relegation of correspondence education to a
component of the former.
• Educational broadcasting brought back the
spoken word to correspondence education.
14
• Face to face contact brought teaching and
learning under distance education to its
traditional roots (teaching and learning
through oral presentations).
Open learning
• The term “open learning” started with the
establishment of the UKOU in 1970.
• It was intended to show that age was the only
qualification for entry and the students would
learn when and where they chose.
15
• This meant that the students would not
necessarily learn on campus while following
strict admission criteria and rigid time tables.
• Since the 1970s, the scope of open learning
has expanded to include not only when and
where but also what and how to learn.
• What refers to programmes, how means that
students have the freedom to select media of
learning, institutions to study and even when
and what to learn at a distance or
conventionally.
16
Part 2: Distance Education and Open
Learning: A Historical Perspective
Lecture 2: Distance Education and Open
Learning: A Historical Perspective
• Distance education is one of the oldest
approaches to teaching and training.
• It began about 3000 BC with the invention of
the art of writing in Mesopotamia in present
day Iraq.
17
– Its informal use in education and training is
associated with the practice of writing letters to
give information, instruction or even directives to
another person or group of people.
– From the period of the early Christian movement
from about 60 AD, it was extensively used by
people like St. Paul, Timothy and others to
educate followers in various churches and places.
– Islamic traditions show that Prophet Mohamed
employed a similar method in spreading his
teachings from the 7th Century AD.
18
• Initially, it focused on the use of print media
(correspondence education).
• In the course of time, it has embraced usage of
a wider range of media including face-to-face
contact, broadcast, recorded, telephone and
more recently Information and Communication
Technologies (ICTs).
• Introduction of ICTs in distance education, has
brought it to its current stage of electronic or e
– learning.
• Reneé Erdos has periodised the history of
correspondence education into four periods:
19
(i) A period of individual initiative and
experiment by the late 1800's;
(ii) A period of incorporation into national
systems of education in the 1900's in many
countries;
(iii) The expansion period during the Second
World War; and
(iv) The post-war period of rapid and
widespread development.
(v) The rise of Open/ Mega Universities from the
1970s
20
Lecture 3: Application of Distance Education in
Different Countries
• The oldest record on correspondence
education is found in an advertisement
announcing correspondence educational
opportunities carried in an issue of the Boston
Gazette, on 20th March 1728.
• An advertisement similar to the one in Boston,
appeared almost 105 years later in Lund’s
Weckobald No. 30 of 1833, in Sweden.
21
• As a result of insufficient information on the
Boston and Lund correspondence education
programmes, Isaac Pitman of Britain is often
credited as the first known pioneer of
correspondence education.
• In 1840, he advertised the teaching of
shorthand and scripture by post.
• He set up an effective correspondence
education programme in which students paid
for the instructions.
22
• Two prominent educators in the USA
employed correspondence education in
promoting humanitarian causes.
• Thomas J. Foster was moved by a mining
disaster in 1869; he started to educate them
on mine safety.
• From 1873, Ann Eliot Ticknor, played a vital
role in promoting education by post among
women.
23
• Britain, USA, Sweden and Russia offer the
earliest success stories in the use of distance
education in providing tertiary and university
level education.
• University of London which was founded in
1836 as the third British University after
Oxford and Cambridge, established an
External Programme in 1858 to offer degree
courses through distance education.
• In 1887, the University Correspondence
College was set up in Cambridge to prepare
24
students for the external degrees of the
University of London.
• William R. Harper, the first President of
Chicago University set up the first university
level correspondence teaching department in
the USA in 1880.
• In Sweden, Hans Hermod ran a language
school in Malmo, beginning in 1886.
• In 1889, the correspondence method was
extended to students in agricultural and
commercial fields.
25
• In Russia, school level correspondence study
had existed since 1912.
• Technical Institutes and Universities started to
experiment with the method from 1926/27 in
order to meet human resource needs for the
economic transformation of the emerging
Soviet Union.
• The first Act dealing with correspondence
study was passed in 1931.
26
• Ministry of Education authorised to supervise
the extension of the correspondence study
system.
• Correspondence study departments were set
up in universities and polytechnics.
• Conventional universities began to offer study
by correspondence as part of their extramural
work.
• Similar developments took place in the former
Eastern European countries after the Second
World War.
27
• Long-distance transmission of knowledge is
not a new phenomenon in Africa. Using
specific drum beats, people in pre – literate
Africa were able to transmit specific messages
at a distance (talking drum).
• A low technological level as well as the
absence of highly institutionalized formal and
non-formal education systems are largely
responsible for the non-development of
distance education in pre-colonial and colonial
eras’ Africa.
28
• The British introduced in Tanganyika from the
late 1920s, a correspondence programme to
promote primary education among children of
colonial government officials, missionaries,
settlers and commercials, residing in remote
areas far away from the nearest white schools.
• It was administered in Tanganyika by the
Education Department from 1929 to 1960.
• It catered also for children under similar
circumstances in Northern Rhodesia (Zambia),
Nyasaland (Malawi), Kenya and Uganda),
29
Lecture 4: The Open Universities
• The World’s earliest open universities are the
University of South Africa (UNISA) and the
United Kingdom Open University (UKOU).
• UNISA did not start as a teaching let alone an
open university but as an examining agency of
other universities.
• It was founded in 1873 as the University of the
Cape of Good Hope.
30
• It was not a teaching university but an
examining agency of Oxford and Cambridge
Universities.
• It served as an incubator of other universities
in South Africa - Cape Town and Stellenbosch.
• Accredited as an examining university
incorporating the University of the Cape of
Good Hope in 1918.
• Established a Division of External Studies in
1946 and began trials in correspondence
teaching.
31
• UNISA became a fully fledged correspondence
university in 1959.
• However, since 1951, UNISA was regarded as
the first university in the World devoted
entirely to teaching by correspondence.
• In the 1970s, UNISA employed broadcast and
recorded technologies to bridge the distance
between the university and its students.
32
• Throughout the apartheid years, UNISA was
the only route through which black students in
South Africa and even beyond, could access
higher education.
• UNISA was not set up to bridge the
educational gap between the black majority
and the white minority.
• After the democratization of South Africa in
1994, measures were taken to address
effectively educational and training needs of
all South Africans.
33
• In 2001, Prof. N. Barney Pityana was
appointed as the first black Vice Chancellor of
UNISA.
• In 2004, UNISA merged with South Africa’s
two other major distance education providers,
Technikon Southern Africa and Vista
University, to become the sole provider of
distance education in the country.
• Adopted a new vision in 2005. Presently, the
largest ODL institution in Africa and among
the leading mega universities in the World.
34
• The concept of the Open University evolved
from the convergence of three major postwar
educational trends.
• Developments in the provision of adult
education, the growth of educational
broadcasting and the political objective of
promoting egalitarianism in education.
35
• During his successive visits to the Soviet Union
during the 1960s, Sir Harold Wilson was
greatly impressed by the achievements of the
country in pioneering successfully the
development of education by correspondence
for external students.
• In a speech he delivered in Glasgow on 8th
September 1963, he elaborated his plan for
provision of higher education to adults
studying part-time while in full employment,
through a multi-media system.
36
• UKOU enrolled its first students in 1971. It is
the best known and most influential distance
teaching university.
• It was called the “Open University” because
age was the only qualification for entry.
• It offered an open opportunity of higher
education even for people who did not
possess minimum entry qualifications to a
conventional opportunity, provided they were
21 years old (later reduced to 18 years).
37
Part 4: A Comparison of Application of
Distance Education in Some Countries
Lecture 5: India and the Soviet Union
• In India, many universities opened
correspondence course departments at predegree and at degree levels, soon after
Independence in 1947.
• Presently, distance education is provided
through correspondence system or through
open system.
38
• The Distance Education Council (DEC) is
responsible for the coordination of the open
university and accreditation for the distance
education courses.
• There are 14 Open Universities in India at
present- 1 national and 13 state open
universities.
• After the revolution in Russia in 1917, one of
the priorities of the revolutionary government
was to increase education from literacy to
university levels.
39
• Correspondence education was rapidly
harnessed to the task of expansion.
• By 1963, nearly 2.4 million people in the USSR
were studying through correspondence and
evening tuition.
• The success of correspondence education in
the former Soviet Union, inspired Western
countries to adopt and later on introduce
significant innovations in the methodology.
40
Lecture 6: Pre – Tertiary Education in
Tanzania
• The earliest recorded accounts of distance
learners in Tanzania date back to the colonial
era.
• By 1949, the British Tutorial College, Rapid
Results College, Wolsey Hall and the
International Correspondence School were
enrolling and offering learners in urban areas
vocational and academic courses.
41
• The Cooperative Education Centre (CEC ) was
set up at the Moshi based Cooperative College
(currently Moshi University College of
Management and Cooperative Studies
(MUCCOBS) in July 1964.
• The main mission of the CEC was to provide
cooperative management education to staff,
committee and ordinary members of more
than 1500 registered cooperative societies in
the country.
42
• Between 1965 and 1986, a total of 39,381
learners were enrolled in study circles
(learners engaged in discussions with peers
but completed tutor-marked assignments
individually).
• Later on (6th January 1967), the system of
study groups supplemented by radio
broadcasts was introduced (members were
allowed to complete tutor-marked
assignments as a group).
43
• In order to widen educational access in newly
independent African countries, the Swedish
Dag Hammarskjold Foundation commissioned
a survey of correspondence instruction in
Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda
and Zambia in the mid - 1960s.
• The survey was carried out by Dr. Lars Olof
Edstrom who issued his report in 1966.
• He recommended the establishment of
correspondence education programmes in
adult education institutions.
44
• The Government of Tanzania set up a National
Correspondence Institution (NCI) in the
Institute of Adult Education (IAE) in 1970.
• NCI produced and offered to its large and
diverse student body unpaced distance
education courses in both formal and nonformal education programmes.
• From the late 1970s, NCI collaborated with
the Ministry of Education in running preservice as well as in-service distance teacher
training programmes.
45
• Whereas, its annual enrolment was about
3,000 during the period 1985 – 1990, it
dropped to about 616, between 1990 – 1997.
• Presently, the NCI has been transformed into a
Department of Distance Education of the IAE.
• Its main task is to organize and run access to
secondary education programme by open and
distance learning methods.
46
Lecture 7: OUT
• At various times, the Government of Tanzania,
commissioned studies aimed at finding an
alternative method of providing more places
for university education at affordable cost.
• The idea of setting up an Open University was
mentioned for the first time by the then
Minister of National Education, Hon.
Nicholaus Kuhanga in 1979.
47
• A Joint Study Team (British Council and the
Government of Tanzania) was set up to
explore the request.
• It recommended the setting up of a
Correspondence Institute within UDSM under
the control of the SENATE as any other
Institute and not an Open University.
• However, the University Management found
the idea as not viable.
• 1980, a Presidential Commission on Education
reviewed the entire education system.
48
• It recommended the elevation of the NCI,
(then a Department of the Institute of Adult
Education (IAE), into an autonomous Institute
of Correspondence Education.
• The PCE revived the idea of setting up an
Institute to coordinate studies by
correspondence at the UDSM and in other
universities.
• These and other recommendations of the PCE
suffered the same fate as those of the Anglo –
Tanzania Study Team.
49
• In 1988, a Committee chaired by Hon.
Kuhanga was appointed by the Minister of
Education, Hon. A. Mayagila, to explore
prospects for establishing an Open University
in Tanzania.
• In its Report issued in 1990, the Committee
recommended the establishment of the
university.
• Furthermore, it spelled out the university’s
resource requirements and the overall
benefits of the university to the society.
50
• The OUT became operational in 1993. In order
to streamline the management and
coordination of quality assurance in
programmes offered in both public and
private universities in the country, since 1st
January 2007, Act No. 17 of 1992, has been
supplanted by the Umbrella Universities Act
No. 7 of 2005 and the OUT Charter.
• Five Faculties, two Institutes and two
Directorates have been established at the
OUT.
51
• Currently, a cumulative student enrolment in
non - degree, undergraduate and
postgraduate programmes is 19,345; 35,442
and 8,600 respectively.
• With a total enrolment of more than 50,000
students, the OUT has qualified as the largest
Tertiary Institution in the country, in less than
20 years since its inception in 1992.
• More than 2,435 students have graduated in
all academic programmes including seminars,
workshops and tailor made courses.
52
Lecture 8: Distance Education in
Malawi and Zambia
• As early as the 1960s, Botswana, Kenya,
Malawi and Zambia were among the African
countries whose governments decided to
employ distance education for teacher
training and secondary education provision.
• In Malawi, opportunities for distance learning
have mostly been provided by the Malawi
College of Distance Education (MCDE).
53
• The MCDE was initiated as Malawi
Correspondence College with a school
broadcasting unit to prepare and air
broadcasts to primary and secondary schools
and teacher training colleges, in 1965.
• In 1973, the Malawi Correspondence College
and the Broadcasting Unit were merged to
form the Malawi Correspondence College and
Broadcasting Unit. This was renamed the
Malawi College of Distance Education (MCDE)
in 1987.
•
54
• The MCDE offers instructions through printed
self-instructional materials, face-to-face
sessions and radio programmes. Not all
students follow instructions in the three
methods.
• 5% have access to printed self-instructional
materials; 10% study in 44 night secondary
schools receiving 2 hours of face-to-face
sessions daily; 85% study in 351 study centres
receiving 5 hours of face-to-face sessions from
primary schools’ teachers.
55
• As a result of the study centres system, the
MCDE has managed to provide to almost 50%
of primary school leavers an alternative route
for accessing secondary education.
• Mzuzu University was established in 1997 as
the country’s second national university to
tackle the problem of limited access.
• Up to 2008, the two national universities
managed to enrol 0.03% of the eligible school
leavers using the face to face and residential
mode.
56
• This figure was a far – cry from the
international target of 35% access to tertiary
education of the total population.
• Since then, Mzuzu University has established a
CODL to broaden and expand access to
tertiary education.
• The main providers of distance education
opportunities in Zambia are the National
Correspondence College (NCC) based at
Luanshya and the Lusaka based University of
Zambia (UNZA).
57
• The NCC was set-up in 1964 to offer secondary
education opportunities to unqualified
teachers, adults and primary school leavers.
• The NCC has established a system that
provides a structure for supervised learning to
primary school leavers.
• On enrolment, students receive printed selfinstructional materials. They then register in a
local study centre (open secondary class)
where they meet every day under supervision
by primary school teachers or informed adults
58
• They also follow radio or audio lessons at the
study centre.
• Zambia could move closer to its goal of nine
years of basic education for all children if the
last two years were provided in open
secondary classes.
• In Independent Africa, UNZA was probably the
first conventional university to establish a
distance teaching unit at the end of 1966.
• This dual mode system was adopted from the
University of New England in Australia.
59
• While by 1988 distance students at UNZA
constituted a small proportion (12- 16%) of
the entire student population, at the
University of New England they constituted
60% of the total population.
• This was a reflection of the constraints
undermining the effectiveness of distance
education in Zambia at the pre – tertiary as
well as at the tertiary levels.
60
Part 5
Lecture 9: Justification for Adopting Distance
Education and Open Learning in Developing
Countries
• The Need to Promote National Development
• Historical Legacy of Correspondence
Education
• Expansion of Educational and Training
Opportunities Through Cost-Effective Delivery
Methods
61
• Promotion of Non-Formal Education
• The Need to Provide Innovative Education
Programmes
- In the early 1980s, Tanzania used distance
education to train Grade "C" teachers needed
for the implementation of the universal
primary education.
- From 1981, Zimbabwe used the ZINTEC
programme to train primary school teachers in
order to introduce a new primary education
curriculum.
62
• Countries in crisis such as Somalia and Sudan
have used distance education to provide
education for displaced people.
• Through the South African Extension Unit
(SAEU) and the Namibia Extension Unit (NEU)
the Commonwealth Secretariat provided
educational and training opportunities by
distance education to South African and
Namibian exiles respectively in Southern
Africa in the 1980s and early 1990s.
63
Part 6
Lecture 10:Challenges of Distance Education and
Open Learning in Developing Countries
Strengths
• Significant rise in literacy levels achieved in
African countries, can be attributed to the
initiatives of government correspondence
colleges.
• Investment in education results in positive
changes in basic indicators of development.
64
• Ministries of Education have appreciated the
potential of distance education and open
learning as a means of expanding educational
opportunities and developing human
resources cost – effectively.
Challenges
• In many African countries, distance education
and open learning programmes remain
underdeveloped and undervalued.
• Underfunding – Low – cost; excessive
dependence on Donor Grants.
65
• Personnel Training – Lack of personnel to
prepare courses, teach by open and distance
learning methods, provide and maintain the
infrastructure to produce and deliver the
courses.
• Educational Crisis in Africa -The education
sector is characterized by stagnation, decline
and falling investment.
• Weak Tertiary Level and Technical Distance
Education – Not linked with school education.
66
THE END
Thank You
For Your
Attention
67