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Subject: IP: Tech and Education - MIT View
The report of a committee on this topic charged by MIT
President Chuck Vest to explore the same issues in
relationship to the future of that institution.
[EDUCATION VIA ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES]
Final Report, MIT Committee on EVAT
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Medium-Range Recommendations
These recommendations can be started during the next twelve months. Other
pages contain short-range and long-range recommendations.
We recommend:
1. Pedagogic Initiatives. Advanced technologies should enable new ways of
teaching what we teach.
o The Provost should establish a visible and prestigious
Institute-wide competition among faculty for support of curriculum
development projects that make effective pedagogical use of
advanced technologies. The emphasis should be on projects with
readily identified deliverables, actual classroom deployment, and
a relatively short time required for completion and adoption.
Between five and ten projects should be supported annually, at a
total cost of $1M per year. The program should continue for at
least three years. Project leaders should report to Academic
Council and to the Faculty on their progress.
o MIT should study the concept of collaboratively teaching our
regular subjects with other universities, where there would be
both students and teaching staff from each institution. Teaching
staff could also come from industry and private practice. A few
specific subjects should be taught that way in order to gain
experience.
2. Distance Learning. The advanced technologies studied by the committee
enable and improve communications, and can thereby enhance the
effectiveness of distance learning.
o In order to investigate the opportunities and risks associated
with remote delivery of our regular subjects, the EECS department
should offer one regular subject to VI-A students at the plant,
either during a summer or fall term. This offering should use all
the advanced technologies available, not just the Web. As an
alternative, a subject could be offered to students in the
Engineering Internship Program or at the Chemical Engineering
Practice School.
o In a similar way, the proposed Systems Design and Management
program, to be run jointly by the School of Engineering and the
Sloan School, is encouraged to offer one regular MIT subject
remotely to its students while at their companies. The degree of
success of this experiment should be communicated to the faculty
of the Institute.
o MIT should investigate cross-registration of students at remote
campuses. This could include both students of other universities
taking our subjects using advanced technologies, and our students
doing the same with their courses.
3. Alumni/ae Relations. Our alumni/ae should be able to benefit from
continuing MIT education. One long-range recommendation deals with this
opportunity. Improved alumni/ae relations can benefit MIT and the
alumni/ae in many ways even before extensive educational programs can
be mounted.
o The appropriate MIT units, probably Academic Computing and the
Alumni/Alumnae Association, should explore mechanisms to give
alumni/ae network access to materials, discussions,
communications, and other online resources at MIT. These
mechanisms may include MIT-provided services such as Athena
access, commercial access, or some combination of the two. The
analysis should include financial and business aspects.
4. Academic Support. Our normal teaching program can benefit from the
infusion of advanced technologies into the management of the effort.
o All MIT subjects should have Web home pages, or at least
Web-accessible descriptions linked to MIT's official Web pages.
This might be done rather easily by converting what is now in
TechInfo into a different format. Instructors of individual
subjects could develop their own, more extensive, home pages,
which could be linked to a centrally maintained set of pages.
o Bibles (e.g., handouts, notes, problem sets, problem solutions,
quizzes, final exams, and solutions) should be made available, on
line, for all major subjects. The required templates, standards,
and procedures should be developed by the Undergraduate Academic
Affairs Office and the Libraries.
5. Administrative Support. Advanced technologies should be used routinely
in administrative procedures at MIT.
o Web-based forms should be developed for use by the MIT community.
Examples include student registration forms, applications for
parking permits, add/drop cards, and student petitions. (One major
problem with the use of such forms at this time is the lack of
adequate authentication and security mechanisms.)
o Newly admitted students, both high-school seniors and those
accepted to graduate school, should be directed toward information
on the Web specifically designed to help them decide whether to
accept our admission offer. After acceptance, they should be
provided electronic connectivity, such as Athena accounts, to make
them feel part of the MIT community. These efforts should be
organized by the Admissions Office for undergraduate admissions,
and the departments for graduate admissions.
o Student e-mail addresses are useful, unique identifiers. They
should be routinely included in class lists and other lists of
students, probably in place of the MIT IDs which are not generally
as useful.
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This page revised June 12, 1995. Your comments about this report are
welcome.
To the Table of Contents. Copyright (c) 1995 Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
[EDUCATION VIA ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES]
Final Report, MIT Committee on EVAT
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Long-Range Recommendations
These are not recommendations for action; they are recommendations for
study. The resulting programs require further study to verify feasibility,
and then more than a year for implementation. Other pages contain
short-range and medium-range recommendations.
The Committee recommends that MIT monitor carefully trends in advanced
technologies, which both offer opportunities and present risks.
1. Lifelong Learning. Advanced technologies may permit effective distance
education so that education in mid career become more feasible. A
natural group to think of is our own alumni/ae, because they are known
to us, and we are known to them. An extensive program of career-long
education could be thought of in terms of various analogies. Several
industries offer extended warranties or technical assistance, and make
money doing so. In our case we might serve the needs of our graduates
at the time they perceive those needs. We might offer upgrades to our
graduates, to update the technical ideas they have in their minds. The
analogy is to the software industry, which regularly issues software
upgrades and invites customers to buy the latest version. Another
metaphor is the Health Maintenance Organization. In our case, an
Educational Maintenance Organization might emphasize preventing
obsolescence by introducing alumni/ae to new ideas and new skills
before their lack causes problems. Any of these models changes how we
think of our students, from customers during an intense 4 or 5 year
period, to that of partners in education, with a relationship lasting
through the end of the their careers.
o We recommend that, as a first step, electronic connectivity with
our graduates be enhanced (this is one of our medium-term
recommendations).
o We recommend that an ad hoc faculty committee prepare plans for a
pilot program in lifelong learning, using advanced technologies,
for our alumni/ae, so that we can gain experience.
2. Pre-Freshmen. Many high-school seniors who are accepted to MIT are
capable of taking one of our freshman subjects. The opportunity to do
this would increase the likelihood of their choosing MIT in preference
to another university. The program would also increase the visibility
of MIT in high schools and result in more qualified applicants.
o We recommend a study of the feasibility of offering one or more of
our freshman subjects remotely, to high-school seniors who have
been admitted.
3. Risks and Opportunities. MIT could easily misjudge the impact of
advanced technologies if we are not prepared. If distance education
becomes well understood by other universities but not us, we are at
risk of losing our reputation as leaders in education. We might find
ourselves competing on price with other universities in courses like
our freshman subjects. Or, on the other hand, we might overlook the
opportunity to capitalize on MIT's name recognition to market education
programs for the large number of students who are qualified for MIT but
whom we cannot admit for lack of space.
o We recommend the development of plans for responding to dramatic
future developments in advanced technologies, so that MIT is
prepared to act decisively and rapidly as changes occur.
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This page revised June 12, 1995. Your comments about this report are
welcome.
To the Table of Contents. Copyright (c) 1995 Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
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