Introduction
Two basic organisational models for distance education systems or institutions can be identified, namely the purpose-built institution model and the mixed-mode institution model (Rumble, 1986). The purpose-built institutions teach only distance students. They develop their own teaching materials for the distance teaching purpose. They teach and examine their own students. The purpose-built institutions started in the nineteenth century with the development of commercial correspondence schools and colleges. And the twentieth century has seen the development of purpose-built distance teaching universities. The earliest are those which were started in the Soviet Union and later in South Africa. More have been developed since the 1970s following the establishment of the British Open University (Enckevort et al, 1986).
The major argument for the purpose-built organisational model is that administrative structures of conventional educational systems are not the most suitable ones for developing and managing distance education systems. It is argued that distance education systems engage in several quasi-industrial processes, for example the production, storage and distribution of teaching materials. And the best results are achieved where disciplined adherence to production schedules is encouraged. All staff including academics, are required to work in a disciplined manner and deliver the products on time. The purpose-built institution model is most suited for this kind of corporate culture (Perry, 1976; Daniel and Smith, 1979; and Rumble, 1986). In this kind of corporate culture, academics are subjected to managerial controls and are accountable for their work in ways different from those in a conventional educational institution, where they enjoy almost complete autonomy. It is further argued that the requirements
of distance students are likely to be better served in an institution which is wholly dedicated to distance education. For example, it is easier for it to design and develop new courses to meet the needs of distance students, since there are no competing needs from other categories of students.
The mixed-mode institutions or systems teach both conventional classroom based (internal) and distance (external) students. Mixed-mode systems include (a) a structure where within the university there is a single department which teaches and administers courses at a distance on its own, without involving the rest of the university and (b) a structure whereby a number of departments offer distance education courses but where there is a central unit to administer the distance education programme. In the former organisational structure the separate distance teaching department is sometimes invested with considerable autonomy and has authority to decide what should be taught to whom and how. In the latter Organisation arrangement the distance education department is only an administrative unit. It has little or no autonomy. It works closely with faculties or schools. The decision as to what should be taught at a distance and to whom is a product of a joint decision in which the influence of academics in
the schools or faculties may predominate over that of academics working in the distance education unit. The Department of Correspondence Studies at the University of Zambia is an example of the latter type of organisational model. Academic staff in the schools are responsible for teaching both internal and external students, while the Department provides administrative services.
The major argument for the mixed-mode organisational model with a distance education department fulfilling a purely administrative role is that, since both external and internal students meet the same entry requirements, are taught by the same lecturers and write the same examinations, it ensures a parity of academic standards and hence legitimacy and credibility of qualifications awarded to external students. The assumption is that the quality of teaching materials prepared and the support services, such as counselling, provided to external students are sufficiently high to enable them to achieve the course or learning objectives as well as do the internal students.
This article analyses the practice of organising for distance education in a mixed-mode institutions model as found at the University of Zambia. There are four basic functions that a distance education institution or system undertakes which require to be organized in one way or another. These are (a) the development and production of teaching materials; (b) the storage and distribution of teaching materials; (c) provision of two-way communication channels between students and teachers/tutors and (d) record keeping (Erdos, 1975; Holmberg, 1981; Perraton, 1984; and Rumble, 1986). An analysis is made of how these functions are organised. It brings out the problems and issues associated with the mixed-mode organisation model of the type found at the University of Zambia.
Development and production of lecture materials
The Department of Correspondence Studies in the Centre for Continuing Education undertakes administrative functions such as enrolling students, printing and dispatching study materials and maintaining student records.
The teaching and tutoring function is undertaken by academic staff of the various teaching departments and schools of the University. The development of lecture or study materials function rests with the teaching departments in the schools which participate in the distance education programme. Course development here means the entire process from course planning to writing individual lessons or study lectures. The planning of courses is done by the departments with the approval of School Board of Studies and the Senate. Courses are implemented once the Senate has approved them. The lecturers and professors who are assigned to teach courses which are offered both to internal and external students are required to prepare lecture or teaching study materials for both categories of students. The prepared or written study materials are then sent to the Department of Correspondence Studies for production and distribution to the students. The assumption in this organisation arrangement is that lecturers are
not only content experts but also experts at teaching distance students. For example, when writing study materials they are expected to consider principles of learning such as supplying the learner with appropriate practice or activities, providing the learner with a chance to obtain feedback, and selecting and using appropriate instructional media. However, in practice the lecturers and professors involved in preparing study materials for distance students do not see that their task goes beyond merely putting together lecture notes used to teach internal student or reproducing chapters in textbooks. There are two reasons for this. First, many of them have no prior training or experience in distance education methods. Besides, the organisation for course development does not create opportunities or the environment for lecturers to learn on the job to become course developers who can work as authors and editors and take responsibility for the choice and use of appropriate media in their course materials.
Second, most lecturers have very heavy teaching loads for internal students and this does not give them time for preparing study materials for external students whom they regard as an extra burden. Hence, this accounts for their apparent negative attitude towards the distance education programme.
Nevertheless, once the study materials are prepared by the lecturers and professors, they are sent to the Lecture Materials Units (LMU) of the Department of Correspondence Studies for printing. The LMU records the study materials before passing them to the Typing Pool (TP) for stencil cutting. The method of printing is that of stencil cutting and duplicating. The stencils are then sent back to the LMU for proof-reading and duplicating, once the corrections are completed. The main problem here is the technical quality of the study materials produced. First, attention is not paid to the layout in the typing, although there is a format to be followed. There are two main reasons for this: (a) the support staff are not trained to type distance study materials. And even if they were trained, that would not help, since typists and other non-academic staff who provide support services can be transferred to any other department of the University, regardless of specialised knowledge and skills they have acqui
red as a result of working in their present department; and (b) lecturers contribute to the problem by requesting that whole chapters or section of books be reproduced. Secondly, the proof-reading is not properly done and, as result, the study materials have many typing errors which can be a hindrance to reading and, therefore, learning. The organizational arrangement does not allow for appointment of full-time proof-readers. The Department of Correspondence Studies depends on part-time, untrained and inexperienced proof-readers, who in most cases are undergraduate students. Sometimes the poor technical quality of study materials is due to other factors which are mainly technological, such as failure of the machines (typewriters and duplicating machines) to function well and the poor quality of paper. After the study materials are printed and packed in the LMU, they are passed to the Department Registry for mailing to the students. The Registry keeps a record of all study materials sent to the students,
in addition to a similar dispatch record kept by the LMU.
The distribution of lecture materials
Print is the main medium of instruction in the distance education programme at the University of Zambia. Therefore, the programme relies mainly on the country's postal system. As mentioned earlier, the printed study materials are mailed to all enrolled students, wherever they are in the country. However, since the national postal system is still developing, the distribution of study materials has been affected. The experience thus far shows that it is a slow process. Often students receive their study materials late. Students' written assignments are received late and returned late. The process results in intermittent and delayed feedback. In some areas of the country the turn-round of mail is about two months. This has obviously affected student performance. However, the University has not taken full advantage of the broadcasting and other media to circumvent the problem of the slow distribution of study materials. In particular, the use of radio could help to speed up the process. The other a
lternatives to be considered are the use of telephones and the delivering of study materials by road to groups of learners in places where the University has Resident Tutors' offices.
Communication with students
Communication with distance students at the University of Zambia is done through the following ways:
- Printed study materials are mailed to students. The printed study materials have several advantages: (a) they allow the student independence and freedom to decide when and where to study; (b) they provide the student with a permanent and easily accessible record of learning materials (c) they do not require special equipment or maintenance and they are easy to distribute by post. However, these advantages are severely undermined by (a) the quality of study materials, which is usually poor and prepared without considering the needs of distance students and (b) the undeveloped postal system especially in the rural areas. A well-developed postal system is a necessary condition, although not sufficient. A well-developed postal system can be supported by the other media such as radio. But unfortunately radio programmes for university distance education have been suspended due to lack of production personnel.
- Regular submission of written assignments: Students submit written assignments during the year. These assignments are corrected or marked by the lecturers and returned to the students through the Department of Correspondence Studies. They are returned with written comments from the lecturers. This is the only time, apart from the chance provided by the residential school, that a lecturer has a chance to communicate his comments to the student. In other words tutoring by the lecturers is done by commenting on the students' assignments. It must be emphasised that tutoring a distance student is a specialist job. It requires the tutor to correspond warmly and sympathetically with the students as Perraton (1984) pointed out, a tutor
has a slightly different function from that of marking, which is to build up a relationship with the student. If the student feels that his tutor is a real person, and gets to know him through correspondence even if he never meets him, then each will get much more out of the relationship (p. 69).
The comments one reads on assignments by distance students at the University of Zambia appear to be those intended for internal students who have the chance to visit their tutors in their offices for clarification or further help. Again, as for the preparation of study materials, the lecturers appear not to have both the expertise and time to provide the tutoring service that takes into account the needs of distance students.
- Occasional face-to-face teaching is done through a two to three weeks residential school organised once a year during vacations. Students are required to attend residential school, since they are regarded as an integral part of teaching. Exemption is not normally granted. This is a plus for the distance education programme at the University of Zambia. It gives students the chance to use the facilities of the University such as the Library and the Bookstore, apart from interacting with their teachers. It gives a human face to the whole programme and reduces the psychological barrier of feelings of isolation common to a distance student.
- Counselling is offered by the two course advisers in the Department of Correspondence Studies who give minimum counselling services to all students enrolled in correspondence courses. They counsel students in matters such as choice of degree programmes, course combinations, withdrawing from studies, enrolling, and academic progress. These services are very limited and only few students in a year have access to them. Perhaps this is a function that should be undertaken by the lecturers together with tutoring. A reorganisation is needed which could result in an increased number of academic staff who could provide the tutoring and counselling services-instead of the two academic personnel provided under the current organization.
Record keeping
A record system is the nerve centre of any institution. Information is required for various purposes which include decision making. A distance education institution or system must organize for the following types of records: student records, tutor or lecturer records and teaching materials records (Perraton, 1984). At the University of Zambia some of these records are kept by the teaching departments and schools and others are kept in the Registry in the Department of Correspondence Studies.
Apart from being a mailing or dispatch room, the Registry of the Department of Correspondence Studies is a records office (Nyirenda, 1982). It maintains student records on enrolments, students who have been withdrawn either with penalty or with permission, expelled students, course assessment, examination results, and student fees payments. The Registry operates a manual record keeping system based on the filing system. Each student has a file in which records about him/her are kept. The typical contents of a student file (a) the enrolment forms completed by the student which contain student background information in addition to enrolment information; (b) student fees forms which indicate the payments of fees made so far: (c) student progress: - assignments submitted and returned and forms which indicate courses taken and passed or failed; (d) information about attendance at annual residential schools; (e) copies of examination results slips and correspondence both from the student to the University an
d to the student from the University as well as correspondence about the student from within the University (i.e. departments and schools).
This is a reasonably comprehensive record kept by the Registry. However, considering that it is manually maintained, the possibility of gaps in information on each student cannot be ruled out. Furthermore, there is still room for expanding the records on students. Records about study materials are kept by the LMU of the Department of Correspondence Studies. It uses a simple progress control chart on a board to monitor study materials production.
Summary and conclusion
The lecturer at the University of Zambia who is involved in the teaching of distance students does not have time to develop suitable quality distance education lecture materials and to tutor distance students. They are obliged by their conditions of service to teach distance students. Many of them have no prior training or experience in distance education methods. This situation has undermined the very argument of parity of standards the University wants to maintain (Siaciwena, 1983).
Therefore, it can be concluded that the mixed-mode Organisation for distance education, at the University of Zambia in which teaching is done by academic staff in schools of the University and the Department of Correspondence Studies provides solely administrative services, has been disadvantageous to the distance teaching programme. This study agrees with Siaciwena (1983) when he states that:
It has created a number of problems including late and hasty preparation of materials and late return of marked assignments from lecturers. As a result the study materials have been of poor quality in terms of layout in many courses... This has had an adverse effect on students' performance and progression (p. 70).
Siaciwena has further pointed out that lecturers who have a full teaching load for internal students tend to dislike teaching distance students. This is understandable, since teaching distance students is more demanding than teaching internal students. It 'involves meticulous preparation of instructional materials and marking of students' assignments' (Nyirenda, 1982, p. 24).
In addition to the pedagogical quality of study materials, there is a need to produce good quality materials in terms of technical characteristics such as the layout, legibility of print and colour of paper. The technical quality of study materials to some extent depends on the knowledge and skills of the support staff producing them. But as it has been shown, it has not been possible at the University of Zambia to produce technically good quality study materials, because the support staff are not trained to do that and, since they can be transferred anytime to any other department of the University, they are not motivated to learn or acquire the required knowledge and skills. Such training would be a waste of resources unless the present policy changed.
There are two other issues that have emerged. First, there is a need for lecturers to participate more actively in the provision of tutoring and counselling services to distance students. Tutoring a distance student 'is exacting since it demands ability to write full, fair, thoughtful, probing comments on the work of someone the tutor may possibly never meet' (Rogers, 197, p. 83). Secondly, there is a need to strengthen the distribution of study materials through the postal system by considering the use of additional methods such as delivering study materials to groups of learners through the network of Resident Tutors and/or radio broadcasting. The possibility for this even under the existing organisation is very high, provided resources can be found.
What has emerged from the analysis is that there is need to modify the organisation in order to improve on and strengthen the distance education programme. The performance of distance students is to a greater extent dependent on the quantity and quality of both teaching materials and tutoring and counselling services.
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