Capítulo 12 - Macro level Blended Learning. The experience of the Bavarian Virtual University

Paul Rühl
Managing Director of the Bavarian Virtual University and coordinates EuNeOn, the European Network for Higher Education Online

 

1.  THE BAVARIAN VIRTUAL UNIVERSITY-AIMS, FACTS AND FIGURES

In the Federal Republic of Germany, higher education is the exclusive legislative domain of the 16 states («Länder»). Bavaria, with an area of 70,000 km², is the largest of these states, and the second largest with regard to population (12.5 million). The federal structure of Germany explains why there is no «German Virtual University».

The Bavarian Virtual University (Virtuelle Hochschule Bayern-VHB) was set up in May 2000. Among the founding universities were all nine state universities and all 17 state universities of Applied Sciences in Bavaria. A further five universities in Bavaria outside the jurisdiction of the Bavarian Ministry of Higher Education have also become members. At the moment, the member universities have about 260,000 students. This figure is expected to rise to about 320,000 by 2012.

The aim of the VHB is to complement the programmes of the traditional universities, not to replace them. With the help of the VHB, students can earn credit points in individual courses, but they obtain their degrees at their home universities as the VHB does not offer complete courses of study.

The VHB employs neither academic staff nor tutors. Full-time employees of the VHB are administrative and technical personnel. Teaching is offered by professors of member universities who work within the VHB either as part of their workload or in addition to it. For day-to-day course work, professors usually employ tutors. The remuneration of the tutors is subsidised by the VHB. The financial support for the courses in action (not only for their preparation) is a key concept of the VHB’s course development policy.

In the academic year 2007 / 2008, more than 180 different courses were available. Most courses are offered each term (semester), some courses are offered once a year. In both terms of the academic year 2007 / 2008 combined, there were more than 47,000 enrolments by 18,000 individual students. This makes the VHB one of Europe’s largest providers of higher education online. Already in 2007 the VHB was identified as a «mega-provider» of higher education online by the «MegaTrends» –project of the European Union–¹.

Among the many elements which have made this success possible, perhaps the single most important success factor is the decision to employ «blended learning» at the macro level. The present article will outline this approach.

2.  BLENDED LEARNING-MICRO AND MACRO LEVELS

During the e-learning «hype» around the turn of the millennium, e-learning was widely regarded as a superior way of teaching and learning and as a panacea to all the problems of the traditional universities. Promises as well as expectations were grossly exaggerated. Many advocates of e-learning even regarded the traditional universities as an endangered species. Face-to-face teaching, those enthusiasts predicted, would soon be greatly reduced. In a study published by the renowned Bertelsmann Foundation in 2000 2, three experts predicted that already in 2005 more than half of the students World attend virtual rather than traditional brick-and-mortar universities.

Soon it became obvious that neither promises nor expectations would be fulfilled. The importance of interaction and especially of direct, not technically mediated face-to-face contact for human learning again was on the agenda. A new term appeared: «blended learning» became the common term for the integration of computer -and web- aided elements into teaching and learning. But at which level, at which granularity should face-to-face and online elements be combined? Should that combination take place at the level of the single lecture, the single course, or at the level of the course of studies?

3.  BLENDED LEARNING AT THE MICRO LEVEL

By «blended learning», many experts mean the combination of face-to-face teaching and web-based teaching within a single course. We call this type of blended learning «micro-level blended learning».

Micro-level blended learning obviously avoids the problems of long-term distance teaching and learning and can have many pedagogical benefits. It can enhance and enrich the traditional approaches to teaching and learning by facilitating the integration of the whole range of multimedia teaching and learning aids as well as of other information sources on the web. On the other hand, teachers using single e-learning elements in their courses do not necessarily gain additional teaching-time, and micro-level blended learning is hardly a remedy for, e.g., a shortage of lecture rooms, which many universities have to face.

In many cases, especially when the e-learning elements concerned are exploited by only one professor at one university, micro-level blended learning seems to offer a possibly higher quality of teaching only at additional cost. Thus, micro-level blended learning seems feasible only where and if additional financial means are available –the alternative being unpaid additional work by enthusiast teachers–.

For the students, e-learning seems to be especially attractive if it helps them to arrange their individual courses of study in a more flexible way. This is particularly important for the growing number of non-traditional students –students who have to combine their academic effort with «ordinary» work, or students who have to care for children or other relatives–. Blended learning at the micro-level of the single course offers only a rather limited degree of flexibility.

Another problem of micro-level blended learning is that it complicates cooperation between universities. To acknowledge the course of another university, to integrate it into one of the local courses of study can be attractive for a university if the total responsibility for the given course can be delegated to the «exporting» university. If the «importing» university should have to provide tutoring to their students from their own teaching resources, this would make the «import» of courses far less attractive. In addition, micro-level blended learning courses are unattractive for students if the face-to-face sessions require time-consuming travelling to other cities.

4.  BLENDED LEARNING A THE MACRO LEVEL

The VHB address these issues by offering macro-level blended learning. We understand macro-level blended learning to be the integration of single online courses into courses of study or curricula which predominantly consist of «traditional» face-to-face courses. Thus, students can earn some credits in online-courses, but not a full degree. This combination of face-to-face courses with courses that are delivered completely on-line (with the possible exception of the final examination which has to be held face-to-face) allows the students much more flexibility than micro-level blended learning. At the same time students enjoy all the benefits of traditional face-to-face university teaching. Therefore, macro-level blended learning minimises the dangers of social isolation often associated with distance learning.

Moreover, if online courses are developed once at one university, but exploited at several universities, the comparative cost-effectiveness is obvious. Universities can «import» courses from other universities, even including student support from tutors of the «exporting» university. In contrast to micro-level blended learning, this kind of import also helps universities to compensate for a possible lack of teachers as well as eventual room shortages.

The possibility of integrating online courses managed by other universities into local programmes is especially valuable for smaller universities and for universities of Applied Sciences creating Master programmes. The experience of the VHB shows that large universities and their students profit equally from having at their disposal a variety of courses from other universities.

5.  FUTURE PROSPECTS

Macro-level blended learning combines the social and pedagogical benefits of face-to-face teaching and learning with the economic effects of e-learning. It is therefore one of the responses to the challenge of growing student numbers in times of strained public budgets.

To achieve the goal of cost-effectiveness, courses must be developed to meet the demand of the universities. To develop new courses exclusively according to the pedagogical and other preferences of individual professors at individual universities would not ensure the amount of student enrolment necessary for a noticeable contribution to the total teaching load of the Bavarian universities, and it would implicate the danger of paying the reinvention of the wheel with the taxpayer’s money.

The cost effectiveness of macro-level blended learning is a major motivation for financing the necessary administrative structures and the development of new content for shared use. However, it should be pointed out that macro-level blended learning is not an instrument for reducing the overall cost of education. On the contrary, investment in education, in Germany at least, will have to be increased considerably, and face-to-face teaching and learning will continue to be dominant in higher education. Macro-level blended learning is a means of limiting the additional costs of better education for more students.

It is to be expected that these aspects of macro level blended learning will become even more important when the consequences of growing public debt will become clearly visible in the years to come.