Web conferencing is proving to be ideal for distance-learning
management courses, writes Daniel Thomas.
Henley Management College in Oxfordshire, one of the pioneers of
the distance-learning MBA (master of business administration), is
using Web conferencing technology to support the delivery of its
management training courses.
Henley College, which offers short electronic courses in subjects
such as e-business and competitor intelligence to participants from
areas as geographically distant as the West Indies and the Middle
East, says Web conferencing is a natural progression from its
existing use of e-learning tools.
E-learning has been in place to support the MBA and executive
courses for many years and the core platform has been available as
a Web-based e-learning tool since 1999.
The platform provides asynchronous connectivity but the college
wanted a synchronous tool to support more personal learning,
explains Matty Smith, director of learning and teaching services.
"Our research showed that Web conferencing is the only tool that
fully supports a collaborative group-learning approach," he says.
Henley College trialled the use of audio and videoconferencing but
a number of problems ensued after the implementation, says Smith.
For example, he says, many of the home participants did not have
the necessary equipment to use the system, forcing them to travel
to a separate centre, negating the time and cost benefits
videoconferencing claimed to offer. In addition, Smith says it did
not allow for information to be transferred in a collaborative way
- an essential tenet of the college's approach to study.
Audio conferencing proved to be more useful, robust and
cost-effective than video but the use of the technology was limited
due to the fact that course members could only interact verbally.
It was also incapable of showing and sharing applications, which is
particularly important for e-courses.
After the problems encountered during these trials, the college
opted for Web conferencing, externally hosted by supplier
PlaceWare.
Although it required changes to traditional teaching methods, Web
conferencing has enabled tutors to present to distributed learners
in a more structured and focused way, Smith says.
Web conferencing, he explains, not only allows tutors and students
to share applications, such as Powerpoint, Word and Excel, but it
also supports real-time interaction. Course members make frequent
use of the application's tools for voting, whiteboarding (entering
free text or images on screen) and submitting text-based questions.
These tools, Smith says, are an essential way for assessing course
members' comprehension, extending learning and exchanging
information.
Smith expects the college to extend its use of the technology in
the coming months. "The success of the project is attested by the
fact that Web conferencing is fast replacing the collaboration
tools we used before," he says.