BACKGROUND

Virtual Universities are making headlines. The Western Governors' Association, working with the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE) has a fast track action planning process underway to create the "Western Virtual University." The full proposal "A Western Virtual University: From Vision to Reality" is up on the World Wide Web (http://www.wiche.edu/telecom/). The WICHE Homepage also includes information on the SmartStates initiative created by western state governors as a mechanism to "manage change for the benefit of government, business, and citizens." The initiative states that "information technology is the single most powerful agent of change in organizational life, and there are three key avenues through which the Governors can harness this change to promote market efficiency in the development of accessible, cost-effective networked services for the public and private sectors."

There are many virtual university activities going on in the private and public sectors. For example, Microsoft has a Virtual University Institute, with a mission currently described as "brokering" through technology arrangements between teachers and learners. Microsoft says they will make matches and take a percentage for overhead.

ADEC is currently partnering with North Carolina State University, University of Illinois, as well as appropriate others as identified, to move forward to develop an ADEC Virtual Learning Environment.

ISSUES FROM WESTERN GOVERNORS/WICHE INITIATIVE

The Western Governors' Initiative paper identifies some of the reasons they want to form a Western Virtual University:

• better link educational and business opportunities - better educational environment for the private sector
  
• shift certification and incentive mechanisms to open marketplace environment
  
• change way accrediting is done - "competency based" - see "Schools Out" - Lewis Perelman (he is on the advisory panel for this) - develop new currency that makes learning "portable" in the marketplaces of employment and academe.
  
• expand marketplace for instructional materials - Simon and Schuster have given the Governors/WICHE $150,000 for planning this - remove state barriers so educational markets can function freely

The Governors say they want the plan fully in place by June 1996 and the Western Virtual University operational by June 1997. They want the university to be market oriented, independent ("not controlled by those who represent established interests with regard to either the delivery of education or its certification); client-centered; degree-granting; accredited; competency-based; non-teaching (drawing on capacity from anywhere public or private); high quality; cost-effective (reduce per student costs and time to degree); regional, quickly initiated (no lengthy study or developmental work). There is a regional advisory group and governors may appoint state advisory groups.

"USING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY TO ENHANCE ACADEMIC PRODUCTIVITY"

This 1995 EDUCOM report by W. F. Massey and R. Zemsky identifies the following points of significance to ADEC members:

1. "Investments in knowledge codification, delivery systems, and assessment techniques will decouple the provision of learning from the certification of mastery."
   

2. "Information technology "will place the advantage with the learner rather than the institution by creating a more effective market in learning as opposed to a controlled allocation of scarce teaching resources."
   

3. "Given the tremendous knowledge base already extant in their communities, higher education institutions have a significant advantage in capturing this new market in learning - but only if they invest their resources wisely. If universities use the business as usual, non-adaptive strategy - other organizations will cherry pick the knowledge base and intellectual property that colleges and universities have helped to develop but have been unable to exploit in terms of revenues. The result will be research universities will lose out competitively and nontraditional providers will take over a great share of the education market."
   

4. "Higher education's core values will be at risk if more and more undergraduate education shifts to nontraditional providers. Ironically, those research institutions which are most adaptive, most flexible, and most capable of developing information technology utilizations seem to have the least incentive to do so. Their very strength permits them to maintain the traditional ways."
   

5. "Institutions have a great deal to lose or gain depending on their decisions about technology, if colleges and universities fail to adapt effectively, other kinds of institutions will take up the challenge."

PREVIOUS ADEC BOARD ACTION

On January 19, 1996 the ADEC Board of Directors passed a motion to accept the Program Panel report on the Relationship with Community Colleges and the Virtual University presented by Bud Webb, Clemson University. The motion called for the Program Panel to move ahead in dialog with community colleges to determine the kinds of degrees that ADEC as a consortium might be able to offer in a two plus two arrangement and to spell out more completely the implications for ADEC in the "Virtual" environment. The Board noted that speed was important, with an expectation that a more full report should be prepared for the June 13 and 14 Board meeting.

VIRTUAL - TOWARD A DEFINITION FOR ADEC

The term "virtual" as used in this discussion derives from industrial and systems engineering and the concept of "virtual reality". Today you find "virtual" classrooms; "virtual" libraries; "virtual" organizations; "virtual" learning environments; "virtual" meetings and "virtual" spreadsheets. Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) is an open platform independent digital file format for producing three dimensional graphics on the Internet.

"Virtual" universities or technology supported academic and non-formal teaching and learning opportunities are expanding rapidly. The ADEC Program Panel is working with North Carolina State University and the University of Illinois National Center for Supercomputing Applications on the development of "Virtual Learning Environments". ADEC could easily be defined as a "virtual organization" with the following characteristics:

• collaborative - shared purpose
  
• not place bound - any place
  
• asynchronous - anytime
  
• networked communication structure assisted by telecommunication
  
• non-hierarchical - use of star pattern, not pyramid.

ADEC has adapted a distributed strategy intended to create an appropriate menu of learning opportunities - degrees, courses, nonformal/noncredit options, databases and other learning tools through sharing among members. More advanced computer and telecommunications system tools will assist the ADEC virtual organization in achieving its goals - organizationally and educationally.

ADEC'S PLACE IN THE "VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT"

The ADEC Board of Directors declares that the concept/idea for "Virtual Universities" can take many different forms. ADEC accepts the notion that "virtual universities" will become a reality and sees itself as an important part of any major regional or national virtual university development in higher education related to ADEC's core mission areas:

• Food & Agriculture
  
• Environment & Natural Resources
  
• Nutrition & Health
  
• Community & Economic Development
  
• Children, Youth & Families

ADEC is a collaborative organization ready to contribute substantively to the current Western Governors' initiative as well as other activities of this type. ADEC plans to:

• develop a shared menu of program offerings in academic, research and non-formal/non-credit areas by June 1996, including strategies for increasing flexibility, portability and learning mastery oriented accreditation. (This does not imply that a central ADEC entity validates credits, but rather members test creative approaches to accomplish this task in keeping with development of ADEC as a "Virtual Organization".)
  
• develop and implement Memoranda of Understanding and pursue funding strategies that will assure that the consortium develops a state of the art "Virtual Learning Environment". The President and Program Panel should move ahead in working with the University of Illinois NCSA Virtual Organization prototype - preparing to have some on-line offerings available by September 1996. The "Virtual Learning Environment" will be guided by research and best practices in use of technology in teaching and learning. This "Virtual Learning Environment" will include but not be limited to WWW based tools for delivering courses and programs as well as templates for assisting faculty to develop offerings in the "Virtual Environment".
  
• move to partner and link with community colleges, appropriate businesses and organizations to obtain the necessary market research for "Virtual" offerings, define strategies for creatively marketing offerings from the ADEC Program menu and develop methods for brokering quality relationships between learners requiring higher education in ADEC program areas and ADEC member institution providers.
  
• have a complete, detailed strategic plan that is market oriented, tests methods for reducing barriers and assures a quality learning environment, and includes approaches to continuous improvement and evaluation ready for Board action in June 1996. This group should coordinate closely with the Administrative Heads and should be as inclusive as possible in seeking input and contributions.

Accepted by the ADEC Board of Directors on March 1, 1996