The number of participants in higher education is growing rapidly worldwide. Apart from the growing number of adult participants, the variety of students in general is increasing. However, the organization of universities is hardly able to deal with this growing variety. Students can chose between campus or distance-teaching universities and between full-time or part-time studies. These limited alternatives do not serve many students well with. A thorough redesign must offer relief.
The value of personal contact between students and teachers
Whether students are enrolled in a campus or a distance-teaching university, they spend most of their time on independent study: At home, at work, on the train or in the library. The difference between the two types of universities is the way they support these activities. The majority of campus universities are deploying a combination of lectures and seminars. Distance-teaching universities offer a sequence of assignments, which students have to submit in order to receive feedback. When it comes to getting acquainted with knowledge or theoretical insights, both ways are effective. However online support is definitely outperforming lectures and seminars with respect to efficiency and scalability.
The value-added of campus universities should rather be sought in teaching methods where the degree of interaction between students and teachers goes beyond incidental questioning and answering during lectures and seminars. For instance: tutorials (meetings a few students with a tutor), projects (intensive meetings of students, occasionally attended by a teacher), working groups in problem-based learning (10-15 students, who meet with a tutor regularly) and some types of training. Activities like these outperform the capabilities of education online with respect to aims like critical thinking and problem solving. Unfortunately, the domination of lectures and seminars prevents that campus universities realize this potential fully.
The value of self-paced learning
The majority of educational programs – campus-based or distance teaching – are starting once or twice a year and their length is fixed. For those students who combine study with a job, music or sport, a family and a social life, this system is untenable. Students differ with respect to the time they can spend on their study each week, to the distribution of the available time during the year, to the speed at which they learn and to the knowledge and skills they already possess.
Fortunately, a growing number of distance teaching institutions is adapting their organization to support self-paced learning. These institutions offer unlimited opportunity to enrol as well . In order to stimulate that students prioritize their study as much as possible, they pay a fixed monthly fee under the motto learn as much as you can. Unfortunately, the majority of programs online fail to realize the benefits of flexibility.
Distance teaching and campus-based education both have potential advantages, whose benefits are not fully used.
The value of blending learning
Education online is perfectly well equipped for enabling educational aims like the acquisition of knowledge and the development of theoretical insight. With respect to this aim, campus-based universities can economize by substituting lectures and seminars by online teaching methods. As mentioned before, some types of face-to-face interaction between teachers and students are superior in the realization of educational aims like critical thinking and problem solving. All students – in campuses or online – will benefit from occasional participation in tutorials, projects, small group meetings or intense trainings like boot camps. For some students it will be feasible to be on campus every day, for others one day every week suits best or they prefer residential weeks, for example, four times a year. By offering a variety of blends between face-to-face meetings and activities online, university campuses will become nodes in educational networks and be able to host many more students than at present. The functional combination of independent study with both face-to-face and online support is representing the best of both worlds at lower costs.
The value of freedom what or where to learn
The body of scientific knowledge is doubling every nine years, disciplinary borders get blurred and best research is interdisciplinary. As a consequence, the disciplines that emerged in the 19th century have become obsolete. Nonetheless, they still dominate the educational field. It is time to exchange traditional subjects for broad fields of study that offer ample opportunity to chose introductory and advanced course and projects.
At the same time, students will increasingly obtain their degree by visiting several universities within their country or abroad. Thus, students take maximum advantage of the differences between institutions. In order to assess students, universities should describe their examination rules in terms of competencies to achieve instead of courses to follow.
A blended mix of face-to-face and online activities that is supporting students' independent learning could become the new normal. A variety of blends will be available and universities will become more diverse.
