Family and Education

Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

, in 1911, to parents of modest means, Charles Wedemeyer developed a sense of excitement for what he described as “self-initiated” learning. His parents, Adrian August Wedemeyer and Laura Marie Marks Wedemeyer strived to provide books and magazines and an environment conducive to learning. An avid reader, the young Wedemeyer made great use of his local library in his quest for knowledge. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Education with a major in English, later pursuing a Master’s Degree in English, both from the University of Wisconsin–Madison

University of Wisconsin–Madison

The University of Wisconsin–Madison is a public research university located in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1848, UW–Madison is the flagship campus of the University of Wisconsin System. It became a land-grant institution in 1866...

 and Northwestern University

Northwestern University

Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

. As a young educator, he taught English and Science to disadvantaged youth. It was at that time that he began to formulate his progressive ideas on extending educational opportunities as integral to the democratic project.

Radio

An enthusiastic instructor, during the difficult decade of the Great Depression

Great Depression

The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...

, Wedemeyer began to use the airwaves to broadcast English lessons, using the University of Wisconsin’s radio station—a resource made available in accordance with the University Extension’s mission since 1919—in an attempt to reach an audience to that point excluded from the educational system.

NUEA Committee on Standardization

As early as 1891, the extension movement had been imported from Britain—championed by William Rainey Harper

William Rainey Harper

William Rainey Harper was one of America's leading academics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Harper helped to organize the University of Chicago and Bradley University and served as the first President of both institutions.-Early life:Harper was born on July 26, 1856 in New Concord,...

, with the founding of the University of Chicago—along with correspondence study. In 1906, under the leadership of William H. Lighty, the University of Wisconsin became preeminent in the development of the extension movement and correspondence study. In 1915, leaders formed the National University Extension Association (NUEA); the inaugural meeting was held in Madison. By 1929, the NUEA Committee on Standardization created recommendations on such matters as course and credit equivalencies and instruction by regular faculty. In 1931, this committee identified the first standards for the new discipline, covering eight specific areas for the field.

Naval Instructor

As a naval instructor in World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Wedemeyer interrupted his doctoral studies to create effective teaching methods for the benefit of thousands of sailors deployed around the world in adverse learning conditions. This experience was instrumental in his development of a theoretical framework using innovative communication technologies adapted for non-traditional learners. In the post-war period at the University of Wisconsin’s School of Education, Department of Continuing and Vocational Education, and at the University Extension Division, Wedemeyer pioneered distance and independent learning, although the “distance” descriptor was not used until much later.

Implementing a range of technologies as educational tools, Wedemeyer experimented with radio, television, records, tapes, film, telephones, and computers to enhance and reinforce learning for students near and far. His innovative approach impelled him to travel to six continents, where he witnessed much despair as a consequence of deprivation and neglect of educational opportunity.

Director University of Wisconsin's Independent Study

Wedemeyer’s advanced ideas on self-directed, independent learning emanated from his desire to extend learning opportunities beyond the university to traditionally excluded populations of “back door learners.” With correspondence study—later independent study—students engaged in learning on their own initiative, set their own goals, and exercised a high degree of autonomy. As Director of the University of Wisconsin’s Correspondence Study Program 1954-1964, Wedemeyer broke the mould for higher and adult learning. He initiated a number of research projects on areas of concern for independent study, such as learner characteristics, instructor characteristics, quality and effectiveness. From modest beginnings, he went on to publish a newsletter, The Correspondent, which solicited student and faculty contributions on the process of learning by correspondence (letter to Dr. Borje Holmberg 6/25/84). “There is nothing in our history that remotely justifies the derogation of any kind of learning as second class, when undertaken with purpose, initiative, energy and resourcefulness." In 1961, he collaborated with Gayle Childs, from the University of Nebraska, to write New Perspectives in University Correspondence Study, published by the Center for the Study of Liberal Education of Adults (CSLEA). Also that year, Wedemeyer became Chairman of the National University Extension Association (NUEA) Committee on Criteria and Standards. In Nebraska the following year, NUEA members ratified the 12-page document, establishing the standards as official NUEA policy.

At Madison, Wedemeyer organized and chaired a series of faculty seminars, each devoted to a particular aspect of correspondence instruction, led by a recognized educational leader who presented a paper on a given topic. Reading lists were distributed in advance, and library materials provided. Held twice a semester, the seminars produced articles which were subsequently published in two volumes as the Brandenburg Memorial Essays (1963–1966). Wedemeyer considered that "independent study in the American context is generic for a range of teaching-learning activities that sometimes go by separate names (correspondence study, open education, radio-television teaching, individualised learning)."

A life-long advocate for independent learning, his best known project was the Articulated Instructional Media (AIM) initiative which proved influential in the establishment of Britain’s Open University, now known as the UK Open University.