Virtual university
Encyclopedia
A virtual university provides higher education
programs through electronic media, typically the Internet
. Some are bricks-and-mortar institutions that provide online learning as part of their extended university courses while others solely offer online courses. They are regarded as a form of distance education
. The goal of virtual universities is to provide access to the part of the population who would not be able to attend a physical campus, for reasons such as distance - where students live too far from a physical campus to attend regular classes; and the need for flexibility – some students need the flexibility to study at home whenever it is convenient for them to do so.
Some of these organizations exist only as loosely tied combines of universities, institutes or departments that together provide a number of courses over the Internet, television or other media, that are separate and distinct from programs offered by the single institution outside of the combine. Others are individual organizations with a legal framework, yet are named "virtual" because they appear only on the Internet, without a physical location aside from their administration units. Still other virtual universities can be organized through specific or multiple physical locations, with or without actual campuses to receive program delivery through technological media that is broadcast from another location where professors give televised lectures.
Program delivery in a virtual university is administered through information communication technology such as web pages, e-mail and other networked sources.
As virtual universities are relatively new and vary widely, questions remain about accreditation
and the quality of assessment.
The Virtual University experience can be accurately summed up in the following excerpt:
"A post-secondary educational environment, delivered electronically through a communications medium, which mimics a real-world post-secondary environment in every aspect, resulting in an educational experience equivalent to one normally received by attending the same university in the physical world."
Lush, G.(2010), The Virtual University: Issues for administrators, p. 1, 2010
When the term “virtual” was first coined in the computational sense, it applied to things that were simulated by the computer, like virtual memory
. Over time, the adjective has been applied to things that physically exist and are created or carried on by means of computers.
The Open University
in the United Kingdom
was the world’s first successful distance teaching university. It was founded in the 1960s on the belief that communications technology could bring high quality degree-level learning to people who had not had the opportunity to attend campus universities. The idea for a “wireless university” was first discussed at the BBC
(British Broadcasting Corporation) by the educationalist and historian J.C. Stobbart. From these early beginnings more ideas came forth until finally the Labour Party
under the leadership of Harold Wilson
formed an advisory committee to establish an Open University.
With the goal of bringing higher education to all those who wanted to access it, the committee came up with various scenarios before settling on the name Open University. The first idea floated in the UK was to have a “teleuniversity” which would combine broadcast lectures with correspondence texts and visits to conventional universities. In the “teleuniversity” scenario courses are taught on the radio and television and in fact many universities adopted the use of this technology for their distance education courses. The name “teleuniversity” morphed into the "University of Air” which still had the same goal of reaching the lower income groups who did not have access to higher education. The name “University of Air” did not stick and by the time the first students were admitted in January 1971 the name had become what it is today “Open University”. OU proved that it was possible to teach university-level courses to students at a distance.
By 1980, total student numbers at OU had reached 70,000 and some 6,000 people were graduating each year. The 1980s saw increased expansion continue as more courses and subject areas were introduced; as the importance of career development grew, so the university began to offer professional training courses alongside its academic programmes. By the mid-nineties the OU was using the internet. As of 2008, more than 180,000 students were interacting with OU online from home.
The idea of a virtual university as an institution that used computers and telecommunications instead of buildings and transport to bring students and teachers together for university courses was first published in works like "De-Schooling Society" by Ivan Illich that introduced the concept of the use of computer networks as switchboards for learning, in 1970. In 1971 George Kasey, a media(activist)ethicist, delivered a series of lectures on "the Philosophy of Communications De-Design" under the sponsorship of Phil Jacklin PhD, professor at University of California San Jose, a member of "The (San Francisco)Bay Area Committee for Open Media and Public Access." The lectures contained the theoretical outlines for use of telecommunications and media for de-schooling and de-design of mainstream education and an alternative Virtual Free University system. By 1972 George Kasey established "Media Free Times - periodical Multimedia Random Sampling of Anarchic Communications Art" a prototype for remote learning with the use of "multi-media periodicals," that are now commonly referred to as "web pages". In 1995 by John Tiffin and Lalita Rajasingham in their book "In Search Of the Virtual Class: Education in an Information Society" (London and New York, Routledge). It was based on a joint research project at Victoria University of Wellington that ran from 1986-1996. Called the virtual class laboratory it used dedicated telecommunication systems to make it possible for students to attend class virtually or physically and was at first supported by a number of telecommunication organisations. Its purpose was to seek the critical factors in using ICT for university level education. In 1992 the virtual class lab moved onto the Internet and in 1995 The Open University of Catalonia became the first virtual university totally dependent on telecommunications and computers.
A number of other universities were involved in the late eighties in pioneering initiatives and experiments were conducted between Victoria University in New Zealand, the University of Hawaii, Ohio State University and Waseda University to try and conduct classes and courses at an international level via telecommunications. This led to the concept of a Global Virtual University.
Providing access to higher education for all students, especially adult learners, is made easier by the fact that most virtual universities have no entry requirements for their undergraduate courses. Entry requirements are needed for the courses that are aimed at postgraduates or those who work in specific jobs.
Studying in a virtual university has essential differences from studying in a brick and mortar university. There are no buildings and no campus to go to because students receive learning materials over the Internet. In most cases, only a personal computer
and an Internet connection is needed. Course materials can include printed material, books, audio and video cassettes, TV programmes, CD-ROM/software, and web sites. Support is offered to learners from the professor or a tutor online through e-mails if they are having problems with the course.
Taking courses on-line means that students will be learning in their own time by reading course material, working on course activities, writing assignments and perhaps working with other students through interactive teleconference
s. Online learning can be an isolating experience since the student spends the majority of their time working by themselves. Some learners do not mind this kind of solo learning, but others find it a major stumbling block to successful completion of courses. Because of the potential difficulty of maintaining the schedule needed to be successful when learning online, some virtual universities apply the same type of time management as traditional schools. Many courses operate to a timetable, which the student receives with the course materials. These may include the planned activities for each week of the course and due dates for the assignments. If the course has an exam, the students will be informed where they have to go to write it.
An example of a university that maintains a tight schedule is the Virtual Global University
(VGU) in Germany. VGU offers a graduate program “International Master of Business Informatics” (MBI) – a master program in information technology and management that takes an average of four semesters to complete (for full-time students). Each course has a lecture or a virtual class meeting every week. Afterwards, students get a homework assignment; for example, they have to solve an exercise, elaborate on some problem, discuss a case study, or take a test. Lecturers give them immediate feedback, and one week later, the same happens again.
network. Then as well as now, many of the virtual study programs were mainly based on text documents, but multimedia
technologies have become increasingly popular as well. These web-based delivery modes are used in order to expand access to programs and services that can be offered anytime and anywhere. The spectrum of teaching modes in virtual education includes courses based on hypertext
, videos, audios, e-mails, and video conferencing. Teaching on the web through courseware such as WebCT
and Blackboard
are also used. See Virtual education
.
However, questions remain about accreditation and the quality of assessment. Accreditation is required to assure students that the online institute has certified online instructors who have the expertise and educational qualifications to design and carry out the curriculum. Assessment standards need to be particularly closely monitored in virtual universities. For example, respondents in studies of opinions about online degrees will rate an online degree from Stanford the same as an on-campus degree, because the name of the granting institution is recognized.
Some open universities also teach online:
Higher education
Higher, post-secondary, tertiary, or third level education refers to the stage of learning that occurs at universities, academies, colleges, seminaries, and institutes of technology...
programs through electronic media, typically the Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
. Some are bricks-and-mortar institutions that provide online learning as part of their extended university courses while others solely offer online courses. They are regarded as a form of distance education
Distance education
Distance education or distance learning is a field of education that focuses on teaching methods and technology with the aim of delivering teaching, often on an individual basis, to students who are not physically present in a traditional educational setting such as a classroom...
. The goal of virtual universities is to provide access to the part of the population who would not be able to attend a physical campus, for reasons such as distance - where students live too far from a physical campus to attend regular classes; and the need for flexibility – some students need the flexibility to study at home whenever it is convenient for them to do so.
Some of these organizations exist only as loosely tied combines of universities, institutes or departments that together provide a number of courses over the Internet, television or other media, that are separate and distinct from programs offered by the single institution outside of the combine. Others are individual organizations with a legal framework, yet are named "virtual" because they appear only on the Internet, without a physical location aside from their administration units. Still other virtual universities can be organized through specific or multiple physical locations, with or without actual campuses to receive program delivery through technological media that is broadcast from another location where professors give televised lectures.
Program delivery in a virtual university is administered through information communication technology such as web pages, e-mail and other networked sources.
As virtual universities are relatively new and vary widely, questions remain about accreditation
Educational accreditation
Educational accreditation is a type of quality assurance process under which services and operations of educational institutions or programs are evaluated by an external body to determine if applicable standards are met...
and the quality of assessment.
The Virtual University experience can be accurately summed up in the following excerpt:
"A post-secondary educational environment, delivered electronically through a communications medium, which mimics a real-world post-secondary environment in every aspect, resulting in an educational experience equivalent to one normally received by attending the same university in the physical world."
Lush, G.(2010), The Virtual University: Issues for administrators, p. 1, 2010
History
The defining characteristic of all forms and generations of distance education is the separation of student and teacher in time and space. Distance education can be seen as the precursor to online learning. Before the advent of virtual universities, many higher education institutions offered some distance education through print-based correspondence courses. These courses were often referred to as a “course in a box”. These have been developed so that students can obtain almost immediate feedback from professors and online tutors through e-mails or online discussions.When the term “virtual” was first coined in the computational sense, it applied to things that were simulated by the computer, like virtual memory
Virtual memory
In computing, virtual memory is a memory management technique developed for multitasking kernels. This technique virtualizes a computer architecture's various forms of computer data storage , allowing a program to be designed as though there is only one kind of memory, "virtual" memory, which...
. Over time, the adjective has been applied to things that physically exist and are created or carried on by means of computers.
The Open University
Open University
The Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
was the world’s first successful distance teaching university. It was founded in the 1960s on the belief that communications technology could bring high quality degree-level learning to people who had not had the opportunity to attend campus universities. The idea for a “wireless university” was first discussed at the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
(British Broadcasting Corporation) by the educationalist and historian J.C. Stobbart. From these early beginnings more ideas came forth until finally the Labour Party
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
under the leadership of Harold Wilson
Harold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, KG, OBE, FRS, FSS, PC was a British Labour Member of Parliament, Leader of the Labour Party. He was twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s, winning four general elections, including a minority government after the...
formed an advisory committee to establish an Open University.
With the goal of bringing higher education to all those who wanted to access it, the committee came up with various scenarios before settling on the name Open University. The first idea floated in the UK was to have a “teleuniversity” which would combine broadcast lectures with correspondence texts and visits to conventional universities. In the “teleuniversity” scenario courses are taught on the radio and television and in fact many universities adopted the use of this technology for their distance education courses. The name “teleuniversity” morphed into the "University of Air” which still had the same goal of reaching the lower income groups who did not have access to higher education. The name “University of Air” did not stick and by the time the first students were admitted in January 1971 the name had become what it is today “Open University”. OU proved that it was possible to teach university-level courses to students at a distance.
By 1980, total student numbers at OU had reached 70,000 and some 6,000 people were graduating each year. The 1980s saw increased expansion continue as more courses and subject areas were introduced; as the importance of career development grew, so the university began to offer professional training courses alongside its academic programmes. By the mid-nineties the OU was using the internet. As of 2008, more than 180,000 students were interacting with OU online from home.
The idea of a virtual university as an institution that used computers and telecommunications instead of buildings and transport to bring students and teachers together for university courses was first published in works like "De-Schooling Society" by Ivan Illich that introduced the concept of the use of computer networks as switchboards for learning, in 1970. In 1971 George Kasey, a media(activist)ethicist, delivered a series of lectures on "the Philosophy of Communications De-Design" under the sponsorship of Phil Jacklin PhD, professor at University of California San Jose, a member of "The (San Francisco)Bay Area Committee for Open Media and Public Access." The lectures contained the theoretical outlines for use of telecommunications and media for de-schooling and de-design of mainstream education and an alternative Virtual Free University system. By 1972 George Kasey established "Media Free Times - periodical Multimedia Random Sampling of Anarchic Communications Art" a prototype for remote learning with the use of "multi-media periodicals," that are now commonly referred to as "web pages". In 1995 by John Tiffin and Lalita Rajasingham in their book "In Search Of the Virtual Class: Education in an Information Society" (London and New York, Routledge). It was based on a joint research project at Victoria University of Wellington that ran from 1986-1996. Called the virtual class laboratory it used dedicated telecommunication systems to make it possible for students to attend class virtually or physically and was at first supported by a number of telecommunication organisations. Its purpose was to seek the critical factors in using ICT for university level education. In 1992 the virtual class lab moved onto the Internet and in 1995 The Open University of Catalonia became the first virtual university totally dependent on telecommunications and computers.
A number of other universities were involved in the late eighties in pioneering initiatives and experiments were conducted between Victoria University in New Zealand, the University of Hawaii, Ohio State University and Waseda University to try and conduct classes and courses at an international level via telecommunications. This led to the concept of a Global Virtual University.
Coursework
The convenience of on-line learning attracts mainly working class adult students who need school to meet their schedules and demands of working, family and social lives.Providing access to higher education for all students, especially adult learners, is made easier by the fact that most virtual universities have no entry requirements for their undergraduate courses. Entry requirements are needed for the courses that are aimed at postgraduates or those who work in specific jobs.
Studying in a virtual university has essential differences from studying in a brick and mortar university. There are no buildings and no campus to go to because students receive learning materials over the Internet. In most cases, only a personal computer
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
and an Internet connection is needed. Course materials can include printed material, books, audio and video cassettes, TV programmes, CD-ROM/software, and web sites. Support is offered to learners from the professor or a tutor online through e-mails if they are having problems with the course.
Taking courses on-line means that students will be learning in their own time by reading course material, working on course activities, writing assignments and perhaps working with other students through interactive teleconference
Teleconference
A teleconference or teleseminar is the live exchange and mass articulation of information among several persons and machines remote from one another but linked by a telecommunications system...
s. Online learning can be an isolating experience since the student spends the majority of their time working by themselves. Some learners do not mind this kind of solo learning, but others find it a major stumbling block to successful completion of courses. Because of the potential difficulty of maintaining the schedule needed to be successful when learning online, some virtual universities apply the same type of time management as traditional schools. Many courses operate to a timetable, which the student receives with the course materials. These may include the planned activities for each week of the course and due dates for the assignments. If the course has an exam, the students will be informed where they have to go to write it.
An example of a university that maintains a tight schedule is the Virtual Global University
Virtual Global University
The Virtual Global University is a virtual university offering online distance education or virtual education on the Internet.-Organization:...
(VGU) in Germany. VGU offers a graduate program “International Master of Business Informatics” (MBI) – a master program in information technology and management that takes an average of four semesters to complete (for full-time students). Each course has a lecture or a virtual class meeting every week. Afterwards, students get a homework assignment; for example, they have to solve an exercise, elaborate on some problem, discuss a case study, or take a test. Lecturers give them immediate feedback, and one week later, the same happens again.
Teaching modes
When online courses first began, the primary mode of delivery was through a two way audio-visualAudio-visual
The term Audio-Visual may refer to works with both a sound and a visual component, the production or use of such works, or to equipment used to create and present such works...
network. Then as well as now, many of the virtual study programs were mainly based on text documents, but multimedia
Multimedia
Multimedia is media and content that uses a combination of different content forms. The term can be used as a noun or as an adjective describing a medium as having multiple content forms. The term is used in contrast to media which use only rudimentary computer display such as text-only, or...
technologies have become increasingly popular as well. These web-based delivery modes are used in order to expand access to programs and services that can be offered anytime and anywhere. The spectrum of teaching modes in virtual education includes courses based on hypertext
Hypertext
Hypertext is text displayed on a computer or other electronic device with references to other text that the reader can immediately access, usually by a mouse click or keypress sequence. Apart from running text, hypertext may contain tables, images and other presentational devices. Hypertext is the...
, videos, audios, e-mails, and video conferencing. Teaching on the web through courseware such as WebCT
WebCT
WebCT or Blackboard Learning System, now owned by Blackboard, is an online proprietary virtual learning environment system that is sold to colleges and other institutions and used in many campuses for e-learning...
and Blackboard
Blackboard Inc.
Blackboard Inc. is an enterprise software company with its corporate headquarters in Washington, D.C. and is primarily known as a developer of education software, in particular learning management systems. Blackboard was founded by CEO Michael Chasen and chairman Matthew Pittinsky in 1997 and...
are also used. See Virtual education
Virtual education
Virtual education refers to instruction in a learning environment where teacher and student are separated by time or space, or both, and the teacher provides course content through the use of methods such as course management applications, multimedia resources, the internet, and videoconferencing...
.
Quality
Students taking “virtual" courses are doing “real” work to get their degrees, and educators preparing and teaching those courses spend “real” time in doing so. That is, students meet a comparable level of academic learning outcomes and are evaluated through programs constructed according to standard university-level criteria. Though it should not be assumed, virtual universities may be accredited in the same way as traditional universities and operate according to a similar set of academic standards.However, questions remain about accreditation and the quality of assessment. Accreditation is required to assure students that the online institute has certified online instructors who have the expertise and educational qualifications to design and carry out the curriculum. Assessment standards need to be particularly closely monitored in virtual universities. For example, respondents in studies of opinions about online degrees will rate an online degree from Stanford the same as an on-campus degree, because the name of the granting institution is recognized.
See also
- Autonomous universityAutonomous universityThe term "autonomous university" typically refers to a university which exercises independent control over its day to day operations and curriculum....
- Distance educationDistance educationDistance education or distance learning is a field of education that focuses on teaching methods and technology with the aim of delivering teaching, often on an individual basis, to students who are not physically present in a traditional educational setting such as a classroom...
- Online degree
- Virtual learning environmentVirtual learning environmentDefined largely by usage, the term virtual learning environment has most, if not all, of the following salient properties:* It is Web-based* It uses Web 2.0 tools for rich 2-way interaction* It includes a content management system...
- Virtual schoolVirtual schoolA virtual school or cyberschool describes an institution that teaches courses entirely or primarily through online methods. Though there are tens of thousands of commercial and non-accredited courses available online, the term "virtual school" is generally reserved for accredited schools that teach...
- Bulgarian Virtual UniversityBulgarian Virtual UniversityThe Bulgarian Virtual University is a partnership of Bulgarian universities collaborating in the development of distance and online education.-History:The Bulgarian Virtual University was established at the end of 2004...
- Canadian Virtual UniversityCanadian Virtual UniversityCanadian Virtual University is a partnership of Canadian universities collaborating in the development and marketing of distance and online education....
Some open universities also teach online:
- National UniversityNational University (California)National University , founded in 1971, is a comprehensive, nonsectarian, independent, accredited, non-profit private university headquartered in La Jolla, California, United States, with academic degree programs offered at campuses located throughout the state, one in Henderson, Nevada, and...
- The Open University, UK
- Open Universities Australia
- Open University of Catalonia
- Universidade AbertaUniversidade AbertaThe Universidade Aberta is a Portuguese distance education public university, created in 1988. Its headquarters are located in Lisbon, it has two regional centres in Coimbra and Porto, and study centres all over the country....
, Portugal's Open University - University of PhoenixUniversity of PhoenixThe University of Phoenix is a for-profit institution of higher learning. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Apollo Group Inc. which is publicly traded , an S&P 500 corporation based in Phoenix, Arizona...
- University of the PeopleUniversity of the peopleUniversity of the People is a non-profit, tuition-free, unaccredited online academic institution headquartered in Pasadena, California and founded by entrepreneur Shai Reshef in January 2009....
Examples of virtual universities
Many traditional brick-and-mortar universities have established virtual branches or are at least providing virtual courses. The following is a non-exhaustive list of exclusively virtual universities.- American International University-BangladeshAmerican International University-BangladeshAmerican International University-Bangladesh ' is a private research university located at Banani in Dhaka, Bangladesh. It was established in 1994 by Anwarul Abedin under the Private University Act, 1992. The university is an independent organization with its own Board of Trustees. It offers...
- Canadian Virtual UniversityCanadian Virtual UniversityCanadian Virtual University is a partnership of Canadian universities collaborating in the development and marketing of distance and online education....
- Intercultural Open UniversityIntercultural Open UniversityThe Intercultural Open University Foundation is an international non-profit charitable foundation that provides a mentored educational experience for post-graduate and graduate learners involved in social change programs around the world....
- Michigan Virtual UniversityMichigan Virtual University- Description :According to its website, Michigan Virtual University® was established in 1998 by the State of Michigan. MVU is a private, nonprofit 501 corporation and is governed by an independent Board of Directors composed of individuals representing business, industry, higher education, K-12...
- Rasmussen CollegeRasmussen CollegeRasmussen College is a 110-year old for-profit private college offering Bachelor's and Associate's degrees at multiple campuses in Minnesota including Blaine, Brooklyn Park, Eagan, Bloomington, Lake Elmo, Mankato, Moorhead and St...
- Shiraz UniversityShiraz UniversityShiraz University , formerly known as Pahlavi University, is a public university located in Shiraz, Iran. It is one of the major universities of Iran....
- has the first virtual university in Iran - Syrian Virtual UniversitySyrian Virtual UniversityThe Syrian Virtual University is a Syrian educational institution established by the Syrian Ministry of Higher Education. It provides virtual education to students from around the world. It was established on the 2nd of September 2002 and is the first virtual education institution in the region,...
- Virtual University of PakistanVirtual university of pakistanThe Virtual University of Pakistan is the first university in Pakistan based entirely on modern information and communication technologies. It was established by the Government of Pakistan as a public sector, not-for-profit institution, with a mission to provide education to students all over the...
- Virtual Global UniversityVirtual Global UniversityThe Virtual Global University is a virtual university offering online distance education or virtual education on the Internet.-Organization:...
(VGU) - Virtual Free University