Distance: Field Trip

This past week my "Distance Education" class took a field trip to BYU's Independent study center. The size and scope of their business surprised me. Some of the things that stood out to me are below:

• They serve about 125,000 students and employ 250 people (I may be off a bit on my numbers, feel free to correct me).
  
• Most of the students they serve are _high school_ students
• They have a team that aggressively markets IS courses to school districts (e.g. they are not just sitting around hoping that somebody finds their course).
• They receive about 2,000 help calls a day, and have multiple tiers of service. Only 1% of problems need to go to the professor for resolution.
• As part of a research study a few years ago they implemented the idea of having tutors who provide a free (to students) service of helping them with problems.
  
• They have a machine that opens their envelopes! (okay, that wasn't the highlight, but it was pretty cool). ]

It was really interesting to see theory meet practice. I noticed that some thing e.g. "the conversational theory" were never mentioned, while others, "e.g. the industrial approach" were frequently mentioned. Not saying that one theory is better than another, it was simply interesting to observe.

I also was reminded of how widely learning styles can differ. When it came to a discussion of "religious education" my views about how learning should take place came on somewhat strongly. But others at the table had their own views that they held equally strongly. So again the theme came back to having as many different approaches as possible so that people could select what was good for them as opposed to "the one true way."

(As I write that it makes me think how the "do whatever works for you" as opposed to "the one true way" philosophy isn't always a good idea.

Another thing that interested me was that they allow people to get their money back up to 60 days after beginning the course. So in terms of thinking about the "free" courses they are going to offer, what is the difference between letting them do the course for free VERSUS signing up for the course in the regular way and quitting after 25 days. Still was free.

The difference I see is that the "open" option allows them to be free as in "I don't have to give you my credit card info." I think one interesting thing to look at as this project moves forward is to see how many people sign up for the course because it was free. Obviously the hope is that people who would have never paid money upfront for the course do take it for free, and some buy it. I look forward to Chris Anderson's book on this topic.