Summary and Citations:
These instructors at Texas Tech University, one of the early adopters of electronic distance learning, sought to learn "how to accomplish: dissemination to the student of the information that they are to learn during the course; communication to all students in the class answers to questions of common interest; administration of examinations; collection of student work; organization of the course; and motivation of the learners" (Chandler, Fontenot, Hagler, & Marcy, 1999, p. 12a2-11).
The engineering school developed a model for asynchronous course development including the following six steps: (1) Education research/model development to determine the best technologies for delivery; (2) Faculty training on the methods and technologies unique to distance education; (3) Course design where courses are converted to the digital model; (4) Implementation training for the faculty; (5) Course implementation when the materials a prepared and formatted; (6) Formative and summative evaluations to find areas for improvement (pp. 12a2-12-13).
"The ALN model developed for the graduate distance learning program in engineering at Texas Tech University:
- offers flexibility in scheduling to both students and faculty,
- exploits the World Wide Web and the U. S. Mail to avoid costly video links and wired classrooms, and
- permits the incremental development of learning materials that benefit symbiotically both on-campus and distance learners" (Chandler, Fontenot, Hagler, & Marcy, 1999, p. 12a2-15).
