Summary Notes on "Open University," by N. Shute, prism, ASEE, November 2001, pp. 18-25.

Summarized by J. T. P. Yao, 10/26/01

"… MIT is opening itself to the world, with a vengeance. … Last April, MIT announced that starting in the fall of 2002, MIT will post all of its course material on the Internet free of charge. Offerings will include not only course syllabi, reading lists, and bibliographies but also professors' lecture notes. … OpenCourseWare may be MIT's most audacious educational effort, but it's hardly the first time the school has experimented with how it delivers education. …"

"Students came to MIT to acquire the practical skills needed to work in the new industries springing up: textiles, steel, paper, food processing. No such school had ever existed, and MIT professors created the curriculum on the fly. … Arthur D. Little was a product of MIT; he had been one of the school's first chemistry students, helped develop its chemical engineering curriculum, and went on to found the eponymous industrial research firm in 1886. In 1916, Little joined forces with William H. Walker, an MIT chemistry professor, to create an industrial internship program that farmed students out to New England firms. The program was widely imitated by other engineering departments, and continued today. At the same time, MIT ventured into what would become a long and fruitful partnership with the federal government, a partnership that paid unexpected dividends in higher education. … So it seems only natural that if education would become part of the nation's defense strategy, it would come from MIT. …"

"MIT continued to tweak its curriculum to meet the needs of industry, as those needs changed to deal with a globalizing economy. … Students, sponsored by their employers, spent two years studying manufacturing technology and management, a program that includes plant tours and an internship. … Ten years later, MIT responded to yet another demand from industry: educate managers of complex systems … without yanking those promising employees out of the workforce for two years. The System Design and Management Program is MIT's first foray into distance education, a 24-month graduate-level program co-sponsored by the engineering and management schools. Students are required to be on campus for a one-month opening session and one single term, and to take periodic 'business trips' back to campus. …"

In 1998, MIT expanded its distance learning experiment, adding a joint venture with two universities in Singapore - Nanyang Technological University and the National University of Singapore. … The institute has also been experimenting with distance learning closer to home. … OpenCourseWare is MIT's latest… experiment in education. MIT officials are quick to point out that it's not distance learning; people can't take courses or get MIT degrees online. But it will make the resources of a world leader in technology education available to students and teachers in Accra and Chiang Mai and Shanghai, simultaneously. … Putting course materials online… would give teachers and students around the world a view into the educational process at MIT, and one that wouldn't take years or decades to filter out to remote corners of the globe. … The first materials will go online in a year, but the entire project is expected to take a decade. … All anticipate that the experiment will change how MIT educates students on campus. …"

[Readers who are interested in this article are encouraged to read the original paper in its entirety. Other summary notes on faculty reward systems are available on the Internet at http://lohman.tamu.edu under the heading "Summaries of Papers ..."]