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UNE takes distance the out of learning
By Aileen Macalintal UNE Future Campus. Photo by George Wong
The future has arrived at the University of New England as the institution unveiled its campus for distance learning.
The Future Campus is complete with high-end, high-definition equipment for video conferencing with soundproofing and controlled lighting for telecommunications, allowing virtual presence in campus lecture rooms.
It has a digital media learning centre with iPads and a gaming video wall, aside from its lecture theatre, multi-purpose theatre, and six study group rooms of various configurations.
The campus, financially aided by the Australian government’ s structural adjustment fund, is right at the heart of Parramatta in Sydney’ s west. It will support more than 2000 UNE students living and studying in the region.
UNE vice-chancellor Jim Barber said the Parramatta pilot would be the model for new Future Campuses to be rolled out across Australia, with a second Future Campus to be opened in Tamworth in 2014.
“ We have a long history of pioneering distance education that began in the 1950s with Australia’ s first distance learning courses,” Barber said.
“ Now technology has allowed us to remove the‘ distance’ from education and bring face-to-face online learning to people in the areas in which they live,” he said.
“ With increasing numbers of people looking to study later in life, they need to know there are support facilities available that will allow them to juggle lifestyle commitments such as work and family.
“ The Future Campus is proof of our commitment to making it easier for people of all walks of life, to access quality tertiary education,” he said.
The latest in teleconferencing and telepresence technology will enable students to participate in lectures, tutorials and study groups at the UNE’ s Armidale Campus or other locations around the world.
“ Parramatta is fast becoming an area of high economic growth and the new Future Campus brings us closer to this growing market, as well as our thousands of existing students in the greater western Sydney area,” Barber said.
General manager James Bell said the Future Campus, targeted at mature students who have multiple commitments, will lead technology-enabled learning hubs in the country.
“ It is all about removing the distance from distance education and providing closer, better and more personal support to online students,” Bell said.
He said its state-of-the-art technologies will allow students to feel immersed in remote lectures, tutorials and study groups in collaborative learning,“ face-to-face with experts, as if they were in the same room”.
“ Giving Western Sydney’ s students, who make up 10 per cent of current intake, access to this technology and interactive, supportive learning is part of UNE’ s mission to bring tertiary education within reach of everyone, regardless of their location or circumstances,” he said.
Asked what challenges lay ahead, the general manager said differences in bandwidth could be problematic.“ We will also be connecting with partners in other
countries so will be dealing with timedifferences,” he said,“ but we are wellprepared – flexibility is the key”.
As more and more students and adults are studying while working, Bell said they wanted students to have access and support. The Future Campus puts students and lecturers in better contact, allows them to experience the best of lecturers’ expertise worldwide and creates a communal learning space where they can share ideas with other distance students.
Bell said research has shown that there is a market for this kind of facility and they will build other future campuses that will become more important to UNE students.
“ We hope that providing this facility will also attract more students to distance education, as a slightly more affordable option, at various points in their lives, because they will feel they are getting a satisfying, supported student experience.”
He said the campus has been wellreceived, and teachers have been excited to reach more students and conduct more personal study groups with online students.“ Having pioneered distance education in Australia, this year the university is once again leading the development of flexible education,” said Bell. n
www. campusreview. com. au May 2013 | 9