Internet Learning Volume 5, Number 1, Fall 2016/Winter 2017 | Page 34

Internet Learning Volume 5 Number 1 - Fall 2016/Winter 2017
We are the Campus:
Using the University of Edinburgh’s Manifesto for
Teaching Online to Provoke Dialogue about
Online Learning in the US
Nancy Heath, American Public University System
Abstract
In this article, the Manifesto for Teaching Online, a document created
through an iterative process by students and teachers in the
MScC in E-learning Programme at the University of Edinburgh, is
presented. The goal of the Manifesto is to provoke discussion, and to
“rethink some of the orthodoxies and unexamined truisms” (Ross,
2012) surrounding the field of online teaching. Written in the style of
a manifesto (or even a meme, discussed below) the Scottish document
purposefully eschews formal learning theory or traditional research.
Each point of the Manifesto is “deliberately interpretable”, underlining
its authors’ roles as provocateurs (Ross, 2012). This article discusses
both pros and cons of the Manifesto, but ultimately embraces
the notion that intellectual activity which prompts questions and illuminates
paradigms is a positive good.
Keywords: Manifesto for Teaching Online, digital education, online
learning
Introduction
In 2016, about 5.8 million U.S. students
took college classes offered either
partially or fully online. Online
education enrollments at universities
are growing faster than place-based enrollments,
with the likelihood that online
students will make up close to 25%
of all higher education enrollments by
2020 (WCET, 2016). Kathleen S. Ives,
Chief Executive Officer and Executive
Director of the Online Learning Consortium,
noted that distance education
enrollments are on the rise, whereas
overall higher education enrollments
are declining. She suggests that this is
a “shift in the American higher education
landscape” (Online Learning Consortium
(OLC), 2016), as learners lean
toward online options.
Online education’s rise from obscurity
to prominence has been swift,
and the medium is no doubt still in its
infancy. Internet-based teaching is still
for the most part firmly rooted in the
models and assumptions of place-based
classroom learning. There is usually one
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