MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science EECS Event

Distance Learning: Past, Present and Futures

Richard Larson
EECS and Director, CAES

Monday, October 22, 2001
4:00 PM (refreshments 3:45)
Edgerton Hall, Room 34-101
EECS Colloquium

Abstract

Learning at a distance from the teacher became ubiquitous with the invention of the printing press about 500 year ago. But currently there is much talk and action in technology-enabled distance learning, leveraging the Internet, multimedia and new pedagogical forms. MIT is right in the center of this activity, with programs SDM/LFM, SMA, OCW, OKI, CMI, PBSBTN, PIVoT, MIT World and Knowledge Updates. (We'll translate the alphabet soup during the talk.) Our focus will be on Distance Learning as it has evolved since about 1970, through to the present and then into the future. We will try to place MIT's efforts into a larger framework. Issues to be discussed: characterization of the learners into different segments, including those who cannot live on a residential campus; new pedagogical models made feasible by the technologies; challenging EECS-type technical problems in distance learning -- from AI to many-variable optimization; rise of e-learning universities in developing countries and how MIT might respond to that growing need.