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THE WEBCENTRIC UNIVERSITY
by Samuel L. Dunn
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SUMMARY: Future universities will
thrive if they capitalize on the community-building opportunities brought about by the
Internet and World Wide Web. A university administrator offers a scenario showing how it
will work.
ccording to Bill Gates, the Internet
and the World Wide Web are the driving communications technologies for tomorrow’s
world. Gates believes this so much that he bet the store—Microsoft—that his view
of the future is accurate. Notice that almost all new products coming from Microsoft
assume an Internet or Web connection. In his books, The Road Ahead and Business
at the Speed of Thought, Gates described at great length how the Internet would impact
and change almost every aspect of our lives. For a more recent discussion of this
perspective, see the 10/30/00 Business Week cover story on Microsoft and the net.
Thousands of other business leaders share
Gates’ view of the future. In a December 25, 2000 article in Newsweek, General
Electric’s retiring chair, Jack Welch, describes how he has become a net evangelist.
Even those working in agriculture and the smokestack industries realize that the click
technologies are essential for the survival of the farm and the production industries. An
excellent overview of the net future may be found in Frank Feather’s book, FutureConsumer.Com,
(Warwick Publications, 2000). Feather describes the coming Webolution that our society
will surely undergo.
The Internet and the Web are turning out to be
critically important in the information sector, the sector that now employs over 50
percent of the entire U.S. workforce. Many entities that make up that sector are rapidly
finding new ways to take advantage of the Web technologies. All information organizations
of significant size will have to come to terms with the Internet and its applications.
Those that fail to do so will be left in the dust; many will die.
One industry that will heavily utilize the
Internet and Web and their applications is the education industry, particularly higher
education. This paper will describe a Webcentric management philosophy and many of the
applications which universities must adopt if they are to survive the Webolution. Many of
these applications may be implemented with minimal cost. Universities that implement this
philosophy will be called "Webcentric" universities.
I. BASE LINE ASSUMPTIONS: THE CONNECTED
CAMPUS
This paper assumes that the Webcentric university
has already taken two critical steps in setting up the campus information and
communication infrastructures. First, the campus is connected. Whatever combination of
hard-wire and wireless is used, all dormitory rooms, classrooms, offices, libraries,
laboratories, athletic facilities—any place where there are people—are tied
together by the Intranet and have good and fast linkages to the rest of the world. Either
every student has a computer that can be linked to the network, or the university provides
enough computers in all significant sites so every student has ready access to the net
from either on or off campus. Further, any person with personal digital assistants (PDAs)
can link into the system using current technologies from wherever that person may be
located. Over the next ten years the technology will increasingly shift to wireless
connections; every student will have Web-accessible phones/PDAs.
The second assumption is that the university has
a comprehensive, integrated administrative software system that is Internet, Intranet, and
Extranet accessible, all from on and off campus.
II. THE WEBCENTRIC PHILOSOPHY
The Webcentric philosophy calls for the
university to adopt a comprehensive communications system, based on the Internet and Web,
that provides as many services as feasible and desirable to students, faculty and staff
members, administrators, alumni, and public through one integrated system, all for the
purpose of providing high quality service to the end users. The final goal of this
management philosophy is to help the university be more effective in meeting its mission
and educational objectives.
The philosophy also calls for significant public
access to information about the university. Documents related to mission, accreditation,
budgets, personnel policies, and programs should be widely available.
To consider how this philosophy can be
implemented, various uses of the Internet and Web will now be illustrated through a series
of vignettes. Finally, a list of Internet and Web applications will be listed.
III. FOUR VIGNETTES FROM KING
UNIVERSITY, A VANGUARD WEBCENTRIC UNIVERSITY
It is the year 2013. King University is an
institution of higher education located in Nashville, Tennessee. It came into existence as
a merger of three historically black colleges and universities. In 2009 the leaders of the
three separate colleges saw they could not remain independent; already 20 percent of the
existing private colleges and universities and ten percent of the public institutions that
had existed in the United States in the year 2000 had closed or merged. While the number
of traditional colleges and universities was declining, there had been over the same
period a significant growth in for-profit educational companies giving college degrees;
nearly 700 such corporations that existed at the end of the year 2000 had grown to over
1,300 by 2009.
By bringing the assets and strengths of the three
institutions together, and by adopting new educational strategies, the founders saw a
strong future for King. The university founders adopted two key strategies for its future.
First, it determined that it would provide a living community with up-scale amenities to
meet the social and cultural needs of its students. Significant resources were assigned to
make "out of class" life a high quality experience for students. Second, the
founders determined that the university would be on the vanguard in its uses of
technologies as it prepared leaders for the 21st century. The Internet and Web
are key parts of the university’s strategies for delivering high quality educational
services. King is now a Webcentric university.
King University officials realized that it could
not provide all the resources its faculty and students desired, so King entered into
consortia and developed linkages with several other universities and corporations. King
offered courses on its own, but it also facilitated students taking and faculty teaching
courses through other institutions and companies.
The following vignettes illustrate the role of
the Web and Internet in King University’s work.
Susanne Rigdon. Susanne is a senior at
Middleton High School in Casper, Wyoming. She has done well in high school and placed in
the top five percent of students nationally on the SAT. For the past three years Susanne
has been looking at college catalogs and surfing the Web to gain information about
colleges and universities around the country.
Early on, Susanne ran onto the King University
Web site. She was impressed with the quality of the Web site and the ease with which she
could navigate through the pages. She watched several videos regarding the campus and
campus life. She saw many pictures of the buildings, including videos showing dormitories
and food and health services. As a sophomore in high school Susanne filled out a form on
the Web indicating she would be interested in receiving special information from King. At
that time she listed three disciplines in which she was especially interested. From that
time on, the university regularly sent her information on faculty, curricula, and events
from those three curricular areas.
Since Susanne was interested in the musical arts,
she watched several videos of musical performances, operas, and plays. Using virtual
reality players she played her clarinet in two concerts with the King University
Orchestra. She had several videoconferences over the Web with the music professor who
advises incoming students.
By the end of her junior year Susanne had
narrowed her choice of college down to two. She applied online at both colleges using the
universal college application form. She applied for various King scholarships online. Her
high school submitted her transcripts online. Various teachers at the high school and her
church pastor sent recommendations by E-mail to the two schools.
By the beginning of her senior year Susanne knew
that King would provide her several small scholarships. During the second half of her
senior year Susanne and her parents completed on the Internet the federal forms for
determining need levels for financial aid. After receiving updates on transcripts and the
federal need report, King awarded Susanne a presidential scholarship which, with other
scholarships, paid $39,000 per year toward total expenses of $48,000 per year.
In April of her senior year Susanne accepted the
invitation to attend King. By that time she had narrowed her principal field of interest
to music and was again put in touch with the music advisor. Online, both in writing and in
video conversation, Susanne and the advisor developed the course of study for
Susanne’s first year at King. Once Susanne’s program had been settled she went
ahead to order course materials online. She had the materials delivered to her in Wyoming
so she could start to read ahead before school started. Actually, very little of the
materials were in print. Most were online at password-protected sites where courseware
publishers daily updated the material available in support of the courses. Susanne also
got copies of all the syllabi for her courses along with pictures and information about
her professors and fellow students. She got acquainted with several of her fellow students
before ever starting school.
Susanne worked with the student housing office to
arrange for a dormitory or apartment. After viewing online videos about several housing
opportunities she settled on a particular dormitory and meal plan. She wanted to have a
roommate, so the university gave her information about several potential roommates. She
made contact with a couple of them and eventually chose Sophia, a new freshman woman from
California who was also interested in music, to be her roommate. The two women started
videoing back and forth and got well acquainted before ever meeting in person.
As a student intending to major in music, Susanne
wanted to be in various music ensembles. From home she auditioned before a committee of
professors for a spot in the orchestra. Susanne was in Wyoming and the committee was in
Nashville; communication was by Web video and audio.
It is now mid-August, and Susanne is packed and
ready to head out to Nashville. Using the university’s travel office she was able to
arrange for an inexpensive flight to Nashville. She is eager to get started with her
college career. Although she has never visited campus, she feels she knows the campus, the
university programs, her roommate, and a couple of professors very well. The university
experience looks bright for Susanne.
Ralph Rutledge. Ralph is a junior student
at King majoring in biology. Ralph intends to be a medical researcher. Before school
started this year Ralph registered for classes online after consulting with his advisor.
After his scholarships were applied to the bill, he paid the balance online by approving a
funds transfer from his bank.
Before school started Ralph went to the
registrar’s office to pick up his university smart card, which contained security
codes to access his dormitory and the biology laboratories he is using. The card also
keeps track of his use of the meal plan, bookstore and convenience store, and university
telephones. The smart card also contains transcript and health information. Ralph is a
physical fitness buff and strong supporter of athletics. The smart card gets him into the
university’s recreation center and into athletic events.
Ralph and all the other students at King use
their webphones as their principal access device to the world in general and to King
programming in particular. The webphone is a wireless, small cell phone which has web
output and natural voice input. The webphone number Ralph uses is his lifetime phone
number which he can use wherever he is in the world. The webphone has the typical small
display, but also has a pull-out scroll-sheet that unrolls to become a computer sheet
about the size of a regular piece of paper. Ralph can read textual information, receive
full video output, and have audio output as desired. The webphone also has a built in
camera so he can send picture messages from his webphone. [See: Feather, FutureConsumer.Com:
The Webolution of Shopping to 2010, Warwick, 2000, p. 48; and "Companies compete
to develop electronic paper," Idaho Press-Tribune, 12/31/00]
Ralph’s webphone goes with him wherever he
goes. Anytime he wants to pull up courseware and work on his courses, he can do so. He can
send messages to his professors, fellow students, and friends. He can watch current-run
moves by charging his bank account through a few simple keystrokes. He doesn’t need
to worry about someone else using his webphone since it can be turned on only by his
voiceprint.
Ralph doesn’t particularly care for the food
that is normally served in the dormitory cafeteria. As part of his morning ritual Ralph
opens up the cafeteria Web site and selects the dishes he wants for lunch and dinner, and
the times he will be going to the cafeteria. These special meals are ready for him when he
goes to the cafeteria.
Ralph wasn’t really sure if he wanted to
major in biology. Last summer he considered several other majors which focus on health and
the biological sciences. From his room he used the online self-advising services which
allowed him to overlay his transcript on the requirements of any specified major, after
which the computer listed the courses he would need to take to finish that major. After
considering several options, Ralph decided he would stick with biology.
Ralph is taking four courses during the first
semester of his junior year. He is taking an advanced human developmental physiology class
live from a King professor. Actually, the class meets as a group only one day each week
for the semester. Most of the course materials are found online with assignments given and
received online. There are several different kinds of chat groups and threaded discussions
required for the course. Papers and term papers are submitted online, are graded by the
professor, and returned online.
A second course is in biometrics, which is
actually being taught by a professor at Carnegie-Mellon University. Ralph’s advisor
had recommended this course because of the quality of the professor (a Nobel laureate) and
the institution. The course is a typical high-end distance education course, with much
access to the professor, teaching assistants, and groups of fellow students who study
together and work through the course as cohorts. Most instruction is done in asynchronous
mode, although there were a couple of optional synchronous class parties.
Ralph paid the regular tuition amount at King.
King in turn forwarded access fees to Carnegie-Mellon through the special arrangement made
possible by the National Online University Consortium, a group to which King University
belongs. The course requires "laboratory" work, much of which is done in
simulation mode through online access to Carnegie-Mellon. There is some "live"
laboratory work required, which Ralph does in one of the biometrics laboratories on the
King campus.
The third class Ralph is taking is a humanities
course in Modern U.S. History. Ralph is taking that course from Rafael University, a
publishing company that is supplying courseware for the 25 courses that get one-third to
one-half of all undergraduate credit enrollments in the United States. Rafael determined
in the late 1990s to become an accredited university in its own right and to sell
courseware and classes directly to the end user, thus through disintermediation bypassing
traditional colleges and universities. Rafael developed killer applications for these 25
courses and provided, arguably, the best supporting courseware found anywhere. Rafael
employs world class scholars to develop course content and uses a small army of pedagogy
experts to design the courses. Actors are hired to play the role of professors on the few
occasions when a person is needed for short lectures.
Each semester the Rafael course in Modern U.S.
History enrolls 300,000 students from around the world. Rafael employs a host of scholars
to interact with students, to tutor, to run the threaded discussions, and to assess
learning.
Rafael is also a member of the National Online
University Consortium, so Ralph had no trouble enrolling or paying for the course.
The fourth course Ralph is taking is actually an
internship. During the semester he works ten hours a week for Dietrich Pharmaceuticals, a
London-based drug firm which specializes in designer drugs for low incidence diseases.
Actually, Ralph never leaves Nashville to do the internship. All his work for Dietrich is
done by computer simulation using the corporation’s data banks located at the company
headquarters in London. The professor who supervises the internship is Dr. Hoshuta Takaki,
a professor of biometrics at Rochua University in Japan. Since Ralph doesn’t speak
Japanese and Dr. Takaki doesn’t speak English, they communicate with each other
through the English-Japanese translation program King made available on the Web. Ralph
writes his E-mails in English, while Professor Takaki reads them in Japanese. While the
translation is not perfect, the program is a learning program and does improve as
vocabulary is added to the program by the two users.
Marvin O’Malley. Marvin O’Malley
is a King graduate student in mathematics. He did his undergraduate work at Michigan
State, then won a teaching assistantship to King. He completed his master’s degree in
two years, then moved into the Ph.D. program. He now has completed one year of course work
toward the doctorate, is working on his languages, and getting ready for his comprehensive
examinations.
Marvin still holds his teaching assistantship. He
is an assistant to Professor Sharon Hopkins, full Professor of Mathematics, who has
responsibility for the courses in differential equations. She gives live lectures three
days a week, while the other two days the class is split into small discussion groups,
with attendance optional for students. Each of the discussion groups is led by a graduate
teaching assistant. Marvin leads one of these sections two hours a day on two days of the
week.
The class syllabus and all assignments for the
differential equations courses are given on the Web. Some very sophisticated mathematics
programs are available by password access to help students learn the material and do the
required homework. Students turn their homework in over the Web, and the teaching
assistants grade the homework and return it over the net. Marvin also helps with online
tutoring four hours each week.
About half the students come to the general
lectures on a regular basis and about the same fraction come to the help sessions.
Typically, a student comes to a live lecture or to a live discussion section if they are
having difficulty with a particular concept or homework assignment. Otherwise, they study
on their own and use the online services and programs to master the materials.
Marvin also works ten hours each week
(indirectly) for International Cryptography (IC), a New York based company which
contracted with King University for cryptology development services. All of Marvin’s
work for IC is done in Nashville from his apartment.
Marvin is studying Russian over the Internet. He
is taking from Moscow State University, a crash course that teaches
scientific/mathematical, Russian to English speaking students. The course was designed by
content experts and course designers specifically for this audience, even though it is a
small audience worldwide. The King University graduate faculty vetted the course and
agreed that anyone passing the course would meet King’s doctoral language
requirement.
In the Russian course Marvin is able to speak and
listen to native Russian speakers. Actually, the listening and speaking is all done
between Marvin and machine, which uses artificial intelligence programming to teach the
language. Occasionally Marvin does videoconference with a live Russian instructor based in
Moscow who assesses Marvin's progress and prescribes the next set of lessons.
Mariam Campton. Mariam Campton is an
attorney who lives in San Francisco. She did her undergraduate work at Randall College,
one of the institutions that merged with others to form King University. Soon after King
was formed, Mariam was sent information that gave her access to King’s Internet,
E-mail, and alumni Web site. Mariam regularly receives information about events at the
university, about its success in carrying out its mission, and information about
classmates. Each month the school delivers a four-hour short course over the Internet for
its alumni. Mariam takes two or three of these courses each year.
Mariam also volunteered to be an alumni tutor. In
this program Mariam agreed to answer questions that might be posed to her by undergraduate
students regarding her work as an attorney. This E-mail question and answer system is
controlled by the university, so it generally takes only about four hours of her time each
month. She is very happy to provide assistance to the next generation of leaders coming
through King.
Now in her fifties, and having enjoyed good
financial success, Mariam is considering giving a sizable donation to King. Before giving
her money to her alma mater, Mariam decided to investigate the university, its management,
its finances, its mission, and its financial health. She found all the information she
wanted on the Web.
From King’s home page Mariam was led to the
university’s mission and educational objective statements. Further, she was able to
read the mission statements for each of the schools and colleges that made up the
university. Being in agreement with the goals of the university, she decides to continue
her research.
Mariam investigated the current health of the
university by reviewing the full audit statement that was posted on the Web. She had some
questions concerning the audit statement, so she E-mailed her questions to the vice
president for finance whose address was hot-linked to the audit statement. She got the
answers she wanted, so she continued on.
Mariam wanted to know who was on the Board of
Trustees. Again she went to the Web page and got a directory of the board, with
information about each member. A picture and vitae was given for each member. The
organizational structure of the board was given with committee memberships listed. She
liked what she saw there. She was especially happy to see some attorneys on the board and
that 40 percent of the board members were women.
By this time Mariam was about ready to make her
donation to King. She needed to investigate one more aspect of university management, and
that was the endowment. To get this information, she again went to the university Web page
and located the endowment section. There she found a copy of the investment policy, list
of investments, information about the board of investors, and returns on investments for
recent years. Being satisfied, Mariam is ready to commit to the University her gift of
$15M.
IV. WEB AND INTERNET SERVICES
Now let’s return from the year 2013 to the
year 2001. To get ready for the world of 2013, universities must start now to use the
Internet and Web to improve services to their various internal and external publics. In
this section a host of university applications of the Web and Internet are listed and
briefly described. Many of these can be developed at little cost to the university. The
applications are organized by principal administrative sector: general administration,
academics, student services, university advancement, and alumni.
General Administration
Homepage and Web Site. The first view many people have of the university is its
home page. To give a good impression, the home page must be attractive and must provide
menu linkages to the university’s principal features, functions, and databases.
University Mission and Strategic Plan. These
two documents will be available to the internal and external publics.
Board of Trustees. Information about the
board will be available on the Web. Each member should have a Web site with picture,
vitae, and linkages to E-mail. The principal board documents will be posted on the Web.
Minutes of meetings of the board and the executive committee will be posted on private Web
sites. There will be a chat room available and list-serve capability for board members.
Advisory Boards. The various advisory
boards will be listed with board functions, pictures, vitae, and E-mail linkages. Each
advisory group will have its own Web site, with information, minutes, messages relative to
the work of that advisory group.
Administration and Staff. The names,
pictures, vitae, E-mail address with linkage, and job descriptions of each administrator
and staff will be posted on the Web and available from on and off campus.
Budgets and Audit Statements. This
information is important to donors, accreditors, employees, students, and the general
public.
Endowments. Information about endowments
and endowment philosophy and management will be available on the Web.
Administrative Manuals. The various
administrative handbooks will be available on the Web.
Human Resources. Job listings, online
application capability, and personnel policies will be posted on the Web and available to
the general public.
Maps, Directions, and Building Plans.
These items will be placed on the Web and will be available to the general public.
Pictures of exteriors and interiors of buildings will be posted.
Public Relations Thrusts. Various videos,
still pictures, testimonials, advertisements, and information about funds campaigns will
be on the Web, all with linkages back to the people and offices involved.
Federal Reports. Increasingly federal and
state agencies are requesting that reports be submitted over the Internet. Integrated
Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), crime, and athletics reports are examples of
those that can be quickly transmitted. This trend should be encouraged.
Accreditation. Data relevant to
accreditation will be on the Web and will be accessible to accreditors as needed.
Events Management. All publics will be
able to go to the Web and learn about conferences, workshops, special courses, concerts,
athletic events, speeches, plays, and events that are open to some or all of those
publics. Schedules should be available together with opportunities to purchase tickets.
Maps giving locations, parking, and hot-links to hotels and restaurants should be
provided.
Security. In addition to other methods of
communication, campus police will be linked to the Internet and will be prepared to
respond to community needs that come to them over the Internet. Security sensors will be
cross-linked to the net to provide additional warning information to security personnel.
Academics
Faculty Web Sites. Each faculty member will have a Web site that contains the
faculty member’s vitae and picture.
Faculty Publications. Faculty publications, as copyrights permit, will be placed on
the Web.
Course Web Sites. Each course should have a Web page that is linked
to the university’s course management system for full communications of syllabus,
assignments, chat-room, and threaded discussions. Student grades throughout the semester
are posted for password access. Webliographies for each class with linkages to principal
sources of related information will be available to students.
Libraries. The library will utilize a philosophy of "access to information,"
rather than "collection of information." Students will have access to journals
full-text, linkages to other principal libraries, book listings, inter-library loans, and
will have access to information specialists, all from on or off campus.
Catalogs. The university catalogs, current and immediate past, will
be on the Web.
Dissertations and Principal Papers. Dissertations will be placed on the Web.
Faculty Governance. Faculty policy manuals, faculty officers, faculty committees, minutes,
faculty voting, chat rooms, will be placed on the Web and will be accessible to the
faculty.
Distance Learning. The Internet with its capability of video, audio, and data
transmission will be the principal vehicle for delivery of distance learning courses. The
university’s course management system assists students and faculty in the
teaching-learning process.
Tutoring. Online tutoring is available 24 x 7 to students.
Outcomes Assessment Reports. It is increasingly important that universities make available
to the general public the results of outcome assessment activities.
Graduation Rates. Prospective students, parents, accreditors, and government
agencies need to know how the university is doing in getting its students to graduation.
Student Services
Recruiting. Recruiting is a natural use of the university Web site. Recruiting
information can be posted on the Web with linkages to relevant information about the
university. All names received by the university from students interested in the
institution will be added to the database. These individuals should regularly receive
E-mail from the university, graded to the age or grade level of the recipient. Notes about
the campus and university life should regularly be sent to prospects. Changes in curricula
that may impact the high school program should be sent out. Deadlines for applications,
reminders of dates for PSAT, SAT, and ACT should be included. Music and videos can be
transmitted for copying by the recipient.
Admissions. Students should be encouraged
to apply online, with feedback online. Transcripts and records from high schools and other
colleges can be ordered using online forms and transmitted directly to the university on
encrypted Internet.
Financial Aid and Scholarships. Students
will file their financial aid requests online. Government forms should be provided online
by the institution, with instructions how to file with appropriate offices. All university
scholarships are posted along with all necessary application information and forms.
Transcripts. Transcripts may be viewed by
password access and official transcripts may be ordered online. Transcripts will be
submitted from high school and other colleges through a transcripting service that will
format the transcript according to the needs of the receiving institution.
Smart Cards. Each student will receive a
smart card that provides access to various protected security and services areas, such as
dorm rooms, laboratories, and cafeterias. The smart card will contain information related
to the student’s program of study, transcript, health, and financial status.
Advising. Admitted students will be able
to contact advisors online, with assistance to build the schedule of classes. Prospective
and current students can access academic program databases and overlay their transcripts
over majors templates to get a machine readout of courses needed to complete a given
major. Advisors can be contacted by the Internet and real-time advising done between
student and advisor.
Registration. Registration can be done
online with immediate determination of the student’s course schedule.
Student Accounts. Accounts may be accessed
on a password basis. Students may pay their accounts online.
Bookstore. Books may be ordered online.
Grades. Students may see their grades in
each class during the semester and may access grades on transcript.
Student Web Sites. Each student will have
a Web site with student determined information.
Career Counseling. The career counseling
databanks, credentials listings, and job listings, will all be available through the Web
for current students and alumni. Linkages will be available to corporation human resources
offices.
Student Government. Names of officers,
lists of committees, minutes, elections, chat-rooms, are all online.
Help Desks. Help desks linked to the
Internet provide opportunity for students to get their problems solved on a real-time
basis. Concerns about any area of student life, such as computers, facilities, food,
parking, and campus police, may be answered on a 24 x 7 basis.
Hospitals, Clinics, and Health Care.
Students needing health service may transmit their problems via the Internet for immediate
response and advice. Doctor’s health certificates and certificates of immunization
may be transmitted directly from the health provider to the university.
Food Service. Students needing special
food services may order special meals by Internet. Complaints can be handled likewise.
Atheletics
Videocasts and Audiocasts of Sporting Events. All sporting events should be
videocast and audiocast live over the Web and archived for future viewing and listening.
Coaches and Events Information. All sports
schedules, scores, athlete listings, coaches’ vitae, pictures, fund raising
activities, dinners, and events will be placed on the Web.
Athletes. Appropriate information
concerning athletes will be made available to the public on the Web.
Booster Club. The booster club will have
its own Web site, with information about its officers, members, events, and publications.
Athletic Scholarships and Assistantships.
Information about athletic scholarships and assistantships, with application forms, will
be posted on the Web.
University Advancement
Donors. All major donors will be offered Internet and Web privileges through the
university. On the Web site donors will be able to access university information, budgets,
audit statements, mission statements, their own individual giving records, and current
funding projects.
Capital Campaigns. Information about capital
campaigns, pictures of proposed buildings, progress reports, and funding targets will be
available on the Web site.
Publicity. There will be regular E-mail
publications and news releases that go out to donors. The president and other officers
will post messages to donors.
University Publications. All university
publications will be available online.
Alumni
It has been said that higher education is the only industry that has a ceremony and fires
its customers after four years. The university of the future will need to retain its
students for life, provide degree programs and continuing education for them, and maintain
them as university supporters. The slogan should be: Once a student, always a student.
Lifetime Internet Connection. Each alumnus
will have a lifetime Internet connection with the university. Alumni will have their own
Web pages on the university system. Courses, tours, reunions, and meetings should
regularly be conducted for alumni.
Alumni Services. Alumni services will be
set up on the Web. Alumni directories, including E-mail information, is a standard.
Messages will go out regularly to alumni, with information about the alumni, current
students, and university happenings. Each graduating class will have its own chat room.
V. CONCLUSION
These are exciting times in higher education as
the industry changes from the factory approach to education to client-oriented services.
Many traditional colleges and universities will not survive the shift from the assembly
line approach to virtual education strategies. Management guru Peter Drucker predicts that
higher education will be a great wasteland in the next twenty-five years.
Those institutions that do survive will be
characterized by full utilization of the information technologies. To survive, colleges
and universities must determine now that strategic advantage lies in implementing the
Webcentric philosophy. Just like Bill Gates did for Microsoft, university leaders must be
prepared to bet the store as they face the challenge of the future.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dunn, Samuel, "The Virtualization of
Education," The Futurist, March/April 2000.Feather, Frank, FutureConsumer.Com:
The Webolution of Shopping to 2010, Warwick Publishing, 2000.
Gates, Bill, Business at the Speed of Thought, Warner, 1999.
Gates, Bill et al, The Road Ahead, Penguin, 1996.
Greene, Jay, "Microsoft’s Big Bet," Business Week, October 30, 2000.
McGinn, Daniel, "Jack Welch Goes Surfing," Newsweek, December 25,
2000/January 1, 2001.
Pelton, Joseph N., "Cyberlearning vs. the University," The Futurist,
November/December 1996.
Pope, Justin, "Companies compete to develop electronic paper," Idaho
Press-Tribune, 12/31/00,
Snider, James H., "Education Wars: The Battle over Information-Age Technology," The
Futurist, May/June 1996.
About the Author
Samuel L. Dunn, MBA, PhD is Vice
President for Academic Affairs, Professor of Business and Mathematics, Northwest Nazarene
University, Idaho sldunn@nnu.edu
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