名古屋高等教育研究 第２号（2002）

Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online
learning community at Deakin
Pamela MULREADY*
Toshiki NAKAI**
Terumasa IKEDA**＜Outline＞
The purpose of this paper is to outline the critical factors enabling theuniversity to undertake transformative change; and to illustrate how
the creation of a macro socio-constructivist environment for online
teaching and learning using a communications system has become amainstream vehicle for online education and cultural change. Whilst
the merging of our on and off campus communities using informationand communication technologies is a significant symbolic achievement,
the underpinning organizational strategic planning and resourcing
have been critical to facilitate the University’s commitment to provide
learner centered flexible learning within a global context.

Introduction
A transformation is occurring within higher education, affecting administration, research, teaching, learning; and the systems and structurescharacteristic of them all. Thomas Kuhn coined the phrase “paradigm
shift” (Kuhn, 1970) several decades ago in relation to transformations inthe scientific community. The community affected here is global society*Computer Conferencing System Development, Deakin University**Center for the Studies of Higher Education, Nagoya University93

at an international, national, local and individual context and it is driving
the demand to remodel, reshape and reform education. Whilst the world
has moved to an information age, education has been observed by many
to remain in the industrial era.
At Deakin University the development of a mainstream online learning
community has been a symbolic milestone, and evidence of the paradigmatic change the university has embraced throughout the last decade.
Historically the tyranny of distance has challenged Australian educators.
Today the ubiquitous nature of Information and Communication
Technologies (ICT’s) enables the university to achieve what was once
unimaginable, increasing access to education whilst increasing flexibilityof method, mode, location and time. Significantly the merging of the on
and off campus communities around an accessible network based system
serves the potential of a major breakthrough for learners and a psychological leap for the institution. Importantly this system is one of many
parallel and complimentary developments that collectively have enabled
institutional transformative change.
The purpose of this paper is to outline the critical factors enabling theuniversity to undertake transformative change; and to illustrate how thecreation of a macro socio-constructivist environment for online teaching
and learning using a communications system has become a mainstream
vehicle for online education and cultural change.

Deakin University
Deakin University was established in 1975 as a dual mode institution (Onand off campus). It was the first regional University established in theAustralian state of Victoria. Its foundations stemmed from a TechnicalInstitute and a teachers college, with an Open campus mix of schoolleavers and mature age students. Some of its strategies were to emulate
the United Kingdoms Open University in the quality of its print materials, and to provide a library service at a level of quality that is equitable
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Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinwhen compared with an on campus library service.
The university has grown from its regionally based dual-mode beginnings to become a multi-campus and online institution. Deakin’s vision
today is to be recognised internationally as Australia’s most progressive
university for the quality, effectiveness and accessibility of its teaching
and learning programs; research in key areas, commercial, educational
partnerships, and international activities. It aims to provision life-longflexible learning and is committed to enhancing graduate attributes toensure that they are well equipped to meet the demands of society.
Deakin was the first Australian University to be awarded “University of
the Year” on two separate occasions, first in 1995 for its innovative useof information technology in teaching, and again in 1999 for its productive partnerships with business and industry.
Facilitating organizational change in an environment characterised byever reducing government funding, increased accountability, competition, social diversity, and quality control is a significant challenge. When
combined with a social context where individuals will need to update
their knowledge and understandings throughout their working life, thestrategic planning process has been instrumental in harnessing the university’s collective intelligence to define directions and priorities within
an ongoing framework. The process has enabled the organizational transition from a perpetually propagating organism to one that is much moredeterministic and strategic in its development and measured in its
review. ICT was identified as a strategic imperative for the fulfilment of
its vision and mission.
The early 1990’s was a period of considerable innovation with ICT.
Deakin led a consortium in the design and development of an administrative system, sufficiently flexible to handle the divergent needs ofmulti-campus, multi-mode institutions. It also saw the introduction of an
innovative online teaching and learning system (TEAS) “Tutorial andElectronic Access System” which combined personal and group commu95

nications, and university services around a single interface. It was adopted by some of the major university programs, however at this particulartime, networked computers were not ubiquitous, and the interface andsystems were not particularly user friendly. In 1994 funds were madeavailable to improve and expand TEAS, and provision a new more user
friendly system for the entire university.
The development of TEAS was motivated by issues surrounding the isolation experienced by remote students as the Australian “Tyranny ofDistance”, could impact negatively on their learning and success.
Following a preliminary investigation of user requirements and a combined expert selection team, FirstClass(Centrinity) was selected toreplace the teaching and learning components of TEAS (Thompson,
1994) and delivered to the University as part of a project called DeakinInterchange, a mainstream vehicle for ICT application distribution.
This project was just one of a number of strategic initiatives under theumbrella of the Information Technology Enhancement Project (ITEP),
designed to propagate research and evaluation of ICT for teaching andlearning. This was the first of what was to become a series of major
strategic projects, facilitating seed funding to Faculties for program
development. Critically such projects were underpinned by professional
development to enable staff to develop their skills, understandings, andmost importantly, facilitate

their input to the emerging pedagogicalmodels, and environments.

Articulating a vision at Deakin and implementing a plan
Flexibility in structure, mode and delivery was a foremost objective
within the 1995-97 strategic plan, and it remains a high priority today.
Let’s consider the implications to a historically “fixed” organisational
infrastructure extending from this definition of flexible learning provided
by Jocelyn Calvert Deakin University’s Professor of Distance Education.

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Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakin“Flexible learning refers to an approach to education that places theneeds of learners and groups of learners at the center and takes account,in the design of learning and teaching programs, of the particular circumstances of learners and teachers, the requirements of the subject ofstudy and the available options for learning methods and milieux.
Flexibility may apply to access to courses; accommodating diverse student groups in a course; the place, time and pace of student; the form
and pattern of interactions among learners and teachers; and the typeand variety of resources to support study and communication.
Underpinning principles include primary emphasis on student learning;catering for diverse backgrounds and learning styles of students; accommodating diverse learning environments; recurrent education as a lifelong process; and the appropriate use of ICT to facilitate learning”(Calvert, 1997)
This approach was complementary to strategic environmental analysis,
our community, contemporary understandings of how individuals learn,
the nature of diversity, competition and increased accountability, and primarily the needs of learners. Flexible learning places the learner centrally in the learning process. The direct implications of this on structures, systems and procedures called for the transformation in our organizational design, pedagogical approaches, and the systems underpinningthem all. A flexible learning framework (Bottomley, 1998) was developed which composed of the following characteristics:●

It supports a range of teaching models suited to the needs of adiverse student body and curriculum.

●

It allows for continuous change and improvement●

It is consistent with the emerging international standards for theeducational use of the Internet thus allowing for easy acquisition
and use of existing learning resources97

●

It provides a series of online administrative tools and systems to
support teaching and learning.

The framework aimed to cater for diversity, flexibility and adaptivity,and be facilitative rather than a prescriptive.

The use of technology

whilst central to the university’s vision and mission, would not determine methodology, but would underpin our ability to respond and provision a range of learning models, suitable to the needs of particulargroups. The strategies employed to facilitate these included the acquisition or use of complimentary components, aimed at providing teacherswith the media, mediums and systems which would enable them toorchestrate and manage learning experiences for their students. Thesesystems would be fully integrated with our administrative management
system, and developed within an Information Systems Framework to
support teaching and learning. This in turn would specify systems, standards, and priorities for development, with the aim of providing a coherent overall information systems capability.
The Flexible Learning Framework launched a new stage of professional
development, targeting the identified, localized needs of Faculty. This
Online Teaching and Learning Enhancement Project (OLTLEP) aims
were to identify and quantify (scope) a range of models, appropriate toparticular units and courses of study, and to identify and plan contextual
professional development models to assist faculty integrate technology
into flexible teaching and learning methodologies.
Both ITEP and the OLTLEP fostered the development of projects facilitating an organizational shift to the adoption of ICT for online teaching
and learning. While project evaluations sometimes identified structuraland procedural impediments to the mainstreaming of systems, the projects importantly provided a framework for university collaboration andsupport. Faculty would often be confused and frustrated by the multiplicity of communications necessary to foster the traditional and emerging paradigms, and educational support and systems management would98

Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinbe frustrated by traditional roles and sometime conflicting responsibilities in times of system and service convergence. The management andproduction infrastructure required for traditional print and analogue
educational media was extensive, requiring specialist skills, facilities andsystems, the new paradigm demanded new specialist skills and infrastructure, and restructure. With the ongoing development of electronic
content and environments and the need for their ongoing management,
the need to facilitate organizational and system integration around an
information management system became a priority.
The framework identified major organizational re-engineering, redefining
the roles of the universities support service providers,the Library,

Learning Resources Services (LRS), Deakin Centre for Academic
Development (DCAD), and Information Technology Services (ITS). The
result of this review saw LRS, the traditional developers of analogue
based media; and DCAD the developers of multi-media, teaching andlearning systems, and providers of professional development, merge andrefine direction, significantly from the development of systems and print
resources to the development of digital content. A new combined groupcalled Learning Services was merged under the position Executive
director, Learning Services and University Librarian. An earlier review
had also dispersed centralized ITS support, largely to faculties, outsourced other key service functions and redefined core business.
The acquisition of an Information Management system to enable the cooperative development, management and delivery of educational materials was central to the re-engineering of educational systems support.
While it was desirable to simplify our production systems for Faculty
and support providers, it was a significant challenge to find an off the
shelf system which would meet the universities criteria, and fulfill
diverse teaching and learning needs. A tender process was undertaken
and the WBT systems product TopClass was selected as the core component of the Universities IMS, for integration with our Administrative
systems. The tool would enable the supported development of educa99

tional content, and the management of these resources, as well as facilitate the introduction of important pedagogical aides, such as online testing, and interactive content, and system reporting. Other critical development motivations were copyright, international meta-data standards,
facilitating institutional informational exchange and delivery.
While it is very easy to view tools as technologies, devoid of intrinsic
value, they are of course implicitly connected with the nature of humanactivity and individual and collaborative capability.

Whilst the IMS

would meet many of the organisational and management needs, as wellas the learner centred delivery of content, but could not in its present
form facilitate the nature of the online community previously developed
using the communication system Centrinity’s FirstClass.

The nature and importance of an online learning community
The nature of traditional on-campus education is facilitated within asocial environment, sustained through, programs, societies, administrative and support services, architecture and facilities. The online environment at its minimal can be limited to informational resources and email.

Fig 1. The Deakin FirstClass (by Centrinity) Web-site
The metaphor for FirstClass is a personal desktop, with a mailbox,
access to public and private conferences. The desktop provides students
with personal storage space, a home page folder, directory and lots oftools for organizing and categorizing information, and communicating100Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinwith others.

Importantly it facilitated a synchronous as well as asyn-chronous social presence, through the ability to see who was online withyou and who had read messages and conversations, providing a dynamic
and “live” dimension to the environment. This provided students with asense of connectedness that is generally absent from many online environments. Interaction with the system is facilitated around personal andgroup communication through computer conferencing (messaging).
System performance is efficient, which remains critical given the geographic spread, platform and network diversity of our community. At astructural level the system facilitates distributed administration, educational development and learner centred access to programs, units andservices based upon human communications, as designed by Faculty,
teacher or service provider. The system enables the mediated incorporation of external electronic content, and environments facilitating ongoing discourse and learner support.

Fig.2. The student desktop using a web-browser.
FirstClass was originally released within the software distribution system Deakin Interchange (ITEP project). Student evaluations and staff
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feedback of the distribution system were negative due to performanceissues, however the small numbers with access to FirstClass were very
positive, causing the Faculties involved to continue with expanded use ofthis tool. One early and ongoing problem was that with limited licenceholdings not everyone had access, and some staff initially did not know
the difference between the distribution system and the tool, leading tofrustration, anger and confusion amongst staff who felt obstructed fromthe opportunity to engage on their own initiative. Due to this it was
decided that more licences be acquired to ensure all-staff access. Usagegrew from an initial 45 staff and students, to 2500 in 1996, to 6500 in
1997, and by approximately 40% every year thereafter, until in 2001
when it was decided to provision this virtual desktop for all 32,000 staff
and students.

Funding for this growth has only been made available

through responsive strategic funding, rather than an ongoing budget
line.
The systems success was measured by continued demand throughexpanded usage by Faculty.

Individual programs were measured byformal evaluations and informal user feedback. There were many micro
projects for research, teaching and learning, educational development,
student support, and professional development that identified positive
quantitative and qualitative results, which contributed to ongoing interest, use and further development. There was no systematic measurement at a macro level beyond performance monitoring and general feedback and observing patterns of use and activity. Strategic funding
secured was limited to basic licence requirements, professional and technical support, rather than system development.
The Faculty of Business and Law was an early adopter of online systems for teaching and learning for major university programs including
the Masters of Business Administration and Bachelor of Commerce .
That faculty identified quickly the benefits for learning offered by thesmall study group online model. In this model, groups of between 6-8
students meet asynchronously online to work collaboratively on assign102

Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinments and activities. Whilst not a feature of every unit it is used extensively and successfully.

Learners will often find others from widely

divergent backgrounds and contexts collaborating. You may find a company director from Hong-Kong, a teacher from Mildura, a businessmanfrom Stockholm and a second year student working together.
Characteristics of such activities are multiple perspectives, requiring students to share views and negotiate outcomes. Teachers may not attend
the private study areas, however will attend a general unit area, which
is used for stimulating discussion, distributing information and responding to any issues and questions.
The online communications environment is not the only medium the faculty use, also relying upon face-to-face and teleconferencing, however
they are moving to a position where mediums are selected for theirappropriateness for the teaching and learning process, rather than simply following the traditional timetabling and models. With the merger ofour on and off campus communities, they has been a reduction in theneed for face to face tutorials alongside the increase in the activity within the online environment.

They have project managed the develop-

ment and integration of this medium with their print based educational
material, and retained quality control throughout all of their processes.
They have designed, developed, planned, released and managed one of
the largest online programs in the world, and most importantly an educational rationale has been central to their use and adoption, staff andeducational development.
The system is used across the university and within all Faculties forteaching, learning, and student support, as appropriate. There is great
diversity of pedagogy, particularly at the unit level, however the shift toa more systematic development at the Faculty and program across the
University is well underway.

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Professional Development
Professional development has been a critical lever to effect change. The
easiest step is to acquire the systems, however staff will not engage
unless they perceive added value. Whilst some staff were highly motivated with ICT this was generally an exception to the rule. In the first
instance, Professional development was provided Face-to-Face and concentrated on skills and conceptual issues, whilst providing hands onopportunities for staff to explore. Unless individuals designed it to be so,these sessions did not have any direct application to their work.

Itbecame apparent that if we were to maximise the opportunities for staff
development we needed to engage staff with meaningful developmental
activity using the tool, rather than simply providing them with sand-box
opportunities.
In 1996, an online computer conferencing course was developed aimed atdeveloping pedagogical understandings and it was targeted but not limited to staff within the Faculty of Business and Law. Critically, it was
supported by the Dean who directed staff to participate. Additionally heprovided financial incentives to the winning teams.

There was someresistance at what could be viewed as a rather didactic approach, however most staff participated. Central support staff important to the organizations shift to the new mediums of communication also participatedas students, working in teams together with Academic staff. One aim
was to provide participating staff with the same experiences as theirstudents would have using the medium. As the course was designed tobe meaningful, the major project for the exercise was for teams todesign and develop an online unit. At the end of the training, staff had a
relevant and useful product, as well as the experience of collaboratively
producing a new course online. They also experienced the environment
from the student perspective, and learnt how to use the tool, and developed views on how to and how not to facilitate online. Most importantly
they gained an insight on how usage may apply to their particulardomain and pedagogy. This course was run several times and if trans104

Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinformative outcomes are any measure then it was highly successful. Staff
provided with the opportunity to experience and conceptualise were onmuch firmer ground, as the possibilities, relevance, and implications fortheir area became more meaningful. It is heartening today to see manyof these staff who once could have been described as recalcitrant
resisters become enthusiastic and committed to the use of ICT for teaching and learning.
The course was revised in 1998 as part of a central online- project,directed more to other Faculties, and experienced online teachers,
encouraging reflection and cross faculty communication, development
and support.

Learning Organization within a Flexible Learning Framework
Another dimension of usage beyond teaching and learning and the provision of meaningful and relevant professional development, are the adoption of the environment for genuine University business, related to
strategic planning.

In 2000, the university released its Teaching and

Learning Management Plan, which outlined a framework for strategicplanning around Teaching and Learning. The detail, however, had to be
developed by the use of experts across the six campuses of the
University; hence, the medium was adopted to assist this purpose withareas established for collaboration, moderated by the relevant chair.
This was used in conjunction with face-to-face meetings, and a list-service. At the end of 2000, the developed documents were presented to
the University Council for ratification and incorporation into formal
strategic processes. Such usage provides relevant applied professional
development, flexible access to committees and documents, and opportunities for professional collaboration and productivity previously unavailable. The potential for such use when made available to the broader
community can provide transparency of process and outcome.

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Research
The system has provided the data for numerous research projects,
through the content constructed, the pedagogical process, and the learning outcomes.

All activity is retained on the system; hence, this has

proved very useful for Academic publication, and contextual reflection.
On occasions it has been used for international research, in one instancea World Health Organization project, involving young people in Beijing,
Kuching, Suva and Geelong, regarding adolescent health. The data fromtheir communications provided unique perceptions relating to youth priorities, perceptions and cultural differences at the same time but very
different place. Since then the value of the medium for providing themechanism to structure and facilitate a process and capture all input inthe form of transcripts, has resulted in many papers and publications
reflecting practice and outcomes.

Student support
Social support was a critical early motivation for the development of thissystem, which clearly displays, through participation, the diversity andFig 3. The Public conference106Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakingeographic spread of learners. University support staff were one of thefirst groups of specialist staff to commit to this environment, developing
university wide services in the public conference area, which was open
to all. The University Chaplain established Stop 42, a philosophical conference in 1996, and the Chapel within it for more theological discussions.
While few actively post messages, many discussions are widely read.
The Distance education co-ordinator established a Student services area,
harnessing the support of study skills advisors and counsellors to thepoint that they began rostering “on-line hours” to be available. Whilst
this was not necessary, it was indicative of a major cultural change. The
co-ordinator also facilitated a remote club after being swamped withresponses to the suggestion.

Through the conference students havebeen able to identify others who can provide local support in foreign
cities, participate and have a presence within the university wherever
they are located, and generally access help and support. The conference
like many of the environments is linked from the Student services webpage as well as from the students FirstClass personal desktop. The pic-

Fig.4. Remote students club, web-page, conference link,sample message, and sample history107

ture below illustrates the link from the web-page, the conference environment, a sample message, and a sample history from the message,
showing the community who has read the information.

The New higher education environment
In a 1999 interview, Mike Fitzgerald, a strategic thinker on the evolutionof higher education within knowledge based society, described an
emerging model as being similar to the “Oxbridge” model. This earlymodel involved a relationship between pupil and tutor, where the learner was active in the process of knowledge creation, through negotiationand facilitation with the tutor. The tutor would recommend references,
readings, and lectures for the student to attend to assist them in theirinquiry. Throughout the 20th Century we saw the industrialization of
education, where the learner shifted from the active inquirer to the passive consumer of predetermined content, characterised by teacher centred environments and rote learning, with learning measured by how
well the student could regurgitate content during tests. A post-industrial model represented by the UK Open University was characterised byrich learning resources and facilitated by a mentoring tutor providing
iterative feedback.

According to Fitzgerald, the emerging model isbased upon distributed learning with convergent modes of delivery
between on and off campus, and a shift to individuate the learning, similar to the Oxbridge model. Fitzgerald thinks the network will be themetaphor for learning and the question is how to individuate.
Deakin has been shifting the concept of on and off campus mode, to amore distributed paradigm as described by Fitzgerald, however the educational evolution is formative. Our students come from many international contexts, be they Australian or foreign nationals. Whilst the challenge may be how to individuate, we must remain mindful of the natureof higher education, the importance of community and learning based
upon social and facilitated interaction, within and across multiple contexts. The potential of ICT to compartmentalize learning environments
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Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakinwithin micro constructivist contexts without any resource to flexible
socio-constructivist associations, across and between contexts may beconcerning. Socio-constructivist associations are significantly important
for the individual and the community and the macro society to which
the individual is a part. It is important that the new immersive environments are contextualized. Our capabilities will be that students will
experience a combination of the ICT based cognitive-constructivist models, which can provide the learner with immersive problem based experiences and simulated interactions, and socio-constructivist environments,
which will enable higher learning, and the development of real world
skills in communication, negotiation, and collaborative knowledge construction, within professional contexts.
Sherry Turkle (1995) noted that individuals adopt the characteristics of
behaviour appropriate to the metaphor communicated by its symbolic
representation. Within Deakin’s FirstClass communication system it canbe observed that individual students would behave quite differently in
one environment to another, and with some individuals it would manifest
in greater extremes. A student can present as being quite aggressive
and controversial in a public environment, considerate and reflective inthe philosophical area, and an active constructive participator in the
study group. Participants in these environments are merely operating
within the relativistic context of the communities we construct.

Itdemonstrates that universities cannot consider these systems externaland separate to the traditional university, but important social and educational infrastructure in a diverse multi-contextual learning community.

Conclusion
Deakin has moved steadily from the post-industrial model of higher education to a distributed learner centred and flexible system within a global knowledge based society. There has been enormous transformativechange in structure, practice and process within the institution.

Thestrategic planning process and objectives have facilitated the develop109

ment of frameworks, which have been pivotal, in enabling a common
direction, shared understandings, and structure for change. Within thisenvironment, the development of a socially supportive online community
has closed the gap between on and off campus students and fostered thedevelopment of a common space across geographical boundaries. It also
has been pivotal in facilitating professional development, organisational
development and new vistas for research in the online medium. Most
importantly, this is merely one of many parallel developments that havestemmed from the strategic planning process and the directions articulated by the University. The continued evolution of ICT for teaching,learning and organisational change, and the quest to individuate learning
maybe best sustained by the provision of online systems which empowerand enable the individual to form and sustain lifelong connections andinteractions within a learning community.

Recommendations
Based upon the experiences of transition and transformation undertaken
by Deakin in response to globalization, the new mediums of education,
pedagogical development, we try to suggest some recommendations
assuming the current situations of university reform in Japan.
●

The development of a university strategic plan which considers ICTdevelopment, globalization, and local environmental analysis.

●

The development of appropriate frameworks to facilitate the implementation of strategic planning processes.

●

The seeding of university wide projects to foster professional development and the development of appropriate teaching and learningmodels, using best of breeding systems.

●

The establishment of meaningful professional development opportunities for staff, pertaining to a broad range of relevant areas.
(Technical, pedagogical, assessment, and research)●

The fostered development of a community of interested practitioners through the establishment of accessible online systems and seed-110Scaling the Paradigm: The creation of an online learning community at Deakining funds for development.
●

Acquisition, implementation and trial of teaching and learning ICT
based systems within a supported organisational framework.

●

Provision of on-line orientation and training for students.

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