The importance of classroom attendance can be a topic of contention between faculty and students, but now the corporate world has jumped in the ring.
Officials from the Global Education Network say that with their online courses-which may eventually include some from Duke-you'll soon be able to take elite college classes without ever setting foot in a classroom, but faculty are hesitant about the idea and say the University should exercise caution. "We are holding preliminary talks with them, focusing on developing a pilot course that a Duke professor would offer," William Chafe, dean of the faculty of arts and sciences, wrote in an e-mail. "Our goal is to see how well this works."
Early next year, GEN will begin offering online courses designed by professors from Williams College, Wellesley College and Brown University and plans to target anyone interested in learning, including high school students, undergraduates and adults.
"The idea is to bring the greatest liberal arts educators from around the globe to the public," said Don Burton, CEO and president of GEN. "Basically, it's working with the Dukes of the world, the Wellesleys, the Browns, Harvards, Princetons, Yales... to find out who the best educators are and bring them to the public via the Internet and then really support them with media."
But educators have long agreed that classroom interaction is an integral part of any education, and several Duke professors expressed reservations about online education, even if it involves virtual interaction.
"A place like Duke wants to say that the heart of our education is in interaction between research faculty and undergraduates. To mess with that would not be a good idea," said Joe Harris, director of the Center for Teaching, Learning and Writing. "[Listservs and chat rooms] do certain things quite well but they don't do the same things an actual conversation does and they don't replace the value of a conversation."
Burton insisted that GEN courses will have a place for interaction. "Each course will have many different formats for interaction," he wrote in an e-mail. "The social experience will not be eliminated; it will just be different via the networked environment of the web."
Furthermore, Chafe said the University is concerned primarily with targeting an adult audience-those who would otherwise be unable to take college courses. "The advantage of this is to tap into a potential worldwide market of long-distance learners, primarily adult, who wish to participate in the excitement of a university learning experience," he said.
But Richard White, director of undergraduate studies in biology and former dean of Trinity College, said online education should not be Duke's primary role and that GEN's proposal to bring top-level education down to the masses denigrates public institutions.
"Because it is outreach to the public, it would be more appropriate probably for the responsibility to rest with public institutions," he said. "I don't see that an online system of a particular course [from a private institution] has any greater panache than one coming from a state institution. It may be for the company.... It might make a difference to them."
Marjorie McElroy, chair of the economics department, raised long-lingering concerns about intellectual property rights and faculty members.
"Enterprises such as the Global Education Network force the University to deal with a fundamental educational issue: Who owns a professor's human capital and lectures that go into making a great course? The professor? Duke? All citizens who pay taxes in a country that supports university education via tax exemptions, research grants, and outright subsidies?," she said. "These are tough questions. The answers will determine if universities and colleges lose their shirts as the answers get worked out over time. There is no guarantee for Duke or any other place."
Last spring, the Academic Council approved a policy that rendered course notes the professor's property and works created in class as partly Duke's.
Still, Burton, Trinity '85, said educators from at least three of the top 15 universities have agreed to work with GEN, either by contracting directly with it or by allowing their professors to do so.
John Tomasi, associate professor of political science at Brown, said he looks forward to relating his teachings to a wider audience. "I get to reach people I normally couldn't get to," he said. "It always struck me as odd that I teach the stuff I love... to an elite group."
Guy Rogers, chair of the history department at Wellesley College, is producing a course on Alexander the Great and said that although Internet courses do not allow for student-faculty interaction, they have other advantages.
"If you keep an open mind about teaching in a new medium, I think it changes how you think of what you're doing," Rogers said. "This new medium allows you to simultaneously have a visual story going on as well so it's not just me talking in a classroom.... Like anything else in life, you don't know what it's really going to be like until you do it."
And that's exactly why Wellesley has entered into an agreement to provide courses over a five-year period to GEN, unlike Brown and Williams, which have only allowed individual professors to contract with the company. "I think the whole thing is a huge unknown right now," said William Reed, Wellesley's vice president for finance and administration. "This is a way to experiment and learn and to see.... You can't answer it without really being a player and being involved in it."
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.