Teaching and Learning via the Network

Establishment of a US-Russia Electronic Distance System

Project Number 04 - 1993

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Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D.
President, GU/USA
Chairman, GLOSAS/USA
Global University in the U.S.A. (GU/USA)
A Divisional Activity of GLOSAS/USA
(GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.)
43-23 Colden Street
Flushing, NY 11355-3998
(718) 939-0928

utsumi@columbia.edu

Other Individuals And Organizations Associated With The Project

Currently, over 75 prominent schools and organizations contacted GU/USA to indicate their interest in this project. Some have already confirmed their participation in GU/USA consortium. Apart from schools such as Agricultural Satellite Corporation, Brown University, Dartmouth College, George Washington University, National Technological University, University of Hawaii, University of Maryland or University of Tennessee, GU/USA has also received expres-sions of interest from potential corporate sponsors such as IBM, Sun Micro-systems, DEC, US Sprint, INTELSAT and the World Bank. Our Russian partner Association of International Education (AIE) has over 20 school members in Russia. We have also received inquiries and proposals to join this project from Australia, Canada, Croatia, England, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Sweden, Ukraine, and a number of countries in central and eastern Europe, making this an international project to help Russia and, later, other ex-communist countries in Europe.

Abstract

GLOSAS/USA is acting on a request from the Ministry of Science, Higher Education and Technology Policy of the Russian Federation to jointly establish a U.S.-Russia Electronic Distance Education System (EDES) via various tele- communication media. This project will be conducted by Global University in the U.S.A. (GU/USA) and the Association of International Education (AIE) in Russia. GU/USA and AIE are consortia of educational, governmental, industrial and international organizations.

Russian students will use the U.S.-Russia EDES to access courses offered by member schools of GU/USA, without coming to the U.S. or requiring their American instructors to travel to Russia. The students will be able to converse with American instructors and classmates at a distance, using such devices as audio, voice-mail, electronic mail, fax and slow-scan TV through a free of charge narrow band channel of INTELSAT's Project ACCESS. The plan will include the lease of a broad band (video) channel on INTELSAT satellites in subsequent years, thus permitting Russian students to receive American satellite courses directly at their homes.

Project Criteria

1. use technologies that interoperate with the National Science Foundation Network (NSFNET), the global Internet, and the emerging National Research and Education Network (NREN);
   We use them as the main coordinating and delivery system of the U.S. courses to Russia.

2. explore how library and other information resources and services can be made available in the networked teaching and learning process;
   Through these telecommunication media (with supplemental use of satellite videoconferences in early stage), Russian students and researchers can access them frequently and inexpensively.

3. are collaborations involving different types of institutions, organizations, and agencies;
   Educational institutions, governmental and non-governmental organizations, industries, international organizations, etc.

4. observe the contemporary economic imperative to "do more with less" while providing an "elegant" approach to networked teaching and learning; and,
   Russian students receive courses from American universities without leaving Russia, and on the other hand, American instructors need not to be in Russia, thus saving considerable travel expenses and time. With telecommunications, more students and teachers of Russian and American institutions can also share discussions on educational, research and cultural problems. In the future, American (and later other nations') students will have the equal possibilities to receive courses from Russian universities and outstanding academicians in Russia.
5. manifest a high degree of replicability and long-term viability.
   Once in place between the U.S. and Russia, the same scheme can be applied to its neighboring countries. Russians are making this a Russian national project, and the World Bank is planning to support them with $5 million a year.

Audio-Visual requirements

Two overhead projectors, one VCR with several TV monitors (one for about 50 attendees) in a room.

If there are satellite uplinking/downlinking facilities free of charge, we may be able to arrange a U.S.-Moscow videoconference for, say, one or two hours.

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