Thanks for this. It might be a bit expensive but as it happens, I’ll be on holiday during the conference you advertise here. It all looks interesting and very exciting, and I’d love to be there.

One thing caught my attention about bullet 5.

“Learning can – and must – be networked.”

While I agree that this is a fine principle – and I believe that it is valid and right – there are many distance learners in my cohort who, for one reason or another, cannot yet be networked.

I’d like them to be, but the practicalities are that there are also many in that wide group (and throughout the world) who are living in isolated zones, where the Internet and like technologies are, as yet, inaccessible.

We have learners like these at TCS. They are categorised as ‘Isolation’. Some of these learners are not living in New Zealand.

I know, I know. It’s early days yet. And I agree that networking is precisely what these learners need.

We often have this debate at TCS when new resources are being planned and discussed:

Do we go all online?
Do we do a mix of print-base and online?
Do we do it all in print-base?

So you can appreciate that funds and strategy are real issues for us in serving hundreds of distance learners in this category.

Bridging-the-technological-gap will be with us for a good few years. During which time there will be created a new set of underpriviliged.

I cannot forget about these. They form part of my cohort of learners.

Catchya later