Internationalizing professional development in geography through distance education

1、internationalizing professional development in geographythrough distance educationmichael solem, lex chalmers, david dibiase, karl donert, and susan hardwickabstractto dointroduction this paper assesses the value and relevance of geography education in the realm of professional development. it explo

2、res the potential of distance education to deliver instruction to lifelong learners through courses or modules that operate across international boundaries and incorporate materials from local and global contexts. we argue that internet-enabled distance education offers the potential to extend acces

3、s to many prospective students who are unlikely or unable to participate in full-time residential courses, and that distance education can facilitate international collaboration among educational institutions. the paper begins by making a case for an internationalized program of study for continuing

4、 adult education, as opposed to the primary, secondary, and higher education sectors that are the focus of most existing geographical education programs. next, we document the ways that recent commitments to internationalizing teaching and learning in geography have brought us to the point where pro

5、fessional development of lifelong learners is demonstrable, particularly in the fields of geographic information technologies and teacher professional development. in this review, we outline some of the main challenges that must be addressed if the potential of distance education as an enabling tool

6、 for professional development in geography is to be fulfilled, specifically, collaborative development and delivery of curricula and the articulation of quality assurance standards and certification agreements among participating institutions. thinking beyond existing primary, secondary, and higher

7、education models of professional developmentmost of the literature on geographical education focuses on students and teachers in primary, secondary, and higher education sectors. we focus instead on the needs of adults who seek further education, but whose commitments to families, employers, and com

8、munities prevent them from participating in full-time, residential programs of study. we focus on this clientele for a number of reasons: first, demographic trends in most developed countries (oecd, 2002), combined with changes in the relationship between employers and employees (robson, 2001, 34) e

9、mphasize the importance of lifelong learning. despite international concerns about the future of traditional educational institutions (gallagher, 2000), there is evidence that education can be provided across borders (cunningham, et al., 2000) by 'capable' technology (ibm, 2004). workforce d

10、evelopment experts estimate that “one-third of all u.s. jobs are in flux each year, meaning that they have recently been created or soon will be eliminated from the economy” (kohl 2000, p. 13). the generation of workers now reaching retirement age entered the workforce with the reasonable expectatio

11、n that their entire careers might be devoted to a single employer, but a more realistic expectation for graduates entering the workforce today is a succession of careers with different employers. education is no longer just a prelude to a career; for many professionals it now spans a lifetime.the qu

12、estion as to how higher education institutions can better prepare the next generation of professionals is already prompting change in graduate education. outside of the academy, the value of a graduate degree has come under scrutiny in recent years, with questions raised about the abilities of new g

13、raduates to apply their knowledge and skills to serve a broad range of societal needs in many professions (nyquist and woodford, 2004). for example, a report by the renewable natural resources foundation in the united states warns of imminent retirements of large numbers of senior grade personnel in

14、 federal agencies and private research firms, and the current lack of orientation in graduate schools to preparing and encouraging graduates to consider careers in these sectors (colker and day, 2003). indeed, a survey initiated by the pew charitable trusts found a majority of american students in a

15、rts and sciences doctoral programs to be dissatisfied with their professional training and unprepared for their careers (golde and dore, 2001). the same survey revealed that many students enter programs without a clear understanding of the nature of graduate education and what they can do to enhance

16、 their own abilities and prospects for success in their programs and future careers. in response to these concerns, some institutions have introduced “professional masters” programs in the sciences that integrate management training and internships with scientific education (tobias et al., 1995).in

17、europe an attempt to address the divide between the needs of society and what higher education provides is being addressed by the tuning initiative. tuning implies the development of points of reference, convergence and common understanding between institutions for curriculum design and evaluation (

18、tuning project, 2002). the reference points have been developed for generic and subject-specific competences at bachelor (first level) and masters (second cycle) graduates in some subjects. european geography departments are undertaking a pilot study concerning these competences through the herodot

19、thematic network (donert, 2003).in this article we also suggest that the emphasis on lifelong education should be explored first closest to home. concerns about professional development in tertiary education led to the formation of the international network in teaching and learning geography (inlt)

20、in 1999, and since that time this group has sponsored ongoing research into pedagogy in higher education. healey (2003,1) makes the point that while professional development of teachers of geography in primary and secondary schools was a “major achievement in geography education of the twentieth cen

21、tury, promoting the professional development of faculty teaching geography in higher education is one of the major challenges that faces us.” we concede this point, but suggest several factors make the promotion of internationalized, online professional development options for school teachers also a

22、 worthy target for collaboration. despite curriculum and language variation, we argue that an internationalized program for teacher professional development would attract universal interest. the demographics, working lives, and widespread distribution of geography teachers make online professional d

23、evelopment particularly attractive. building on successgeographers have already laid the foundation for success in internationalized education for adult professionals, particularly in the areas of gis education and teacher professional development. they have created excellent “proof-of-concepts” tha

24、t explore the internationalization of courses and programs through projects including the ncgia core curricula, the virtual geography department, and the unigis consortium (kemp, reeve and heywood, 1998). more recently, as part of their “digital libraries in the classroom” initiative, the u.s. natio

25、nal science foundation (nsf) and the european joint information system committee (jisc) jointly funded a research and development project that combines the efforts of geographers, education specialists, and computer scientists at the university of california at santa barbara, pennsylvania state, sou

26、thampton and leeds universities. the aim is to develop and deploy reusable digital learning objects for geographic education through the alexandria digital library (). this development focuses on modular content and individualized instructional and learning programs with the aim of

27、 developing and deploying reusable e-learning units. to illustrate some of the potential of internationalized distance education for lifelong learning in geography, we continue by examining two successful areas of cross-border professional development: gis and teacher professional development. gis e

28、ducation and training as noted above, some of the greatest activity in geography has been in developing online courses and programs in geographic information systems (gis). however even relatively high investment in online courses like unigis is no guarantee in providing products that really meets t

29、he needs of students (buckley and donert, 2004).the need for formal quality assurance mechanisms is particularly great in the realm of gis education. in their popular college text geographic information systems and science, longley et al. (2000) sketch both optimistic and pessimistic scenarios about

30、 the future of gis. their optimistic scenario envisions pervasive location-enabled technologies. “within the next five years,” they predict, “geographic information and maps will be everywhere” (longley et al., 2000, 446). their pessimistic scenario involves an identity crisis that threatens the pot

31、ential of geographic information science to improve the quality of life. “as gis technology becomes increasingly fragmented and embedded into specialist areas,” they fear, “there is a danger that some may lose sight of core gis values” (longley et al., 2000, 445). even as esri, the preeminent softwa

32、re vendor and host of the worlds largest annual gathering of gis professionals, promotes gis as “the language of geography,” academic geographers are ambivalent about the disciplines identification with the technology. currently, geography retains a central role in gis higher education. we argue tha

33、t the sustainability of this role is by no means assured, but that it will be strengthened to the extent that geography educators are able to (a) adapt our offerings to the needs of lifelong learners, many of whom need to study away from campus; (b) minimize curricular redundancies and stimulate col

34、laboration and internationalization by sharing students within a marketplace of distance education providers; and (c) embracing accountability through voluntary participation in peer review and accreditation. to advance their careers, professionals need credentials as well as the educational achieve

35、ment that credentials denote. colleges and universities are entrusted by society to confer educational credentials. more than 4,000 higher education institutions are accredited in the u.s. however, none of the hundreds of gis certification and degree programs in the u.s. have submitted to any formal

36、, voluntary quality assurance mechanism such as those embodied in organizations like the accreditation board for engineering and technology. as the gis profession matures and societys reliance on geographic information technologies increases, gis education will be expected to be more accountable. mi

37、ndful of the fact that accreditation is essentially a peer review process, analogous to the quality assurance mechanism long institutionalized in academic publishing, dibiase (2003) proposes that the gis education community implement accreditation as a form of peer-reviewed publication. if gis educa

38、tors in geography departments do not accept responsibility to develop and participate in accreditation initiatives, it seems possible that authority for gis education may migrate to accredited engineering programs. the resulting marginalization of geography and kindred faculty could exacerbate the “

39、erosion of core gis values” that so worries longley and his colleagues.professional development and geography teachers for the past several years, geography faculty active in the association of american geographers committee on college geography, in partnership with officers of the national council

40、for geographic education, have been engaged in an ongoing discussion about how best to develop, assess, and disseminate a collaborative on-line degree program in geography education. building on a foundation of online degrees already in place at other institutions as early as the mid-1990s, and onli

41、ne geography courses offered at institutions such as the university of colorado, pennsylvania state university, the university of oregon, and texas state university, this initiative provides a model program designed to meet the needs of the adult learners discussed in this paper. preliminary plans f

42、or launching this international degree program center on offering graduate level courses for teachers at three or more institutions that, in tandem, would meet the requirements of a rigorous, standards-driven, and inclusive masters degree.a similar program is being developed by the institute of educ

43、ation in london and the university of waikato in new zealand. the institute of education in london has a long history of providing learning experiences in geographical education for teachers located throughout the former british commonwealth and beyond, and the progressive move to e-mail and interne

44、t based servicing of these adult learners has been a feature of developments since 2000. collaborative work with the university of waikato began in the late 1990s when an emphasis on the importance of including some reflexive work in theory relevant to the teaching and learning of geography was esta

45、blished. in part, this emphasis was adopted to address a growing divide (gourdie, 1993): the gap between new cultural geographies and skills and competencies of a teacher body trained in methodologies of the 1970s and 1980s. in short, a professional development need that could be addressed by co-ope

46、rative, cross-border provision of an online resource was identified. the early steps in establishing a module based on awareness of different 'perspectives' in geography is described in chalmers, keown and kent (2002). bell and gilbert's (1996) framework that emphasizes social and politi

47、cal dimensions of professional development was a key focus in the initiative.perhaps more important than the content was the constructivist model of teaching and learning that has been adopted at the university of waikato. based on more than a decade of teaching on-line courses in distance education

48、 mode, using a variant of the webct tutorial system known as classforum, the waikato professional development option advocated a strong 'communities of practice' (schlager and fusco, 2003) approach to professional development. the principles used to articulate this approach to on-line distan

49、ce education for professional development are described in keown and chalmers (2004). early experiences with learners from a variety of cultural backgrounds have shown that some of the benefits of teaching and learning across (cultural) borders can be realized. maori, pakeha (new zealanders of europ

50、ean heritage) and pacific island teachers have all completed the module successfully.within europe there are new opportunities available that target international audiences. the erasmus mundus programme is a co-operation and mobility programme which addresses the growing educational markets of latin

51、 america, africa and south east asia with the provision of relevant, high quality products with a european seal of approval. erasmus mundus is intended to strengthen european co-operation and international links in higher education by supporting high-quality european masters courses. it will enable

52、students and visiting scholars from around the world to engage in postgraduate study at european universities, as well as encouraging the outgoing mobility of european students and scholars towards third countries.internationalizing e-learning for professional development international partnerships

53、leading to the sharing of internet-based courses between institutions involved in teaching and learning is a positive development, yet there are some significant issues related to the design and quality assurance of such online provision. in this section of the paper we discuss two major challenges

54、that we believe set the conditions for the success of internationalized professional development programs in geography. we also offer some guidance to faculty, departments, and institutions as they explore the prospects of internationalizing an online curriculum for professionals and lifelong learne

55、rs. collaborative development and delivery of internationalized curricula in recent years geographers have pursued a variety of strategies to design courses through international collaborations. hurley, proctor, and ford (1999) developed a course in which teams of students from the university of cal

56、ifornia, santa barbara and westminster college, utah collaboratively analyzed problems of human-induced environmental change. similarly, reed and mitchell (2001) and warf, vincent, and purcell (1999) collaboratively developed and taught courses that linked students in the u.s. and europe. in each ca

57、se, the authors reported the need to prepare students with the skills necessary to learn in online environments, an intercultural challenge that is especially daunting where the curriculum is specifically intended for an international audience. this is an important issue because researchers are find

58、ing that students tend to learn geography differently from country to country. healey, et al. (2005) examined the learning styles of geography students in 12 different universities (three each in australia, new zealand, the united kingdom, and the united states). students were asked in a survey to d

59、escribe how they preferred to learn geography, with the results categorized using kolb's (1984) learning style dimensions: converger (those who like to learn using abstract concepts and active experimentation, including labwork and fieldwork), diverger (those who like to learn using reflective observation and concrete experience, including writing journals and brainstorming), accommodator (those who like to learn using concrete experience and active experimentation, including simulations and case studie