[gu-l] (12/15/01) Goals of global learning by Tapio Varis
Tak Utsumi
utsumi@columbia.edu
Sat, 15 Dec 2001 18:01:37 +0000 (GMT)
<<December 15, 2001>>
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P. Tapio Varis, Ph.D, Professor <tapio.varis@uta.fi>
Yamasawa, Kiyohito, Dr.Eng. <yamasaw@gipwc.shinshu-u.ac.jp>
Dear Tapio:
===========
(1) Many thanks for your sending me your wonderful essay (ATTACHMENT I)
which we received yesterday. My wife, Hisae, and I were greatly
impressed by reading it. It is very timely. Congratulations!!
(2) I agree with you that we need more global e-learning for human
development with intercultural and peace dimensions -- especially
after terrorists' attack of the World Trade Center in Manhattan on
September 11th.
We saw from our window black smoke coming out from the center
for many days. We watched it with our dismayed, depressed and
disgusted feelings, since the attack and the Taliban's behaviors
in Afghanistan in the following days were so much similar to the
situations we had in my home town of Shinshu (or Nagano
Prefecture) in Japan during the last days of the World War II --
even digging caves in our nearby mountains to hide our Emperor's
family.
Dear Prof. Yamasawa:
====================
(3) This may be a very good reference for the vision setting of your new
Shinshu University.
You met Tapio during our Tampere event
<http://www.uta.fi/EGEDL/>. He was expecting your workshop at
our recent phone conversations.
Best, Tak
****************************************
ATTACHMENT I
Perspectives
Tampere Business
2/2001, Page 23
The goals of global learning
by
TAPIO VARIS
Professor and Chair of Media
Culture and Media Education,
University of Tampere, Finland
Quality also requires that higher education should be characterized by its
international dimension.
We face new realities in the process of globalization. Already ten years ago,
Hans Magnus Enzensberger wrote that violence has freed itself from ideology -
it has become a way of life not only in the poor countries but in the
metropolis of the world. The world is also definitely multicultural and we
have to face it as such.
In a historical perspective it has been very difficult to plan, execute and
provide transnational educational courses. The League of Nations started the
international textbook revision soon after the First World War. Since then,
many efforts have been made to overcome suspicion and mistrust, bias and
prejudice in all fields, political and religious in particular, but also
social and psychological.
After 1945, UNESCO in particular has continued the work initiated in the
1930s. A major achievement of UNESCO was the World Conference on Higher
Education in 1998. It noted that there is an unprecedented demand for and a
great diversification in higher education, as well as an increased awareness
of its vital importance for sociocultural and economic development.
The quality of higher education is a multidimensional concept, which should
embrace all its functions, and activities: teaching and academic programmes,
research and scholarship, staffing, students, buildings, facilities,
equipment, services to the community and the academic environment. Internal
self- evaluation and external review, conducted openly by independent
specialists, if possible with international expertise, are vital for
enhancing quality. Independent national bodies should be established and
comparative standards of quality, recognized at the international level,
should be defined. Due attention should be paid to specific institutional,
national and regional contexts in order to take into account diversity and to
avoid uniformity. Stakeholders should be an integral part of the
institutional evaluation process.
Quality also requires that higher education should be characterized by its
international dimension: exchange of knowledge, interactive networking,
mobility of teachers and students, and international research projects, while
taking into account the national cultural values and circumstances.
Marco Antonio Dias, the former Director of UNESCO, has noted that
globalization is consolidated by the extraordinary invasion of higher
education by new technologies, especially the Internet. The development of
communication and information technologies makes it possible for distance
teaching institutions to strengthen their position in the educational
landscape. They also pave the way for lifelong education for all and at the
same time are spreading the traditional universities, more and more of which
use distance teaching methods in their activities, thereby making the
distinction between the two types of institutions virtually meaningless.
There are an increasing number of university networks of this kind all over
the world, and the use of computers in the learning process, access to the
Internet by students as a vehicle for self-directed learning, educational
broadcasting and videoconferencing are all being stepped by.
Higher education cannot, however, be visualized any longer in purely national
or regional terms. Future graduates have to be in a position to take up the
complex challenges of globalization and rise to the opportunities of the
international labour market. The equitable transfer of knowledge and the
mobility of students, teachers and researchers, and also the mobility of
learning environments using eLearning applications, are crucial to the future
of peace in the world.
We realize that after so much talk of technology and eLearning we are now
talking of peace, cultures and human development. It is not too late to think
of the goals of global learning.
****************************************
Distribution List
P. Tapio Varis, Ph.D, Professor
Acting President, Global University System
Chairman, GLOSAS/Finland
Professor and Chair
Media Culture and Communication Education
Hypermedia laboratory
University of Tampere
P.O.Box 607
FIN-33101 Tampere
FINLAND
Tel: +358-3-215 6111
Tel: +358-3-614-5247--office in Hameenlinna
Tel: +358-3-215 6243--mass media lab in Tampere
GSM: +358-50-567-9833
Fax: +358-3-215 7503
tapio.varis@uta.fi
tapio.varis@helsinki.fi
http://www.uta.fi/~titava
Yamasawa, Kiyohito, Dr.Eng.
Professor
Dept. of Electrical & Electronic Engineering
Shinshu University
4-17-1 Wakasato, Nagano 380-8553
JAPAN
Tel: +81-26-269 51 96
Fax: +81-26-223 77 54
ISDN:+81-26-223-0228
yamasaw@gipwc.shinshu-u.ac.jp
http://yslab.shinshu-u.ac.jp
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* Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D., P.E., Chairman, GLOSAS/USA *
* (GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.) *
* Laureate of Lord Perry Award for Excellence in Distance Education *
* Founder of CAADE *
* (Consortium for Affordable and Accessible Distance Education) *
* President Emeritus and V.P. for Technology and Coordination of *
* Global University System (GUS) *
* 43-23 Colden Street, Flushing, NY 11355-3998, U.S.A. *
* Tel: 718-939-0928; Fax: 718-939-0656 (day time only--prefer email) *
* Email: utsumi@columbia.edu; Tax Exempt ID: 11-2999676 *
* http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/ *
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