EDUCATION BY TELECOURSE

By Gail S. Thomas


For a Saturday afternoon in mid-February, the campus of Los
Angeles Harbor College seemed unexpectedly busy. Around 2:00
p.m., Saturday, February 20, 1988, I drove onto the campus of
the two-year community college, located at 1111 Figueroa
Avenue, Wilmington, CA 90744. My car formed part of a stream
of vehicles halting in the parking lot near the Liberal Arts
Building at the corner of Figueroa and "L" Street. During
weekdays, the parking lot was reserved for faculty and staff
use. However, none of the cars driven into the lot and parked
that Saturday bore Los Angeles Community College District
employee parking decals.

To the left of the staff parking lot, a covered truck stood
parked with the tailgate down. The open tailgate revealed many
cardboard boxes, some opened, some still stacked. A cash
register perched on the right-hand side of the tailgate. Using
the rest of the tailgate as a work surface, a man and a woman
sorted what appeared to be various types of papers and forms.

Men and women of varying ages and appearances emerged from the
parked cars. I parked my car, got out and followed the people
towards one of several rectangular, modern, one-story
structures connected by covered concrete walkways. Just
outside the open double door, a banner welcomed all comers to
the "ITV Orientation." Inside, in the entry hall, people
milled around various tables staffed by five or six people,
mostly women. The arriving men and women moved through various
lines, collected papers, filled out forms, and asked
questions. As the people were processed through the lines,
they gathered in a medium- sized, amphitheater-style lecture
hall. The men and women filled most of the tiered wooden
seats.

The men and women gathered at Harbor College that Saturday for
a shared purpose important enough for each of them to give up
three hours on a weekend afternoon. They came on campus for
the orientation meeting of the spring semester group of five
television courses conducted by the Los Angeles Community
College District.

Often referred to as "telecourses," television courses are
broadcast each semester under the academic sponsorship of many
educational institutions throughout the United States, Canada,
and other countries. Mostly the telecourses yield lower
division and general education credits, granted by the local
public junior or community college district. Sometimes,
departments of those same school districts also produce the
telecourses, from initial instructional design to finished
study guides and broadcast quality video lessons. In the
western United States, for example, two of the largest centers
for telecourse production include the Center for
Telecommunications, Dallas County Community College District,
Dallas, Texas, and the Office of Alternative Learning Systems,
Coast Community College District, Fountain Valley, California.

Telecourses involve much more than just watching television
programs. Besides watching fifteen to thirty broadcast-quality
half-hour videolessons, each telecourse student reads a
comprehensive textbook and refers to a specially prepared study
guide keyed not only to the textbook, but also to the televised
lessons. Some telecourses also include supplementary books,
such as collections of readings or laboratory manuals. Many
basic telecourse textbooks come from the lists of major
publishers. All other materials, from study guides to faculty
manuals and test banks, are prepared by the instructional
designers and faculty advisers of the school district which
developed the particular telecourse.

Each resulting telecourse represents a self-contained
instructional package, suitable for use by students desiring
alternatives to traditional classroom instruction. Students
enroll in telecourses for a wide variety of reasons. Most
telecourse students are adults (persons over eighteen) who
either cannot or do not wish to attend on-campus courses. Some
community college districts allow high-school seniors to get a
head start on college by enrolling concurrently in telecourses,
with permission from both the student's high school and the
community college district. However, many persons enrolled in
telecourses come from the ranks of people with part-time or
full- time working responsibilities. Those work categories
range from unpaid homemakers to salaried nine-to-five office
workers. Across the country, retired persons also regularly
enroll in telecourses for lifelong learning and mental
stimulation.

Each semester the associated stations of the Public
Broadcasting Service broadcast a selection of telecourses. In
many geographic areas, cable stations and commercial television
stations also broadcast telecourses. Colleges wishing to offer
telecourses for credit choose from potential course offerings
broadcast during any particular semester. For example, during
the current (Spring 1988) semester, the Los Angeles Community
College District Instructional Television office gives college
credit for the following five courses: Economics U$A
(economics); Faces of Culture (cultural anthropology); The New
Literacy (computer literacy); Oceanus (oceanography/marine
biology); and Understanding Human Behavior (psychology).
Successful completion of each course earns the student three
units of lower division credit, transferable to the various
campuses of the California State University and Colleges
system. Many telecourses are also approved for lower division
credits accepted by the campuses of the University of
California system. Private colleges and universities accept
telecourse credits in varying degrees.

"It's been more than twenty years since the Los Angeles
Community College District first offered Instructional
Television courses," writes Ethel McClatchey, Director of
Academic Programs, in an open letter to Instructional
Television students this semester. "The initial, modest
schedules of one or two courses per semester brought a
professor and a blackboard into the homes of people who
otherwise could not enjoy a college education. Telecourses in
the 1980s are much more sophisticated. There is a wide range
of subject matter. They introduce scholars from well- known
institutions and take the Instructional Television student
places a classroom simply can't."

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Successfully completing telecourses involves much more than
just watching televised lessons, reading textbooks, and
referring to study guides. Typically, community college
districts assign an instructor holding a credential in an
appropriate subject matter area to each telecourse that the
district chooses to offer for academic credit. The faculty
member maintains office hours where students can phone in to
discuss the course, ask questions and get answers.
Additionally, faculty members usually conduct a series of
on-campus, face-to-face meetings during the semester. Those
meetings include orientations, discussions of the broadcast
lessons, review sessions, and midterm and final examinations.

That gathering at Harbor College provided an orientation
session for students enrolled in the district's five
telecourses. Additionally, the gathering facilitated in-person
registration and adding classes. For the convenience of
telecourse students, the district even arranged to bring the
bookstore to the students. That covered truck with the cash
register on the lowered tailgate served as a mobile bookstore,
vending necessary textbooks for the five courses. Required
textbooks, study guides and supplementary readings typically
total about $50 per student per course.

In the far-flung Los Angeles Community College District, the
Instructional Television office schedules seven two to
three-hour student-faculty meetings during each semester. The
seminars are repeated four times on a Saturday and Sunday over
a weekend period at four geographically diverse junior college
campuses within the district. Students attend seminars and
exam sessions at the campus closest to home. Effectively, the
instructor comes to the student.

Bringing together students and instructors several times
during a semester represents a conscious effort to personalize
a mass-directed, possibly impersonal educational process.
During the Instructional Television open house I attended an
orientation session hosted by Carroll F. Shelor, instructor for
Economics U$A. Mr. Shelor's discussion ranged from the course
grading procedures to the relevance of economics to consumers'
everyday lives. Students could also view videotapes of the
first two broadcast lessons of the twenty-six-part Economics
U$A series.

The series employs a journalistic style to explore topics from
stagflation to the reduction of poverty. David Schoumacher, a
former CBS network correspondent, acts as on-camera host and
investigative reporter. Dr. Richard Gill, economist and former
Professor of Economics at Harvard University, provides analyses
and comments on the decisionmaking processes and choices
beneath the events that have shaped the economy of the United
States during the twentieth century. The Annenberg/CPB Project
provided funding for preparing both printed and audio-visual
materials for the telecourse. Televised lessons include both
historical film footage and interviews with economists,
businesspersons, academics and government officials.

Despite the best intentions of instructional designers,
faculty advisers and enrolled students, telecourses involve
some disadvantages when compared to traditional, face-to-face,
on- campus courses. As with any kind of extension or
off-campus learning experience, from correspondence courses to
computer conferencing seminars, the individual student must
exercise a certain amount of self-discipline. Without
regularly scheduled, weekly on-campus course meetings, each
student needs to accept the responsibility of keeping up with
the required readings, viewing the videolessons, completing
assignments and taking scheduled exams. Instructors can only
try to motivate students and prevent course dropouts. For
example, Mr. Shelor, who grades on a point system, grants
fifteen points of credit to each student attending each
scheduled seminar or review session. Many community college
districts maintain videocassette recorders and copies of
videolessons in junior college libraries so that students can
catch up on missed episodes during library hours. Beyond the
motivation factor, the subject matter of telecourses seems
rather limited to introductory surveys. Most telecourses
require no prerequisites. Some subjects, such as the
performing arts, do not easily lend themselves to telecourse
presentation.

However, despite motivation and presentation considerations,
telecourses continue to provide educational opportunities and
advantages. People who are for various reasons either unable
or unwilling to attend traditional on-campus courses can earn
college credits through telecourse studies. High-school
students can concurrently earn credits for general education
college courses. Adults of any age desiring continuing
education, enrichment and lifelong learning can derive
intellectual stimulation through the telecourse educational
process. In particular, courses in American history and United
States government can assist refugees and immigrants who are
preparing for citizenship and naturalization examinations.

Granted, education by telecourse requires self-motivation on
the part of individual students. However, the educational
rewards and steady student demand apparently ensure the
continued growth and development of telecourses. For further
information on college credit via telecourse study, contact
your local junior or community college district. For
information on courses offered by Los Angeles Community College
District, contact the Instructional Television office, 5800
Fulton Avenue, Van Nuys, CA 91401-4094. For information on
telecourses developed by and offered through the Coast
Community College District, contact the Office of Alternative
Learning Systems, 11460 Warner Avenue, Fountain Valley, CA
92708-2597.

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author's note: Gail S. Thomas, a businesswoman in Long Beach,
California, earned the first Master of Arts in Media Studies
degree granted entirely through online study by the Media
Studies Program, New School for Social Research. She serves on
the administrative staff of Connected Education, Inc., a
not-for-profit corporation offering online courses for academic
credit. She holds California Community College Instructor
credentials in several designated subject areas.