Responses of Chinese Higher Education to the Challenged of

Information Society

Wenge Guo

Graduate School of Education

Beijing University, China

Main Topic

• Information Society and Challenges for Higher Education

• Responses of Chinese Higher Education– Policy Responses– National Infrastructure Building– Use of ICT at Institutional Level– Network Academy

• Issues and Implication

I. Information Society and Challenges for Higher

Education

• ICT accelerates the process of the globalization, affect the labor division, determine the competitiveness of economies and corporations, and generate new growth patterns of social life.

• “networks constitute the new social morphology of our society, and the diffusion of networking logic substantially modifies the operation and outcomes in processes of production, experience, power, and culture” (Castells, 2000)

The feature of Information society

Challenges for Higher Education

• Information explode• New education delivery vehicle• Anywhere/anyone/anytime communication

and collaboration• Globalization

II. Responses of Chinese Higher Education

Policy responses

• 1993, Outline for Education Reform and Development in China, as meta-policy– addressed the needs for Chinese education to

reform in face of the challenges of information society

– stressed the importance of use of information and communication technology (ICT) in education

Informationalization of education was explicitly stressed as basic national education policy, with an intention to leap some gap, extend access to post-secondary education, and provide equity opportunities for diversity population.

ICT was believed the main instrument for this vision.

• 1999, Action Plan for Vitalizing Education for the 21st Century, launched six projects:– qualification-oriented education– enhancement of teacher quality– developing high level and creative talents– Modern distance learning – “211” project– World class university project

• Program is the financial instrument in China.

“211” Project

• MOE of China shifted finance to selective 100 universities and 100 discipline to improve their infrastructure and research and teaching environment

• During 1996-2000, central and local government has spent 18 billion yuan RMB to improve the ICT infrastructure, especially support two system:– CERNET: China Education and Research Network– CALIS: Chine Academic Library Information System

Network Academy• During the periods of 1998-2003, the governmen

t had invested over 500 million yuan RMB on this project, to:– update and improve China Education Research Netw

ork (CERNET), Chinese Education TV and campus networks in the west China;

– set out a research project on the key technology of modern distance education

• Up to 2004, 67+1 higher education institutions has engaged in distance education and enrolled 2.3 million online students (1 is Chinese Open University)

Finance for ICT in Higher Education

“211” Program Modern Distance Learning

CALIS CERNET CETV Research

Campus ICT Infrastructure

Net-course

Distance Learning System

Support Support

National Infrastructure Building

• CERNET: China Education and Research Network

• CALIS: China Academic Library & Information System

CERNET Project

• China Education and Research Network was started in 1994

• Funded by the State Planning Commission and the Ministry of Education

• Managed by the Ministry of Education

Major Tasks

• Establish a nationwide backbone which connects eight regional networks and connect them to the global Internet

• Set up a national network center • Set up ten regional network nodes• Establish network management systems• Provide Internet applications and develop

China information resources and applications.

CERNET Backbone Topology(by end of Jun. 2004)

622 M POS

155M POS

4M satellite

622 M POS

155M POS

4M satellite

2.5G~10G 155M~2.5G

512K~7M Satellite+DDN

乌鲁木齐

西宁

兰州

银川

呼和浩特

太原

石家庄

郑州

青岛

大连

长春

哈尔滨

济南

拉萨

昆明 重庆

贵阳

南宁

桂林

海口

深圳

台北福州

厦门

长沙 南昌

合肥

天津

北京

沈阳

西安成都 武汉

南京

上海

广州

杭州

Satellite

DDN

To USA

To UK

To Japan

CERNET Statistics

by the end of June,2004

• Users 18,000,000+• Provinces 31• Cities 200+• Universities and Colleges 1300+

CALIS• China Academic Library & Information

System was started in 1998.

• By the end of Nov.2004, the member of libraries had exceeded 500.

Major Tasks

• A shared resources network based on the CERNET will be developed using leading edge technology

• The document resources and information services will be brought to a higher level for the teaching and research activities in higher education institutions in China.

• A set of databases both by purchase and self-development will be developed.

Structure of CALIS

National Center of CALIS

Liberal Studies Engineering Regional Center Medicine Agriculture

7 Regional Center Military

Catalog

• Digital Dissertation (Chinese)

• Digital Dissertation (English)

• Digital Journals (Chinese & English)

• Digital Conference Papers

• Cooperation with ERIC, UMI, EBSCO, SAGA etc.

Use of ICT at institutional level

• Infrastructure

• Management of Information system

• ICT in teaching

• Budget and maintenance

Infrastructure

ItemsData

(end of Jun,2004)

Campus Network ConnectionAmong: Wireless LAN

96.5%, Homepage 13%

Connect to Internet:

Office

Classroom

Dormitories

76.6

48.2%

49.4%

Classroom with fix projector 31.2%

Management of Information systemFeature Model Percent

OA systemStudent Information SystemResearch Information SystemEducation Management SystemOnline Library SystemHR Information ManagementLearning Management System

70%>70>52.3%>70%>70%>68.2%40%

Interestingly,

• 58.2% higher education institutions said, they prefer developing MIS themselves or cooperating with other institutions

• 32.6% purchase the off-shelf software system developed by other institutions

• Only 9.3% institutions will purchase system from commercial company

ICT in teaching

• Since 2000, the Ministry of Education has launched teacher-training project

• 38.1% institutions provide training course regularly, 54.7% provide training course on demand

• 65.2% institutions have established Educational Technology Centers

Instruments in Teaching Percent

Power Point 96.8%;

Courseware 69%;

Email 65.5%

Online Resources 55.1%

Learning Management System 30.5%

Discussion in BBS 19.7%

Budget and maintenance

Expenditure Percent

Hardware 37.5%

Software 18%

Network service and technical maintenance

13.3%

staff salary 11%

campus network custom support 8.9%

III. Issues and Implications

Issues

• Lack of qualified learning Resources

• Invest to maintain and upgrade ICT Infrastructure

• Teaching in ICT environment: Challenge for faculties

• Arguments about the distance learning

• intellectual property issues

Policy Process Model• Up-down model• Vision-Driven Policy

Development Process

• High Efficiency• Low Effect

MOE

State Council

Local Government Top Universities

Universities and Colleges

MOST

Lobby

Policy and Finance

Implication

• Simple change easy take place

• Complex change is more difficult

• Participatory policy process

• Application-driven investment

Thank you!

My Contact Information:

wgguo@gse.pku.edu.cn

+86-10-62767723