Shifting tuition online

I see from The Times newspaper last Monday (29 November, 2021) that Universities UK, the body that represents Vice-Chancellors, has produced a briefing paper on the lessons that have been learnt from the covid pandemic about the advantages provided by online learning. The Vice-Chancellors thought that, in future, there were potential benefits to be gained from digital teaching if the necessary equipment and technology could be provided. Naturally enough, there have been fears raised about a cost-cutting exercise within the university system. I do not think there is anything particularly surprising in this approach: after all, the Open University has been using distance learning techniques for several decades and the advantages of creating a repository for digital lectures and seminars has been obvious for a very long time. I suspect we shall be hearing a lot more about such possibilities in the future.

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