Administration and Management of Programmes Using 

Distance Education Methods

Neil Butcher

 Purpose of document 

This document outlines some possible options in administration and management of programmes using distance education methods or resource-based learning. The document brings together multiple sources of information, in an effort to act as a resource for educational managers planning new programmes or seeking to improve the quality of their existing programmes. Although the tone of this document may sometimes err by suggesting otherwise, it is essential to stress that the ideas below are not intended to be prescriptive in any sense, but are rather intended to function as a stimulus for programme managers and planners.

 Staffing Requirements 

The programme will rely on identification and allocation of certain key job functions if it is to run effectively with a significantly increased student cohort. Some will be undertaken by existing full- and part-time staff members, while others might be new job functions created by the additional dimensions of developing a materials base for all courses and of significant growth in student numbers.  

This latter dimension will demand that certain key job functions will require additional human capacity - which will have significant implications for staff numbers - if they are to be carried out effectively. Key job functions are outlined below, although it should be stressed that a job function does not necessarily equate with a person. In some cases, the same person might carry out various job functions, while in others job functions may be split up between more than one person[1]. In addition, indicating that a particular job function needs to be allocated as a specific responsibility does not imply that a wide range of other people will not also be involved in these tasks. This applies particularly to certain management functions. For example, the setting of policy is indicated as a programme manager responsibility, but will inevitably involve all programme staff in some way. The important point is that the construction of an overall staff cohort will need to cover all of the job functions outlined below (as well as some which may have been overlooked in this breakdown), ensuring that the weighting of staff focus matches the demands of the programme.

Programme Manager

The programme manager will need to take overall responsibility for the implementation of the programme. This will involve various key job functions, including the following: 

•       Responsibility for ensuring that programme policy is developed and implemented (through processes that engage a wide range of interested parties). This will involve engaging with related policy processes (within and beyond the parameters of the institution) to ensure that programme policy does not conflict with other relevant policy statements. It will also then involve ensuring that there as few tensions as possible between policy commitment and the practicalities of implementation. 

•       Negotiation of programme accreditation. This will entail ensuring that the programme, once developed, is recognized by the appropriate accreditation bodies, both within and outside of the educational provider. An important aspect of this within the educational provider will be to ensure that the current relationship between credits and contact hours is changed to reflect a relationship between credits and notional hours of study, in recognition of the viability of different methods of educational provision. Outside of the educational provider, it will entail establishing links with appropriate accreditation bodies, such as the South African Qualifications Authority, as well as ensuring that programme completion is recognized by other educational providers and by employers as an accredited and relevant educational experience. Should the programme not meet accreditation criteria for any reason, the programme manager will then need to take responsibility for implementing processes to overcome these problems effectively. 

•       Allocation of tasks and responsibilities. As part of this, it will be necessary to ensure that the job descriptions of the overall staff contingent match the requirements of the programme.  In this respect, breaking the link between job functions and staff posts will give the programme manager greater flexibility in using full-time and part-time staff, secondments, short-term contracted staff, and outsourcing to generate necessary human capacity to run the programme effectively. The programme manager might also be expected to support staff members in allocating time between activities, with a view to ensuring that key operations are completed. 

•       Establishment of effective communications systems. Many programmes using distance education methods struggle to operate effectively because people often operate in isolation from one another, each not understanding clearly how his or her work fits into the running of the programme as a whole. The programme manager has an important responsibility to ensure that effective communications systems are designed and to set the tone for how these are used (with a particular focus on transparency of information). Communications systems will not, however, only be internal to the programme. It will also be necessary to maintain effective communication channels with other elements of the educational provider, as well as with the outside world. The latter communication channels will become increasingly important as opportunities for partnership with other institutions are explored. 

•       Responsibility for finances. This document is based on an assumption that responsibility for financial management needs to be devolved to departmental and programme management levels - and then complemented by reporting and monitoring mechanisms designed to ensure accountability - to enable educationally and financially effective programme provision[2]. This implies an important role for programme managers in financial management. It will include taking final responsibility for compiling budgets and securing their approval as necessary. It will involve supervising records of income and expenditure for the programme. This will incorporate a long-term planning responsibility for monitoring the balance between fixed and recurrent expenditure and effecting changes which such monitoring reveals are necessary, with a view to ensuring the long-term financial sustainability of the programme. Finally, it will entail authorizing programme expenses and payments. All of the financial functions of the programme manager will be strongly influenced by the financial management requirements set for the programme. 

•       Final responsibility for employment of staff and purchase of physical resources. Various of the job functions outlined below involve recruitment of staff. The programme manager will, however, take overall responsibility for hiring staff for the programme, working in conjunction with the educational provider’s human resource department (where one exists). Clearly, because the appointment of full-time staff has consequences affecting an organization as a whole, the programme manager will need to motivate strongly for additional full-time posts if appropriate and these should be ratified in conjunction with central human resource and financial structures. In line with the point on financial management above, programme managers will need to be accorded greater responsibility for appointment of part-time and contract staff and the establishment of small service contracts (to provide physical or human resources), although limits will have to be set on the extent to which they are entitled to make financial commitments, while reporting mechanisms will need to stress accountability to various organizational structures. 

•       Initiation of ongoing programme design processes. An important responsibility of the programme manager will be to coordinate programme design processes, which will focus on the integrated design of the programme as a whole. These might initially be run as annual planning exercises, during which key problems with the implementation of the programme are discussed, strategic directions set, new courses and major course re-design processes proposed, and action plans generated. In the longer term, though, these would hopefully be integrated into the day-to-day work of the programme staff, as an element of a quality assurance strategy. 

•       Coordination of a programme quality assurance strategy. Elements of a quality assurance strategy are described in more detail below. 

•       Designing and implementing strategies to ensure accountability within the programme and accountability of the programme in relation to the organization as a whole (the latter process being negotiated with various other organizational structures and departments as required). This will involve the establishment of clear lines of accountability within the programme, as well as between the programme and other structures as appropriate. An important element of this will be to ensure that mechanisms prevent staff from using their positions of power within the programme unfairly to generate extra revenue for personal benefit or to receive double payment for the same work. Importantly, communications and reporting systems should, by focusing on ensuring transparency of decision-making processes and other relevant information, play an important part in maintaining accountability within the programme.

Course Design Staff

Given that this document focuses primarily on administrative and management issues, the job functions to be undertaken by course design staff will not be described in great detail. Nevertheless, it is worth describing briefly what these job functions comprise, because integrated into the educational functions are various administrative functions.  

Add job functions for integration of other media/technologies

•       Course coordinator. Distance education experience around the world has demonstrated clearly the benefit of designing courses in teams rather than relying on individual academic staff members[3]. For this to happen effectively, the course design process will have to be effectively managed by a course coordinator, whose primary responsibility will be to ensure that the inputs of all people involved in course design and development processes leads to the creation and review of a coherent course.  Thus, this person will need to undertake the following types of activities:

–      Identification and appointment of part-time and short-term staff and negotiation of outsourcing contracts (in liaison with, and accountable to, the programme manager);

–      Organizing payment in terms of all course design-related contractual arrangements;

–      Allocation of course team tasks and responsibilities;

–      Monitoring of deadlines and implementation of appropriate strategies where deadlines have not been met;

–      Coordination of curriculum design processes;

–      Coordination of course design and development processes;

–      Establishment of effective and transparent communications systems within the course team, which fit into an overall communications system for the programme;

–      Responsibility for maintaining course-specific record systems;

–      Organizing professional development activities for course team staff, as appropriate; and

–      Responsibility for course-specific elements of a broader quality assurance strategy.

 •         Academic staff. This will require involvement in the basic curriculum design for a particular course. In curriculum design, a strong focus on the integration of different teaching and learning strategies within the course will be required, as will a description of strategies for integrating different courses within the programme (where appropriate). It will also include the generation of outcomes, range statements, and assessment criteria, which will provide the foundation of the course. Academic input at the level of course design and development will primarily involve development of course content, but will also entail an overall input into instructional design. 

•       Identification of existing course materials and skill to negotiate copyright as necessary. Often, people planning course materials design and development operate on the assumption that it is necessary to develop new materials. This assumption needs to be tested through identification of existing materials that might be incorporated into a course, either as they are or suitably amended. Building on this, it will then be necessary to develop an understanding of copyright and an ability to secure copyright under favourable conditions when existing materials have been identified. This has been stated as a separate job function, because commitment to using existing materials tends most often to be primarily lip-service, which seldom results in any sustained effort to identify existing course materials that could feasibly be used in a course. 

•       Instructional designer. The primary function of instructional designers is to provide input on the strength of the pedagogy of curricula and courses, examining how the various strategies and techniques employed amount to a coherent teaching and learning process. This will include pedagogical design of particular elements of a course. It will, however, also entail providing constructive input on the extent to which different teaching and learning strategies - such as reading, practical or written activities, face-to-face interaction, and assessment strategies - integrate to form a coherent course. 

•       Page layout expert/desktop publisher. The rapid development of information and communications technologies is making it increasingly possible to save both time and resources at this stage of course materials design and development, provided initial investments are made in basic computer hardware and software and in the design of flexible templates. It also offers increased scope for reviewing and updating materials more easily and quicker, provided processes for conducting this review and updating are well planned. Thus, this job function demands a solid knowledge of computer-based materials development, if it is to yield maximum cost-efficiency. 

•      Graphic designer/illustrator. Most academic and instructional design people would acknowledge the potential that graphics and illustrations have for improving course materials. Very often, though graphics and illustrations are added with little thought given to their educational value or purpose. Such use of graphics and illustration can, at best, be annoying and, at worst, patronizing and of negative educational value. For this reason, the job function of graphic design and illustrations becomes a very important one, which requires engagement with instructional designers and academic staff, as well as clear understanding of target learners.  

•       Editor. This job function would include copy-editing and proof-reading. It would, however, also involve editing to determine clarity of writing and communication of purpose. From this latter perspective, some awareness of the characteristics and language levels of target learners is important. 

•       Involvement in generic programme-related activities. This will involve the following activities, and might include various of the people responsible for the above job functions as appropriate:

–      contribution to programme policy development;

–      involvement in ongoing programme design processes;

–      participation in the maintenance of communications systems and contribution to information circulation; and

–      responsibility for implementing aspects of a quality assurance strategy.

Learner Support and Assessment Staff

This section needs more detail

From a planning perspective, an important difference between learner support staff and course design staff is that capacity requirements for the former will rise pretty much in line with student numbers while those of course design staff do not. All programmes rely on various types of staff to provide support of different kinds to learners. These functions are primarily a description of core educational components of courses, and hence will not be described in detail in this document (such descriptions would form part of statements of curricula and course design). In brief, however, they include the following:

•         Tutors. Their job functions will include:

–        running face-to-face tutorials; 

–        providing individual support to learners;

–        marking - and teaching on - written assignments; and

–        maintaining aspects of the records on individual students.

•         Lecturers.

•         Student counsellors (see section on enrolment and registration below).

•         Examiners.

•         Examination markers.

•         Assessment moderators.

Tutor Coordinator

Tutor coordinators provide a vital middle management function in programmes using distance education methods, without which the programme manager is likely to be stretched beyond capacity. Like the above category of staff, capacity requirements will grow in line with student numbers. Because of the ease with which tutor coordinator job functions can be confused with posts, it is essential to stress again that the description below does not necessarily imply a single full-time employee. Tutor coordination requires a mixture of skills and expertise that is unlikely to reside in one person, particularly in a country where skills are still relatively scarce.  It is, however, estimated that the job functions described below would comprise the equivalent of one full-time post for every sixty tutors employed. The job functions of a tutor coordinator might include the following:

•       Appointment of tutors (including advertising posts, organizing job interviews, identifying appropriate candidates, employing tutors - in consultation with the programme manager; and finalizing contracts);

•       Ensuring that tutors are paid on time.

•       Organizing tutorial schedules, in consultation with tutors.

•       Maintaining aspects of the records of individual tutors, in cooperation with administrative support staff.

•       Organizing professional development activities for tutors, in cooperation with a human resource coordinator.

•       Dealing with day-to-day problems of tutors.

•       Liaising between course developers and tutors.

•       Conducting performance appraisals for tutors.

•       Involvement in generic programme-related activities. This will involve the following activities, and might include various of the people responsible for the above job functions as appropriate:

–      contribution to programme policy development;

–      involvement in ongoing programme design processes;

–      participation in the maintenance of communications systems and contribution to information circulation; and

–      responsibility for implementing aspects of a quality assurance strategy.

Human Resource Coordinator

Human resource coordination will be essential to the successful implementation of an educational programme. Some of the job functions outlined below will need to take place in cooperation with central human resource departments in order to ensure continuity of institutional policy towards employment of staff. The various job functions include the following:

•         Establish staff selection criteria.

•         Establish general conditions of service for staff.

•         Compile staff contracts which include job descriptions.

•         Track staff cohorts to measure individual job descriptions against overall programme requirements.

•         Ensure that conditions of employment do not contravene national legislation.

•         Ensure that there is a description of affirmative action policies and guidelines, as necessary.

•         Establish criteria to measure staff workload that take account of the following activities:

–        contribution to policy processes;

–        programme design;

–        curriculum design

–        course design and development;

–        preparation of course materials;

–        designing and implementing quality assurance strategies;

–        management of other staff;

–        involvement in aspects of learner support;

–        involvement in aspects of learner assessment;

–        research and evaluation; and

–        administrative support functions.

      These criteria should be used to determine staff workloads. This information should then feed deliberations about salary increase and promotion. It should also be used to encourage staff not to overload themselves and to take leave regularly.

•         Help staff to manage their time more effectively.

•         Coordinate appraisal processes for all staff.

•         Coordinate an overall professional development strategy for the programme, which focuses strongly on   equipping - and re-equipping - staff for the specialized roles and tasks that they are expected to perform.

Administrative Support Staff

There are several administrative tasks that will be essential to the successful running of an educational programme. The following is a partial list.  

•         Overall design of administrative support procedures.

This will involve taking general responsibility for implementing responsive and effective administrative support procedures and processes and for reviewing them once they are established. It will have to be guided by the following basic principles:

–      Administrative procedures should focus first and foremost on providing the best quality service possible to students. Thus administrative procedures and processes should take account of student need and context, particular in terms of where and when particular services are available and in terms of the ‘user-friendliness’ of administrative procedures and documents.

–      Administrative procedures should, at a next level, focus on freeing up staff members to focus on those aspects of work that are part of their job description rather than demanding that they expend unnecessary energy on bureaucratic processes.

–      Administrative procedures should be supportive of - rather than prescriptive to -educational provision.

–      Administrative procedures should seek to minimize the expense of educational provision, by eliminating duplication of systems, by reducing the time required to complete administrative tasks, and by ensuring that conducting basic administrative tasks prevents long-term crises or problems that will be expensive to solve. 

•         Student affairs.

–      Handle enquiries from potential students.

–      Enrol and register students, focusing on minimizing bureaucratic processes and the need to be physically present for processes.

–      Develop student orientation material and processes as necessary.

–      Process student payment of fees.

–      Follow up on non-paying students to arrange for payment or to discontinue services.

–      Maintain student records.

–      Organize tutorial venues as required.

–      Organize refreshments during tutorial sessions if needed.

–      Organize examination venues.

–      Receive assignments, track their progress, and return them to students, ensuring that turnaround time is kept to a minimum.

–      Make arrangements for assignment re-submission where necessary.

–      Communicate assessment and examination results to students quickly and accurately, using easily accessible communication channels.

–      Make arrangements for examination re-writing as necessary.

–      Respond to students queries quickly and comprehensively.

–      Design and implement  procedures for responding to student complaints, ensuring that complaints are directed to the appropriate staff members.

–      Provide administrative information to students via easily accessible, regular channels of communication (such as tutorial newsletters). This might include notes about assignments and examinations, as well as information about available services, changes in procedures and schedules, directions to tutorial and examination venues, payment reminders, relevant contact details for staff members, hours of operation of departments, and other relevant student information.

 •         Equipment, stock and other resources.

–      Initiate regular processes to identify resource requirements, ensuring input is received from all relevant parties.

–      Track use of equipment, facilities, and other resources to feed into ongoing needs analyses (as described in the previous point) and to ensure they are used to maximum potential.

–      Secure use of non-departmental facilities as required, including off-campus venues, conference/meeting facilities, and specialized equipment (for example, LCD projectors).

–      Process requests for new equipment and other resources, focusing on transparency and speed.

–      Order equipment and other resources as required, guided by budgetary constraints.

–      Communicate clearly reasons for not purchasing equipment and other resources in response to requests, when the purchase is not possible or practical.

–      Arrange maintenance schedules and contracts.

–      Coordinate repair of damaged equipment.

–      Organize printing of course materials as required, ensuring that lead time for production does not delay student receipt of materials.

–      Organize distribution of course materials via appropriate channels, following up to confirm that materials are received by students before they are required to use them.

–      Implement stock control systems and maintain records of stock and equipment.

–      Ensure stock and equipment is stored in secure premises.

–      Implement regular strategies to confirm that services and resources provided are good value for money.

 •         Staff computer system.

–      Design a computer system (network infrastructure, hardware, and software) based on staff requirements, but compatible with the overall organizational computer system.

–      Purchase computer equipment required to match requirements, but according to financial constraints.

–      Configure personal computers to match staff requirements.

–      Provide necessary maintenance and support (including software reconfiguration to meet changing staff needs).

–     Conduct ongoing network maintenance (including addition of new users and allocation of e-mail addresses), as part of general institutional network maintenance.

–      Develop the capacity of the computer system to allow access from remote sites.

–      Conduct annual computer reviews and implement upgrading based on staff input, expert advice (either from inside of outside the institution), and budgetary constraints.

 •         Financial procedures.

–      Ensure that financial procedures (for example, handling of course fees, orders, accounts, petty cash systems, claiming procedures, schedules of charges for Departmental services, receipt of external funds, and part-time and full-time salaries) are developed in consultation with staff and adhered to by all staff once developed.

–      Process claims.

–      Monitor purchases and claims to prevent exploitation by staff members.

–      Arrange financial aid for students where possible and appropriate.

–      Ensure that payment of all accounts and salaries takes place on time and according to contractual obligations.

–      Issue payments.

–      Keep accurate financial records and accounts.

–      Audit financial records (a function that will have to involve external auditors in various ways).

 •         Tracking and record-keeping

–        Maintain tutorial schedules (in cooperation with tutor coordinators).

–        Maintain course design and development schedules (in cooperation with course coordinators).

–        Maintain record-keeping systems (see below).

 •         Office administration.

This will involve various administrative activities, including the following:

–     Provide telephone reception services when required.

–      Design and maintain key filing systems.

–      Organize provision of basic services, including electricity, water, refuse removal, office cleaning, and security.

–      Provide secretarial services to support various staff members.

–      Organize refreshments for key meetings, as needed.

–      Organize staff travel when needed. 

•       Involvement in generic programme-related activities. This will involve the following activities, and might include various of the people responsible for the above job functions as appropriate:

–      contribution to programme policy development;

–      involvement in ongoing programme design processes;

–      participation in the maintenance of communications systems and contribution to information circulation; and

–      responsibility for implementing aspects of a quality assurance strategy. 

Some of the functions outlined above (such as processing student payments) may be handled by central administrative departments. Importantly, though, the conceptualization of these departments needs to shift, to the extent that they come to be seen as providing support services to programmes rather than prescribing the way in which administrative and financial activities are undertaken.

Evaluators

Mention has been made above of various job functions relating to quality assurance, which is often mistakenly equated with evaluation. Equally often, though, assumptions are made that quality assurance replaces evaluation. Evaluation, however, might more usefully be seen as one element of a quality assurance strategy (described in more detail below). Much evaluation will be conducted by people employed as part of the programme, but it will make sense to ensure that external evaluation processes are also run for the programme regularly as part of an ongoing quality assurance strategy. To maximize effect, it is useful to try to feed the results of evaluation, whether conducted internally or externally and whether formative or summative in nature, into planning processes to ensure that evaluative statements lead directly to constructive action. Importantly, the programme should consider establishing a culture of sharing evaluation findings with other programmes, Departments, and educational providers, in order to ensure that, where possible, lessons learned can benefit educational provision beyond the immediate confines of the programme. In brief, tasks for which evaluators might be expected to take responsibility include:

•         Setting evaluation criteria;

•         Developing an evaluation strategy;

•         Collecting information;

•         Processing information;

•         Compiling evaluation statements and reports; and

•         Feeding evaluation results into planning processes.

Programme Information and Marketing

Information and marketing are important not only to attract new students, but also to ensure that students receive the information that they require to make informed choices about whether or not to enrol on the programme. Marketing job functions will, therefore, include the following:

•       Conducting market research to determine the extent to which the programme, in its current form, has the potential to meet the needs of learners, government, business, communities of various kinds, schools and related structures, other educational providers, school children, parents, and other potential clients (which will, in turn, be fed into quality assurance strategies). This research should also focus on identifying potential new markets for the programme.

•       Developing a coherent information and marketing strategy. It should provide direction on what communications channels should be used (including, for example, mass media, community media, teacher publications, journals, university prospectuses, and the Internet), when they should be used to maximize impact, and what information should be included in marketing campaigns (see section on enrolment and registration). It should also provide a budget for marketing, which will feed into an overall programme budget.

•       Implementing the marketing strategy, ensuring that publicity is truthful and informative and that information about the programme reaches as many of those who can be expected to have a need or use for the programme as possible, given limitations imposed by resources and available information channels.

•       Reviewing and amending the marketing strategy annually.

 Enrolment and registration 

Pre-Enrolment Procedures

The processes of enrolment and/or registration for programmes using distance education methods create various administrative requirements. This starts with a need to provide students with information about courses and programmes on which they want to enrol. In this regard, it will be important to provide various types of information, including the following:

•       target group(s) of learners;

•       entry requirements for the courses or programmes;

•       scope of programme;

•       goals and objectives of the programme;

•       content, in terms of topics covered;

•       knowledge and skills that will be acquired;

•       learning material;

•       teaching and learning activities;

•       time and location/s of teaching and learning strategies (particularly of those that are inflexible in terms of time and location);

•       assessment and accreditation procedures;

•       support services available;

•       programme fees and other costs incurred by enrolment;

•       conditions of payment;

•       right to return course materials;

•       time limits for completion and expected study times;

•       qualification acquired on successful completion (if any) and accrediting body/ies;

•       likely pathways beyond the course of programme (for example, possible employment prospects or access to other courses and programmes); and

•       terms regarding interruption or postponement of study.

 Record-keeping systems 

Programmes using distance education methods require well-conceptualized and systematic record-keeping systems if they are to run efficiently and cost-effectively. These demands arise from dual pressures created on administrative systems of larger numbers of students - whose details will need to be kept in an accessible format - and the need to monitor more administrative processes for these students.  

The successful design of record-keeping systems is strongly founded on a clear understanding of the type of information one might wish to extract from databases developed. An example of this would be payment of student fees. A simple search requirement that a programme manager may have of a student record-keeping system might be a list of all those students who are behind in their fee payment, together with a statement of the extent of their arrears. By passing this information on to tutor coordinators and tutors, the manager can then more effectively implement measures to recover these outstanding fees. For example, after discussion between a tutor and student, it would then be possible either to impose punitive measures on students - such as withholding of assignment marks - until the arrears are paid or to negotiate with the students concerned a special strategy for payment. The latter approach may allow a student to continue studying, with deadlines built in for payment, and may be particularly useful in programmes where many students lack ready funds to cover the arrears. 

The list provided contains examples of combinations of information that staff working on programmes using distance education methods might wish to extract from record-keeping systems. Obviously, this original conceptualization will not constitute the final design of a record-keeping system. Assuming that such a system is computer-based, it will easily be possible to add new fields to the database, change the properties of existing fields as demands change, and develop new search queries tailored to meet the needs of specific programmes. The list itself will obviously need to be fleshed out in more detail by programme staff. 

It is important to note that the record-keeping system need not be conceptualized or designed as a single database or be regarded as information that ought to be stored in a single physical location. The system might be made up of various components, some of which may be managed by central organizational staff and others by programme staff. Importantly, though, care needs to be taken to ensure that parallel systems - in which duplication of data capturing and processing become problematic - are not established. For example, where databases are established, it is possible that these could be linked by key fields (for example, student numbers), thus allowing for more sophisticated queries while ensuring that a single monolithic, unwieldy record-keeping system is not established.

Record of Student Queries

Every year, potential students are likely to make queries about a programme, some of whom will not enrol in that year. Thus, a first component of a record-keeping system might aim to store this information. This would be firstly for administrative purposes, as one would aim to keep a record of names and contact details of potential students, together with a statement of the date on which the educational provider responded to queries. In this way, it would be possible to track queries, to ensure that they are all dealt with promptly and to follow up if potential students do not respond within a certain time-frame. Furthermore, though, these records might form the basis of future marketing strategies, as the educational provider may wish to follow up during the course of the following year to determine whether or not those people who did not enrol are still interested in taking that - or another - programme. In addition, it might be possible to use these records to determine preliminary trends in terms of where queries about the programme are coming from, the types of people interested in the programme, and any reasons why those querying are not enrolling (for example, problems of geographical location). This information could then feed into longer-term strategic planning for the programme. Information categories which might be relevant here would be:

•         Query code.

•         Person’s name.

•         Contact details (physical address, postal address, telephone, fax, e-mail).

•         Pertinent personal details (see comments below).

•         How the student heard about the programme.

•         Reasons for interest in programme.

•         Date of query.

•         Nature of query (for example, telephonic, written, or personal visit).

•         Date and nature of response to query.

•         Did the query lead to enrolment? (Yes/No).

Biographical and Financial Information about Students

Given the nature of information being collected about students, it will be essential that systems exist to maintain the confidentiality of this information. The following types of information might be required here:

 •    Student names. 

•     Student numbers. 

•     Contact details (physical address, postal address, telephone, fax, e-mail). 

•      Link to query code (if applicable). 

•      Pertinent personal details (such as age, gender, and language preferences). These should not be kept merely for their own sake, but should be set up with a view to extracting trends about student populations as the programme grows and develops. Thus, the information in the record-keeping system should feed directly into planning processes and into ongoing course design and development. 

•      Motivations for learning. This information is of particular importance in a context where lifelong learning is being seen as an increasingly relevant and important concept. In such an environment, it is essential not to assume that all students are studying for the same reason (which might, in very general terms, have been traditionally described as preparation by a young adult for a career), but to monitor why students are enrolling in the programme.  

•      Descriptions of prior learning and experience (for example, prior learning and experience, prior qualifications, experience of distance learning, learning skills and styles, and language background). This information would both extend on ‘Motivations for Learning’ by providing important background information on student populations. Importantly, though, this information would also be used to give students credits for prior learning experience. It would then be possible, over time, to review the success of students with particular learning backgrounds and feed this information into course design and development processes, with a view to improving the support given to learners coming from learning backgrounds which have established barriers to their success on the programme. 

•      Resource factors (for example, place of learning, times available for learning, access to electricity, access to media and technologies, and financial resources for purchase of additional materials). 

•      Special educational needs of student. Over time, this information should be fed into programme design processes. 

•      Dates of application and registration. 

•      Courses selected by the student. This will obviously be less important if a programme is made up only of compulsory courses, but will become vital if options are gradually introduced (particularly if there are links to course provided as part of other programmes or by other institutions). In some programmes in South Africa, students are able to take more courses than those prescribed, and are not required to pay for the extra courses. This has financial implications, as it adds to staff work load without generating additional income. In cases such as these, it would be possible to use this information to track such discrepancies with a view to understanding in more detail the scope of the financial implications they have. 

•      Tutors assigned to student for courses. This information would be used for management purposes by tutor coordinators and the programme manager. In addition, though, tutors could use it to run searches relevant to their students only. 

•      Dates on which assignments are due. 

•      Records of student progress, including written assessment marks, together with relevant commentary and reports from tutors, tutor coordinators, lecturers, or other staff. It may also be desirable to monitor specific student queries made during the programme. This could then feed into course design as it would help to elucidate where students are experiencing similar problems, which in turn would point to design problems in courses. In addition, tracking the extent to which students bring individual queries to tutors and academic staff would help to plan future staff requirements, especially when growth is anticipated, as it would give some indication of the amount of time staff might expect to spend helping students on a one-to-one basis.   

      Records of student progress might need to include space for information regarding re-submission of assignments as well as re-marking of examinations where these have been necessary. They might also track delays in receiving assignments, together with reasons for those delays, in order to determine the extent to which assignment delays are the fault of students and the extent to which they are symptomatic of course design problems or administrative inefficiencies. 

      In some South African courses, students are able to take more than the required number of assignments. This also has financial implications, because it adds to staff work load without generating income. To plan for this effectively it would be necessary to monitor the extent to which students take advantage of such options in order to plan staff requirements more accurately. 

•        List of students in contact groups, together with record of attendance at contact sessions. 

•       Dates of completion of courses and programme (or dropout dates, where the programme is not completed). If possible, this should be designed flexibly to allow students more than one exit point, and to gain credit for courses completed even where the programme has not been finished. Dates gathered here could be used, in combination with dates of registration, to track throughput and trends in the dropout rates of students. A field added here on reasons for student dropout could add considerably to such analysis, if it is possible to maintain such records. 

•      Record of student complaints. This should include information on the nature of the complaint, the name of the person who recorded the complaint, date of the complaint, a statement of action taken in response to the complaint, and an indication of when this action was taken. 

•      Payment of fees and statement of payments due. This example was described in the introduction to record-keeping systems. It should be stressed, though, that providing all of the above information on students to programme staff does not equate with providing that information to students. If programme managers and staff perceive a direct relationship between payment of student fees and their programme income, it will be very much in their own interests to arrange directly with defaulting students for payment of fees or to discontinue providing a service to them. By devolving this responsibility to programme managers by making information on who has and has not paid available, it becomes possible to streamline processes of collecting outstanding payments.

Information about Full-Time and Part-Time Staff

•       Staff names. 

•       Staff numbers. 

•       Contact details (physical address, postal address, telephone, fax, e-mail). 

•       Pertinent personal details (such as age, gender, and language preferences).  

•      Job Descriptions. The section on staffing requirements provides information on different job functions that might be necessary to run a programme effectively. However, these job functions would not necessarily be directly related to specific posts of individuals. For example, the administrative and academic functions of tutor coordinators might be separated out and allocated to different people. Importantly, though, it will be important to ensure that the sum of the job descriptions of all staff covers all necessary job functions, and that there are sufficient numbers of responsible for each job function to deal with the number of students expected on the programme. 

•      Employment background and description of key skills and expertise on employment (if desired). 

•      Conditions of service. Clearly, it will be necessary to ensure that aspects of a database tracking staff details - particularly those pertaining to conditions of service - are secure. There are many strategies that might be employed here, which might entail developing separate, but linked, systems that are secured via password systems or other computerized barriers as well by physical location in a secure environment (for example, on a computer not linked to the local area network and housed in a office to which access is limited). It is important, though, to design systems which avoid duplication of information. Developing databases through a primary field (such as staff number) might be a solution to this problem). 

•      Commencement and duration of employment. 

•      Allocation of students to tutors. 

•      Manager. This field of information would indicate who the manager directly responsible for particular staff members is. It would be particularly relevant to part-time tutors, who would be assigned to specific tutor coordinators. Using a database field such as this, tutor coordinators could run searches specific to tutors for whom they are responsible. 

•      Date and outcomes of appraisal. This information would obviously be used for administrative purposes, for example to ensure that appraisal takes place regularly. In addition, however, it might be used to monitor common problems experienced by staff, with a view to improving management and administrative systems. It would also be important information for managers to have in situations where disciplinary action may become necessary. 

•       Record of professional development activities. 

•       Record of absences from work, together with reasons for absence (this would incorporate tracking of annual and other leave). 

•       Reasons for resignation/departure (where applicable).

Tracking the Flow of Information

There are two types of information flow of greatest relevance in the B. Ed. Programme. These are course materials and assignments. Each will be covered separately. The information below works on the assumption that only printed materials will be developed, and additional fields or categories would need to be added should this change in the future.

Materials

•     Information on course design and development processes. The Department has indicated a desire to initiate a five-year process of course design, development, and review. For this to work effectively, it will be vital to monitor the design and development processes, ensuring that by the time the cycle is completed all aspects of the course have been reviewed, as discrete elements, as part of an integrated course, and as part of a broader programme of learning. This will be particularly important in 1998 as the materials required for many courses have not yet been developed. 

•     Schedules for the production on materials. This might include the following records:

-     Due and actual - dates of completion of materials design and development (including deadlines for drafts, academic editing, copy editing, instructional design, graphic design and illustrations, and layout and desktop publishing);

-     Actual dates of completion of materials design and development;

-     Due dates for completion of production of materials (printing and publishing deadlines);

-     Actual dates for completion of production of materials. 

•     Record of available stock of materials (if applicable). This might include:

-      Date material was produced;

-      Number of copies available;

-       Where material is stored. 

•      Information on distribution of materials. This might include:

-      Date and methods of distribution of materials;

-      Record of students to whom materials have been distributed;

-      Log of student complaints about materials distribution;

-      Record of dates on which student problems were resolved. 

•     Record of strengths and weaknesses of materials. This would be based on feedback from students and tutors, and should feed into review and re-design of the materials.

Assignments

•         Date of receipt of assignment.

•         Date of completion of marking of assignment.

•         Date of return of assignment to student.

•         Log of student complaints about return of assignments.

•         Record of dates on which student problems were resolved.

 Financial management systems 

Substantial work required

One of the themes running through this document, and the accompanying issues paper on the use of distance education methods at the University of Natal, is that essential to increasing the flexibility of the institution’s system is a devolution of responsibility for financial management to Departmental and programme managers. This does not suggest a system void of accountability; rather it implies a need for strong monitoring and reporting systems to prevent corruption. If such systems are established, this move may, in fact, serve to reduce both wastage and corrupt or fraudulent practices. It may reduce the former by encouraging programme managers to take partnership and cooperation seriously because of potential cost savings. It can reduce the latter, because highly centralized systems of financial control are more open to fraudulent claims (which, because of the volume of financial information passing through a central office, are very hard to identify if the guilty party is aware how the system operates) as well as to corrupt practices such as offering kickbacks for preferential service contracts. By involving more people in financial management - but implementing strong systems of accountability - it is quite possible to run more efficient systems with better systems of checks and balances. The following steps are therefore recommended for the Bachelor of Education programme.

Development of a Single Programme Budget

A programme budget is obviously essential for planning purposes. It is proposed that the Department of Education be given permission to develop a single budget for the Bachelor of Education programme, rather than being required to develop separate budgets for each site at which the programme is offered. The latter approach to budgeting is time-consuming and discourages effective financial planning, particularly in terms of making long-term investments. This is because it effectively prevents budget developers from combining fixed costs, costs that vary according to the number of courses, and costs that vary according to the number and location of students in budgeting processes. This makes it much more difficult to seek to balance these costs effectively, a process which would help to create long-term sustainability.  

It is further proposed that the basic costing unit of the budget should be courses within the programme, as has been the case in the costing exercise conducted with the Department. Budgets are very important planning tools. It is therefore essential that they should not be developed according to inflexible organizing templates, but should rather be constructed according to the context of programme implementation. 

Finally, it is suggested that budgeting exercises be comprehensive in terms of identifying programme costs. Thus, an important part of developing a programme budget will be the establishment of strong communication channels between the Department of Education and the Finance Department. This communication should focus on identifying the full range of costs accrued by the programme and the extent of these costs. This would include costs currently covered by central funds, such as full-time staff salaries and maintenance of office and garden space (including costs for paying rates, electricity, and water). It would also need to factor in cross-subsidization of important elements and activities within the University that do not generate income of themselves (such as libraries). The purpose of this would not be to move responsibility for covering these expenses away from a Finance Department. This would be both wasteful and lead to duplication as more programmes and Departments come to operate in similar ways. Rather, the intention would be to calculate accurately the costs accrued by Departments and programmes to help them in their financial planning and to ensure that there is transparency in giving reasons why money is kept by central Finance Departments.  

Communication between the Department of Education and the Finance Department should also seek to identify clearly income likely to be generated by the programme, both in terms of fee income and student subsidies[4]. This latter income might need to be based on the income generated from students registered historically rather than attempt to project possible income from current student intake. Basing income estimates on increased student numbers is a very dangerous strategy, as it assumes an unlimited pot of money at national government level. The reality is more likely to be that if student numbers increase rapidly throughout the system, formulae will be adjusted to reduce per-student subsidies. 

By estimating income and expenditure in this way, it will then be possible to calculate accurately what income will need to be directly accessible by the Department of Education (which might be described as programme finances) and what ought still to be managed by the Finance Department (which might be described as central finances). This will pave the way for devolving greater levels of financial management responsibility to Departmental and programme managers.

Managing Finances at Programme Level

As has been stressed many times, these documents are based on an assumption that devolving financial management to Departmental and programme managers is an essential element of supporting more flexible educational opportunities and streamlining expenditure. To give practical expression to this in relation to the Bachelor of Education programme, the following strategies are suggested:

1.   Develop a single programme budget for the Department of Education, highlighting those costs that are not currently being covered by central finances.

2.   Arrange for the return of the semester fee to the Department of Education in order to release the necessary funding to support the expansion of the programme during 1998, along the lines of the costing analysis provided in Appendix D. This should not be regarded as a permanent strategy, but rather one which serves as a substitute until it can be more accurately determined what percentage of fee income ought to be allocated to programme finances and what amount to central finances. In the long term, this ought to be fully compensated for by the additional subsidy earned by the Department in 1998 and would allow for some start-up funding to become available to the Department to allow for investment in materials development.

3.   Return the contingency fund developed by the Department of Education during 1997 to its programme finances, to improve its cash flow and give it necessary financial leeway to make targeted investments. Ensure further that policy is changed to give latitude to programme managers to roll over income not spent in a calendar year, to allow them more latitude in long-term planning and investment and to protect against potential declines in student enrolment.

4.   Use 1998 as a window to determine a more coherent strategy for splitting income between central finances and programme finances (ensuring that sufficient income is channelled into both to cover costs in full). This should be based on detailed cost analysis involving both the Department of Education and the Finance Department, and should make allowance for negotiated cross-subsidization of other important University activities.

5.   Ensure that decisions made by programme managers about how to spend programme finances are given due status, so that they cannot be summarily overturned by central departments without negotiation or discussion.

6.   Implement urgent processes to remove the unnecessary effort required to hire part-time or contract staff, when the costs of this are covered by programme finances. This should focus on increasing the power of programme managers to use their programme finances to buy in staff for short periods to provide additional human capacity as required, particularly in developing course materials, offering learning support, and taknig responsibility for administrative processes.

7.   Investigate causes for delays in the processing of claims by Departments, and ensure that these are removed as a matter of urgency.

8.   Follow up on recommendations made in a document entitled Incentives for Departments and Individuals to prevent the development of courses which personally profit staff members and other commercial agencies, without any regard for the quality of educational provision or focus on the long-term sustainability of the institution.

9.   Develop personal incentives for individuals to become involved in the development of programmes attempting to foster open learning approaches. Options recommended in Incentives for Departments and Individuals include payment for overtime worked (provided this money is taken from programme finances), accrual of academic ‘credits’ for involvement in course design and development, and allowing staff member secondment out of existing responsibilities to ensure workloads are not simply increased.

 Quality Assurance Strategies 

In the description of staffing requirements, various job functions have incorporated a responsibility for designing and implementing aspects of quality assurance strategies. The process of designing a quality assurance strategy is an important precursor to its successful implementation, and should involve a wide range of staff members at various phases. Rather than trying to describe such a system, therefore, this section will simply outline briefly some of the important principles in the design and implementation of such a strategy. The principles are based on national quality standards developed for distance education in South Africa. They are as follows:

•      Management ensures that, in its day-to-day work, programme activities meet quality standards set nationally, as well as institutional and programme policy for different elements of the programme.

•       There is an organizational culture that encourages efforts to improve the quality of education.

•       There is a clear cycle of planning, development, documentation, reporting, action, and review of policy and procedures for the programme.

•       Staff development is seen as fundamental to quality service provision.

•       There are clear routines and systems for quality assurance and staff are familiar with those that relate to their work.

•       Staff, learners, and other clients are involved in quality review.

•       Internal quality assurance processes are articulated with external processes.

 Footnotes 

[1] It is for this reason that the analysis in this section focuses on full-time equivalent posts in certain areas. Where this is the case, the implication is that the equivalent of one full-time person ought to be taking responsibility for particular job functions, even though these job functions might, in practice, be shared between various people.

[2] Devolving financial management responsibility in this way can lead to substantial duplication and fragmentation if it is not managed effectively. Strong coordinating functions are required to overcome this. In an environment where programme managers assume increasing responsibility for determining how income is spent, it will be in the interest of all concerned to share resources wherever possible as a strategy for streamlining costs. In the absence of a strong coordinating mechanism, however, this becomes very difficult to achieve, because programme staff are usually too involved in the practicalities of implementation to spend time identifying possibilities for sharing and cooperation.

[3] This latter strategy is most often employed in situations where people believe that resources need not equate significantly more than a typed version of lecture notes. Worldwide, experience has demonstrated the deficiencies of this approach.

[4] In the long term, it may be possible to identify other strategies for generating income, such as selling the rights to use course materials, either as they are or in adapted form.