At Southern Methodist University in Dallas last semester, Professor H. Charles Baker was leading what may well be a classroom of the future. In the room were 44 electrical engineering students, but six others were sitting 2,000 miles away at A. T. &T. in Middletown, N. J. They watched television monitors carrying the class live, and interrupted Professor Baker to ask questions by speakerphone. The course, appropriately enough, was Introduction to Telecommunications. The six students are enrolled in National Technological University of Fort Collins, Colo., and can earn master's degrees by taking video courses from Southern Methodist University and 45 other universities. Theirs is a virtual classroom, for they travel from campus to campus without ever leaving town.
"Someone in Boise, Idaho, can take a course from Cornell University one term, a class from University of California at Berkeley the next term and a class from Columbia University the next term,' said Lionel Baldwin, president of National Technological University. "This is a way for students to have the best instructors around the country."
Most National Technological University students are engineers, computer scientists and managers whose employers pay their tuition. The average student age is 33. Although the students may complete course work from several schools, their degrees will be awarded by National Technological University, which is accredited by the Commission on Institutions of Higher Education of the North Central Association of Colleges and Universities.
This may be the highest-tech descendant of the old 'Sunrise Semesters,' the continuing education classes on television, offering art or cooking or math to people in their homes. That concept never caught fire - no one could figure out how to replicate the classroom, guided by a wise professor, or the feeling of discovering and learning together.
But today, from the largest universities to the small liberal arts colleges, schools are trying to figure out how to use technology without diminishing the quality of education and without destroying student-teacher interaction.
"The potential of new technology in education is revolutionary, as long as we don't get so carried away that we remove the human element," said Thomas H. Kean, president of Drew University, a small liberal-arts school in Madison, N. J. 'Students with jobs or family obligations might have lectures delivered to their homes electronically and interact with faculty by computer. But for the best kind of education, teacher and student must get together at least once a week. The student needs to explain his ideas and have those ideas challenged in a small group with a professor. And when students challenge the professor's assumptions, that's when they really learn. The professor needs to sit on one side of a log, and the students on another."
But, counters Professor Jack M. Wilson, director of the Center for Innovation in Undergraduate Learning at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N. Y.: "The log might have to be an electronic log. You could bring the students to the classroom electronically. I would argue the students meet the faculty every time they come to class.'
At its best, technology like videoconferencing can permit students like Professor Baker's to participate from 2,000 miles away. And fiber-optic cables promise to improve the picture and sound. Computers can play to a student's best learning style - trial and error, visual memory, graphic example.
But at its worst, video and other technologies could conceivably be used as a substitute for the traditional classroom or lecture. Some faculty members fear that universities with shrinking budgets will force them to teach huge numbers of students by television. They envision exploding workloads, reduced quality of education and, ultimately, loss of their jobs. They worry that a university system with many campuses will decide to save money by showing videos of, say, its best philosophy professor and eliminate philosophy departments on its other. campuses.
"There are people who would love to see the 5,000-student class taught by television, with machine-graded tests," said Erwin Kelly of California State University, Sacramento - an economics professor who is a member of a commission exploring possible uses of instructional technology on all 20 Cal State campuses. 'To the California Legislature, distance learning seems to be the answer to the budget crisis: Teach more students with less money. We have an ongoing tension between people who see technology as a way to cut costs versus people who want quality."
His fears arise from the gloomy outlook for the 320,000-student California State University system. State financing is less, in real dollars, than it was four years ago and in that time, 4,000 faculty positions have been cut and 10,000 class sections eliminated. Some students have been unable to complete their degrees in four years because they could not get into courses required for their major.
"By the year 2005, we expect student enrollment to hit 500,000, but we won't even have physical space on our campuses for 50,000 of those students," said Patricia Cuocco, Cal State's interim director of information technology initiatives. "If more class sections were offered over video, computer, microwave, satellite, there would be less competition for seats,' she said. "students would get the classes they need in more timely fashion and not languish on campus for five or six years to graduate."
This does not mean that administrators are rushing to buy everything available, Ms. Cuocco explains. "We need to be careful that technology should never drive the application," she said. "The application needs to drive the technology."
In a two-year experiment, Cal State is using two-way video to share resources among four campuses. In Sacramento, San Jose, Hayward and Chico, students pursuing a master's degree in business administration can watch live courses transmitted from another campus. Voice-activated cameras at the originating and receiving sites focus on students as they speak up and on the professor while he or she is lecturing.
"This is a prototype to find out what problems could develop, and we've found some,' said Merle Martin, the project administrator.
For example, three of the four campuses are on a semester system, while Cal State Hayward is on a quarter system. A student earns two hours of credit for the marketing course on the Sacramento campus, and three hours at Chico.
And not surprisingly, money is a touchy issue. "Right now, campuses receive funds from the Cal State system for each full-time-equivalent student taking 15 hours of classes," said Dr. Martin, chairman of Management Information Sciences at Cal State Sacramento.
"If eight students in Sacramento watch a course that originates in Chico, which campus counts the students?" he asks. "Under our current arrangement, the receiving site is keeping count of the student."
Prospects of teaching by video also worry the faculty union. "Once a lecture is on videotape, who owns it?" asks Professor Jack Kurzweil, president of the San Jose State University chapter of the California Faculty Association, the union that represents all faculty on the 20 Cal State campuses. "What if someone decides to show the videotape instead of asking me to teach the course?"
The State University of New York, with 397,000 students on 64 campuses, is also trying out instruction by video.
"We and Cal State are facing similar issues," said Christine Haile, associate vice chancellor for technology services at SUNY. "We both have large and diverse student populations and tight budgets."
Last semester, SUNY's Binghamton, Buffalo and Stony Brook campuses shared three engineering courses by videotape, Email and computer. They also sent videotaped classes to SUNY College at New Paltz.
Junior- and senior-level business courses from SUNY's Albany television studio are being shown to students at 19 of SUNY's two-year colleges, giving students access to courses not otherwise available on their campuses.
"We have an award-winning faculty, and we will see greater sharing of our faculty expertise across campuses," said Ms. Haile. "But we don't see one faculty member for 10,000 students."
SUNY's faculty union, United University Professions, is cautious about the experiments. "We're in favor of distance learning provided we have equal control," said Bill Scheuerman, president of United University Professions. "We'll support it if it provides quality of education and doesn't put our positions in jeopardy."
New technology has been successfully brought into the classroom with impressive results as well as dollar savings Rensselaer Polytechnic, a much smaller school with an undergraduate student body of 4,500, dismantled its longstanding introductory physics lectures and created smaller class sections. In the process, the school is saving $80,000 each semester.
"We set out to de-emphasize large lectures and make students feel they matter," said Rensselaer's Professor Wilson, who teaches physics. "We wanted to use technology to get students actively involved in their own education. We also wanted to achieve a spectacular increase in quality and a modest savings in cost - and we have."
Professor Wilson, a physics teacher, led a team that reshaped the course. Instead of lecturing to 400 students, a professor meets with 50 to 60 students in a physics studio.
They sit at computer work stations that provide text, full-motion video, audio, color photos, graphs and spreadsheets. Probes hooked up to computers let students to carry out scientific experiments. Multimedia software asks questions, displays and analyzes student responses, plots results and outcomes, then asks new questions.
Chris McPeek, a sophomore majoring in computer systems engineering, took the first semester of introductory physics in the old format, and the second semester in a physics studio.
"In the lecture, most students fall asleep," said Mr. McPeek, 19. "But the studio is a lot better and really interactive. We learn not by listening to the professor but by doing it ourselves."
Mr. McPeek's reaction affirms Professor Wilson's belief that he has met his goals. "We didn't reneging the class to use new technology, but we did use new technology to re-engineer the class," said Professor Wilson.
A re-engineered way of learning also eases access to education for older, working students. Today only 44 percent of college undergraduates are under 22 years of age and attend school full time, according to a current population survey by the U. S. Census Bureau. Many students have job constraints, family obligations or physical handicaps that make it difficult for them to visit a campus for regularly scheduled classes.
To reach them, New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark offers an extensive program in distance education. The school has produced 50 courses on video, among them chemistry, mathematics, physics and English. Students enrolled in for-credit courses can watch lectures from home on cable television or check out videotapes.
For a bachelor of arts degree in Information Systems, students may do all course work by distance learning. At least twice a week, students are required to log on to their computers and talk with professors and classmates by computer.
"We try to promote face-to-face interaction with faculty," said Ann Lippel, N. J. I.. T.'s director of distance learning. "We provide one- to two-hour orientation sessions. Also, some instructors encourage students to take their exams on campus."
Of 7,000 students enrolled at N. J. 1. T., 950 combined distance-learning courses with attendance in traditional classes on campus in the 1993-94 academic year.
Nancy Kurnellas of Medford, N. J., a computer programmer, was working on a master's degree in computer science when she injured her head in a horse-riding accident. To finish her degree, she got videotapes from N. J. 1. T. for her last three courses and communicated with her instructors and her fellow students by computer.
"I got more student and professor contact over the computer than I did when I attended a traditional classroom," Ms. Kurnellas said. "A lot of professors show up when class starts and leave the minute it's over."
In May 1993, three years after her injury, Ms. Kurnellas received her Master's from N. J. I. T. at the age of 49. She became a senior test engineer for T. R. W. four months later. Rensselaer, too, offers adults degrees by distance learning, broadcasting classes in engineering, computer science and technology management to work sites. "It's a Rensselaer master's degree - nobody knows the difference," said Susan Bray, director of the Rensselaer Satellite Video Program. "These are the same high-quality students with the same course requirements. They get the same education as students on campus. But their seat in the classroom is 500 or 1,000 miles away."
For younger students ensconced in college dorms, learning by video could be a detriment. Matthew Hill, 18, a freshman honors student studying computer science, took one of his N.J.I.T. classes, PASCAL programming, by distance learning. He had to watch the lecture.-; twice a week on videotape.
"Every time you log on, that's a classroom," said Mr. Hill. "You post messages to a bulletin board called Virtual Classroom. The professor might answer your question in the computer, or ask other students to comment first. The only time you see the other students in your class is at the midterm and at the final exam."
But Mr. Hill, who lives on campus, said he doesn't think he will take another class by distance learning. "It's harder to slack off when you go to a class," he said. "The professor is able to light a fire under you. Something is lost over the computer. It's just words on a screen. There are no faces and no voices."
At Drew University, where 90 percent of the 1,300 undergraduates live on campus, "we want to see our students in the classroom," said Alan Candiotti, assistant vice president for university technology. "We don't want to bring lectures into the dorm."
Drew focuses instead on other aspects of technology. The university gives every student and every faculty member a computer with printer and software. Recently Drew built a multimedia lab, where students in art class can use an electronic pen tablet to "paint" and draw, as well as to create three-dimensional images in a computer. In the introductory music theory and composition course, students compose on computers and send their music to the instructor by E-mail.
Rodney Cornelius, 18, a freshman from Boston, applied to several universities, but what tipped the scales for him was Drew's emphasis on technology.
"My theory is that a student who graduates from college without the ability to use new technology is not educated," said President Kean of Drew.
Colleges and universities are re-thinking the student-teacher relationship in the context of electronic education.
"Educational technology should enable us to reach more students in a better way," said Professor Kelly of Cal State's instructional technology committee. "But we want to raise the quality of education, not simply lower the cost. We don't want to replace faculty with machines."
Patrick Nichelson, president of the Cal State faculty union, believes that university advisory committees have become more cautious in the last two years about the use of technology.
"These are all teachers," said Professor Nichelson. "The more they look at it, the more they see that the relation between student and teacher is a precious thing."