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Claudio Dondi, President of the Board of Directors of EFQUEL, the European Foundation for Quality in e-Learning
You were invited recently to an event titled "E-Learning: the Grand Challenges" organised by the Government of Catalonia Brussels Office, Paris/Ile-de-France Chambers of Commerce and Industry and others. What do you consider as the “grand challenges” for e-learning?
The main and most important challenge is to make life long learning a reality for all. Through technology, we can make sure that learning becomes accessible in every situation of life, we cannot dream to have all people in a classroom. So therefore technology contributes to the accessibility of education and creates economic advantages for the education sector in a dramatic way, provided of course that we are able to embed e-learning, the use of ICT, in the normal process of transformation of organizations, society and individuals.
To conceive technology as a mainstreamed tool to implement change and to learn while implementing change, that’s the real challenge in e-learning. Of course this includes confidence in e-learning and in the quality of e-learning provided.
And what are the main challenges for EFQUEL?
The big challenge has always been and still is, to keep the continuity of preaching quality FOR innovation and NOT AGAINST innovation. Our motto is to move quality assurance from inspection towards inspiration. That’s the principle of action; we want people to be aware of the quality of learning, starting from learners to course providers and regulators.
Of course, the other mission is the more institutional mission, is to provide encouragement to quality development through quality marks and quality awards and to stimulate the debate on quality.
What do associations need to know if they plan to implement an online-education-programme?
E-learning is frequently seen as a cheap way to respect the formal requirements of updating professional staff. Unfortunately we have a lot of cases of “e-learning of first generation”: the simple distribution of content.
What is important in ICT in the case of professional associations is the “C”, not so much the “I” for information but the communication and the way of collaboratively developing experiential learning into consolidated learning that is the result of collaboration and willingness to put tacit knowledge to the disposal of the learning community.
Your annual congress the “Innovation Forum 2011” will take place from 14 – 16 September in Oeiras, Lisbon. Why does the e-learning-community meet face-to-face?
The learning community is made from human beings that enjoy gathering especially when they share some vision and some willingness to put their ideas in the public debate. The forum is a successful formula that reaches now its fourth edition with a good record of putting together policy makers, researches and practitioners that are willing to remove their hat for 2 or 3 days and express freely their opinions and ideas, and where they try to establish an agenda for the future.
This year, “certifying the future” (the provisional title of the forum) is exactly going in this direction; having eyes open on the future and considering: what is the future of quality assurance, of certification of quality approaches in a quickly changing world and in a quickly changing education and life long learning environment.
Claudio Dondi, President of the Board of Directors of EFQUEL, the European Foundation for Quality in e-learning a network with over 100 member organisations such as European associations, universities, companies, vocational training institutions from 20 countries. Its mission is to enhance the quality of e-learning in Europe by providing services and support for all stakeholders. www.efquel.org