Electronic Academy to explore learning

I first started at the Bemidji (Minn.) Pioneer as an intern in the summer of 1996. That would begin six years as a news reporter, sports reporter and copy editor for a small, six-day-per-week daily newspaper in northern Minnesota. I wrote a large range of stories from multiple beats, to features to sports, my favorite being the coverage of the Red Lake Reservation High School basketball team named the Warriors. Here is a collection of my stories from my time at the Pioneer.

June 4, 1997

By Devlyn Brooks

Staff Writer

Sometime in the future when higher education institutions look back to the beginning of distance learning and electronic delivery education, they will remember the conference hosted by Bemidji State University in 1997, higher education marketing consultant Bob Toper told a crowd of about 100 people Monday night in BSU's Beaux Arts Ballroom.

Topor was the opening speaker for the first-ever Electronic Academy Summer Institute hosted by BSU, which began Monday and ends Thursday. The goal of the conference is to explore new methods of enhancing classroom instruction and delivering courses through electronic means. The summer institute is hosting representatives of each of the original 22 Minnesota State Colleges and Universities campuses that received electronic academy grants from the state Legislature, and more then 350 people from the state's 60-plus higher education campuses were expected to attend at least part of the seminar.

Speaking about certain paradigm shifts that are occurring in higher education, Topor said he would compare the electronic academy seminar to the meager beginnings of the Mississippi River. He visited the headwaters of the river for the first time Sunday, and he said he was struck by the contrast of the beginning and ending of the river, which he had seen previously.

"That is what I think we have going here today -- a small stream that you can wade across that will become a raging river full of unbelievable force at the end," he said of the conference. "The (seminar) will be a benchmark in distance learning. Sometime in the future, we'll look back at the institute in Bemidji, and it will be a turning point in electronic delivery education."

Topor said that dramatic shifts in education have already begun to occur because of the new technology available, and more are yet to come. He described the shifting of the higher education paradigm as "what happens when old forms of thinking and acting change."

For instance, he said professors used to control how a classroom would operate, but in the future that could change. Students will more than likely demand to become an active part in how the education structure works. Another change will be that educational institutions will no longer be slow to evolve around new technology or new ideas, as schools used to be. In fact, he said universities and colleges may have to embrace technology because that is what just might save them. Lastly, colleges and universities will have to begin to market themselves because they will be competing against private companies that are beginning to form their own colleges.

"Today, we're on a journey, and it's your journey," he told the room filled with college faculty and staff. "You represent the major paradigm shift in education. What needs to be done is what you need to do."

Topor's years as a consultant to higher education institutions have established him as one of the leading thinkers and writers about the positioning and marketing of higher education, according to the seminar's handbook. He is the president of Topor & Associates of Mountain View, Calif., which provides services to colleges and universities in marketing, developing computerized systems, creating organizational culture and exploring reorganization strategies. He has also authored three books in the field.

On Tuesday, the seminar's key speaker was Pam Dixon, an author of several computer technology books. Tonight will feature Michael Allen, a computer multimedia expert.

"We are all dreamers here tonight. Over the next few days we must buy into that dream, and evaluate (distance learning and electronic delivery education)," Topor said. "I think we must. I think for the sake of our grandchildren we must."