Interesting article. Good info for the book.
Anne

Um, this is basically old fashioned correspondence study. A flash drive just makes it easier to mail instead of a stack of paper. The point of having a course management system is partially the storage and transmission of documents and information, but more so for communication and collaboration between students and teacher (and student to student). If you're not online, then it's correspondence like they had back in 1872.

Instead of Flash Drives why not iPhones or the iTouch. This way they can connect when they want and use it offline when they want. They can also backup on them. For $300 they can download books via apps everything is available. They have phones anyway. Two steps forward - one giant step backwards. Leave it to academia.

"Um, this is basically old fashioned correspondence study." - The technology is under development. The initial phase is geared towards independent learning. The difference is that the student has more tools at his or her disposal to complete the assignments. It is much easier to carry around an apple iphone or blackberry than a large typewriter and a stack of papers.

The school wants the student to use the flash drives to submit assignments using an internet connection and communicate online using the softwares that came with the flash drive.

I was hoping that these flash drives were actaully mobile broadband devices so the student doesn't have to worry about getting a connection to the Internet. The devices are slower than DSL in areas with spotty connectivity but this would be a start. Some models come bundled with storage capabilities as well. Most students don't need another phone.

It is another option. I wonder what the accreditation folks think? Also with a military student market, what does VA think for financial aid?

I agree with professorj. This is not online learning - the pedagogical framing doesn't allow for peer-to-peer communication or even any ability to contact the teacher. Forward to the past?

A good point this effort is making is that delivery systems are being tweeked to meet the needs of diverse learning situations. Certainly many of the features presently lacking (as already commented on), will be added as the technology develops.

As Thomas Friedman stated in his book, The World is Flat, we are at the end of the beginning (phase of technology expansion). We are on the cusp of explosive growth in innovation. We are in a dynamic that demands we constantly adjust to never-ending change. This was a "future shock" to my generation but is the "norm" for the present "Cyborg" generation .

flash drives may make some sense if you are based in Iraq or Afghanistan and internet access is restricted but as professorj and mhward say this has nothing whatsoever to do with online learning. This is simply a higher tech correspondence course tool. There is no peer-peer learning and would appear to be based on the "sage on the stage" model of teaching. I am not sure I understand the "news" here except that TESC has found a way to help students post assignments when are registered to take correspondence courses online and find themselves with limited internet access.

I don't know the differenced between flash drive and CD-ROM...
As to capacity, you could use DVD media.
As to writing (saving learner's date), you could copy these data to your HDD.

Many deployed military members have access to a computer, but no steady Internet access. They can't get online, sometimes for weeks. If they're given everything they need (course materials, word processor, etc.) on a device that they can wear around their neck or put on a keychain (versus lugging around a bookbag), it makes a lot of good sense. I've been deployed overseas (2000). While I had my own laptop, I didn't have Internet access available whenever I wanted it. When available, access was dialup, unreliable, and limited to 30 minutes.

Why the flash drive? CDs and DVDs are static, read-only. In the environments we're talking about, they're also easily scratched and cracked. iPhones and the $300 WiFi enabled iPod Touch won't work if there's no WiFi (I can't imagine typing essays on them, either). Integrated broadband transceivers won't work if you're out of the service area.

For all the "this isn't online learning..." commenters, yes, you're absolutely right. It's not online learning, but it's still distance learing. TESC, accredited by Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, has been offering distance learning for many years. This pilot sounds very promising. From the press release linked in the article:

"The college plans to expand the Mobile Learning Initiative to supplement existing college courses with a flash drive, including courses that require an online connection for students to submit assignments and participate in online discussions."

And for what it's worth, I can say from experience that correspondence courses (distance learning) of excellent quality were alive and well in the late 1980s, thank you, University of Iowa and University of Wisconsin -Extension.

I think it's a great idea.

Including OpenOffice apps is a classy touch. I'm so tired of professors requiring MS Word docs. Why should we subsidize on corporation, Microsoft, at a public university?