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Developing opportunities forindependent learnersDave O'ReillyPublished online: 07 Jul 2006.

To cite this article: Dave O'Reilly (1991) Developing opportunities for independent learners, OpenLearning: The Journal of Open, Distance and e-Learning, 6:3, 3-13

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Developing opportunities forindependent learnersDave O'Reilly of the Polytechnic of East London's School of Independent Study examines thecongruence of the concepts and practice that underlie independent study, open and distancelearning. He contrasts the usage of terms like independence and interaction as they are used in theliterature of distance education, and identifies the critical importance of what students learn in anyconsideration of open learning practice.

Dave O'Reilly

W ithin the broad fields of distancelearning, open learning and adulteducation, there has been a recent

renewal of debate on questions of how far it ispossible and how far it is desirable toencourage learner independence. In OpenLearning, key issues were signalled by Gaskelland Mills1 as a precursor to the September 1989conference 'Interaction and Independence:student support in distance education and openlearning1. After surveying previous papers inTeaching at a Distance and Open Learning,Gaskell and Mills concluded that a lot had beensaid about interaction and independence indistance learning, but relatively little had beendone.

In this article, I would like to outline onemodel for developing independent learners inhigher education, that which has been inoperation at the Polytechnic of East London(PEL) since 1974, and to discuss some of theissues it raises for our notions of independence,student-centred learning and open anddistance learning. In doing so I hope to bring outsome of the challenges and opportunitiesopened to educators, policy makers andinstitutions in allowing learners to plan andmanage their own programmes of study.Central to the issues raised is the tensionbetween the diversity of cultural experiences,hopes and expectations which adults bring intohigher education and the culture and learningexperience which higher education offers inreturn.

(In the discussion that follows, I will useIndependent Study with capital letters whenreferring specifically to independent study atPEL.)

Independent Study at thePolytechnic of East LondonIndependent Study was introduced at thePolytechnic (then called North East LondonPolytechnic) in 1974 with the inauguration of anew award, the Diploma in Higher Education,which would be equivalent to the first two yearsof an Honours Degree. The Polytechnic chosenot to devise a set of syllabuses for the newaward, but to enable students to devise theirown programmes of study independent ofexisting academic disciplines.2 There was anexplicit commitment to shifting the focus ofeducational provision from the reproduction ofacademic disciplines to meeting the needs ofthe student. As an early course planningdocument put it:

An important principle of [Polytechnic]policy is to design courses to meet theneeds of prospective students rather thanto seek students to fit courses that NELP[now PEL] would like to run.3

In PEL as elsewhere in higher education, thisprinciple is now in line with a market-oriented,customer-led approach to course production,but in 1972 it constituted a more radical attemptto define a role for the Polytechnic distinct fromthe traditional university model. In particular,the Polytechnic was seeking to relate itsservices to the particular needs of the localcommunities in East London, which were andare characterised by a high proportion of low-income, multi-ethnic groups. Indeed, the twoBoroughs in which the Polytechnic is located(Newham and Barking) continue to be in thebottom five of the national league table for take-up of places in higher education by theirresidents. In this context, the student-

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centiedness of Independent Study was notdivorced from the social background ofprospective students.

Though the DipHE was envisaged as an entryroute for mature students feeding into BEd andother degrees, it soon became clear that manystudents would need a third year byindependent study to pursue their specificinterests, so that a one year BA/BSc (Honours)was added in 1976. The range of opportunitywas extended to post-graduate level in 1984with the introduction of a Post-GraduateDiploma and MA/MSc by Independent Study.More recently still, a 'new route' degree byindependent study has been developed tocater for the more traditional 18 year old A-levelentry student.

Approximately 800 students (about 10 percent of the Polytechnic's student population) arecurrently enrolled on independent studyprogrammes, so that Independent Study isfirmly established in the Polytechnic as a modeof study distinctive from but complementary tothe other two main forms of course provision,namely, conventional discipline-based coursesand modular programmes.

The independent study courses have nosyllabus. Instead, they provide a frameworkwithin which the individual student is enabled todevelop a programme of study appropriate tohis or her specific needs. The first part of eachcourse is a planning phase, usually of one term(about 12 weeks), during which the student,with tutorial support, writes a learning plan. Theplan sets out in separate sections:• prior qualifications and experience• present educational needs• a programme of study to meet those needs,

including a preliminary analysis of issues andproblems likely to be encountered

• a statement of resources required• a justification for the programme• an assessment scheme.

The plan must be submitted for scrutiny andapproval by a Registration Board and might bethought of as presenting to the Board a reasonedcase why the student should be allowed to carryout the proposed study for a specified award.Put in less formal terms, the student says in theplan: what I have done already; what I want todo now; how I intend to do it; what resources Ineed to help me; why it is worth a DipHE orHonours Degree or Post-Graduate award; andhow I will show at the end I have satisfactorilycompleted the programme.

The framework offered by the course also

defines the role of the Polytechnic as a resourcefor the learner and its responsibility for qualitycontrol of academic standards.

As a resource for learning, the Polytechnicprovides each student with the support of acentral studies tutor in the School forIndependent Study and an appropriatespecialist supervisor from a Polytechnicdepartment. To differentiate the two roles, onemight see the central studies tutor as moreconcerned with facilitating the process ofindependent study (writing a plan; managingthe programme of study; monitoring progressand amending the plan as necessary; preparingfor assessment), while the specialist supervisoroffers guidance on the content of the student'sprogramme and feedback on work produced.

With regard to quality control, thePolytechnic takes responsibility, throughformally constituted Registration andAssessment Boards, for the registration oflearning plans and for final assessment. Therelationship between the student's learningprocess and the Polytechnic procedureslegitimating individual programmes for publicawards is set out in Figure One.

Supervision

Registration

Assessment

Figure 1 A schematic model of an independent studyprogramme as a learning cycle, and the correspondinginstitutional process legitimating the individual studentprogramme for public award

Assessment on the undergraduateprogrammes is based on two components, aFinal Product and a Critical Review. The FinalProduct must demonstrate that the student hassatisfactorily completed the registeredprogramme of study at the appropriate level.The nature of the Final Product thereforereflects the nature of the student's programme.

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It might be a traditional dissertation, or art work,or a novel, or a windmill, or a performange orevent, or a portfolio of different items,depending on what skills and knowledge thestudent is demonstrating. The form ofassessment must be justified in the learningplan, with indication of criteria for assessment,especially for less traditional submissions.

The other component of assessment, theCritical Review, requires the student to reflecton the learning experience she has undergoneand to present her own evaluation of the work.

Both Final Product and Critical Review areassessed by the student's specialist supervisorand/or central studies tutor, who then maketheir recommendations to the AssessmentBoard.

Though the structure of independent study is(I hope) relatively simple to outline, itsimplications for students, academic staff and theinstitution need drawing out and placing in thebroader context of attempts to create openlearning opportunities.

The problem of definingindependenceIn its purest sense, we use the word'independent' at PEL to mean independent of apre-ordained syllabus or curriculum.Unfortunately, the word has differentconnotations in other educational contexts,particularly distance learning. It also conjuresup for many people (including myself and mycolleagues and the students at the School forIndependent Study) a range of emotionalovertones coloured by our personal notions offreedom, education and power. These twodifficulties with definition, one contextual andthe other emotional, can easily becomecompounded in debate.

Admittedly, what Independent Studystudents do often looks like distance learning -studying alone in libraries or at home, attendingshort courses outside the Polytechnic, carryingout placements or work-based learning, and soon. Provided that a student sets out in thelearning plan an adequate pattern of contactwith tutors, the bulk of the study might becarried out as legitimately in a croft in theHighlands of Scotland as at a Polytechnic in EastLondon - which is exactly how it worked, forexample, for a student making a comparativestudy of subsistence farming in India and theHighlands of Scotland for a BA by Independent

Study. Other students have studied at first handthe electricity supply system in Cyprus, smallbusinesses in Nigeria and probation services inFinland.4 However, it would be a mistake tomake any simple equation betweenindependent study and distance learning.

Indeed, in the context of distance learning,the term 'independent study' is fundamentallyambiguous, as Garrison has pointed out.5 On theone hand it might mean simply non-contiguity oflearner and teacher, that is, distance learning ina geographical sense; on the other, it hasconnotations of learner autonomy which mightimply a particular set of educational principlesand practices.

In their seminal paper in 1971, Daniel andMarquis,6 drawing on a early discussion byWedeymeyer,7 quite explicitly adopt the firstuse of the term: 'independence will be usedbroadly to denote those learning activitieswhere there is no interaction', whereasinteraction denotes 'those activities where thestudent is in two-way contact with anotherperson (or persons) in such a way as to elicitfrom him reactions and responses which arespecific to his own requests or contributions'(p.30). Set up in this way, the debate can easilybecome focused on means of providinginteraction for distance learners to compensatefor their isolation and, more narrowly still, oneducational technologies to deliver theinteraction.

In later discussions, Wedeymeyer has putincreasing emphasis on the second meaning ofindependence, thus:

...the term independent is...more than adescriptor for a kind of non-traditionallearning that makes use of distanceteaching: it is a link with advancedlearning and personality theory, and isgeneric to the entire range of learningprograms which demonstrate the newemphasis on the learner and on learning.8

At this point can be discerned a meeting ofdebate on distance education with widerdebates about adult education and the needs ofthe adult learner. Drawing on this discussion,Garrison acknowledges the importance ofwidening the debate, yet he remains unhappywith unresolved ambiguity in the term'independent' and unwilling to accept aredefinition of distance learning which mightplace undue emphasis on just one aspect of thetotal learning system, the student. Going on todiscuss analyses in which independent study

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could mean total independence from any formaleducational system, Garrison suggests that theterm is so misleading that it might be betterdropped altogether. Following Morgan,9 heproposes that attention be shifted to the extentto which control is shared between student andinstitution with regard to teaching and learning'.

actually doing on the Independent Studyprogrammes at PEL and on similar programmeselsewhere which have tried to implementgreater student participation in the design,operation and assessment of their programmesof study. It can be seen from the structure of alearning plan at PEL, for example, that it is

Exercise of authorityby staff

Exercise of responsibilityby student(s)

Key: 1 Entry acceptance, registration and assessment2 Devising learning plan and personal specialist tutoring3 Group work with tutors4 Working on assignments and final product and critical review

The diagonal line provides us with a continuum of positions expressing particular relationshipsbetween the use of authority by the staff and the exercise of responsibility by the students. Themore the staff exercise authority, the less will be the amount of freedom and responsibilityremaining for the students, and vice versa. The relationship between the staff's authority andstudent responsibility can be represented by a point somewhere on the diagonal continuum.

Figure 2 Positions of responsibility within the DipHE at theSchool for Independent Study

On this point, Garrison's prognosis is cautious,but unoptimistic:

The issue to be addressed is whethercontrol of the educational experience ispossible when learners are free to choosewhat and how they will learn. It will beargued in this chapter that freedom orindependence as they are generallyunderstood with regard to the content ormeans of education is...an illusion wherethe learner is trapped in other forms ofdependence. In particular, littleconsideration may be given to theappropriateness and worthiness of theeducational goal, the resources that arerequired, and the abilities and motivationsof the learner to ensure achievement of adesired educational goal. (p. 26)Clearly, Garrison has identified an important

potential problem in 'the illusion ofindependence1, yet his conclusions must beconsidered in tension with what students are

possible to give the learner greater power inspecifying aims and objectives, content andmethod, and to locate the study in relation toprior experience, current commitment andproposed outcomes.

Significantly, none of the programmesdiscussed in an influential survey of the field,Developing Student Autonomy in Learning,10

advocates anything like complete freedom: allassume that autonomy must be negotiated andthat the process of negotiation and dialogue areeducationally valuable in themselves in thedevelopment of student autonomy. None ofthem suggests that 'independence' can orshould be complete: rather, that problems ofindependence and control are both moreclearly posed and more fully exposed toconstructive reformulation in actual attempts todevelop student autonomy.

In an educational process that might last threeor more years, the balance of control betweenstudent, tutor and institution might vary

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Open Closed

Who?

What?

1

Both attract part-timestudents seeking aflexible mode of study;both are committed towidening access;Independent Study alsoattracts full-timestudents from groups nottraditionally representedin higher education.

Independent Study studentgenerates and negotiatesthe content;Open University studentstudies pre-packaged

' material, but may do soselectively

Independent Study allowsvaried modes of study,experiential as well aslectures, books, etc.;Open University coursesrely heavily on writtentexts and other media

Independent Study (A) —

Figure 3 Comparision of possible profiles of IndependentStudy and Open University courses on dimensions ofopenness/dosedness. Adapted from Lewis (18)

• Open University (B)

significantly over time. Saddington" hasillustrated this by locating different processes ofIndependent Study on a modified version of theTannenbaum-Schmidt Leadership Grid (FigureTwo). Saddington notes that:

...staff and students are not just at a singlepoint in the practice of IndependentStudy. Students can and do take major .responsibility for such work asassignments, finding resources, reading,writing papers and the final product. Thestaff (and institution) maintain a high levelof control (sometimes close to totalcontrol) over the validation of learningcontracts, acceptance of students onto thecourse and the assessment ofassignments, papers and final products. Inareas of devising the learning contract andpersonal and specialist tutoring, these canvary widely and would depend on the way

in which both students and staff approachor respond to the control andresponsibility issues involved.There is no 'right' place on the continuum -rather it is a question of the appropriatestance to be taken by both students andstaff in relation to the factors inherent inthe learning process.

Just what might be the best stance or at leastgood practice is a matter of continuing debatewithin the School for Independent Study and thePolytechnic. In a sustained critique of currentpractices of negotiation of learning plans and acritical discussion of the principles of whatmight be studied legitimately by independentstudy, Robbins argues for the crucialimportance of negotiation in maintaininginstitution and learner in critical dialogue aboutthe boundaries of knowledge.12 Turning thisaround, we might ask what are the boundaries

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of independent study and where they might lieon the map of open learning.

Independent Study and openlearningThe recent Rumble-Lewis debate in OpenLearning has highlighted the need for clarity inthe use of the term 'open learning'. As Rumblehas pointed out, 'many systems which describethemselves as 'open learning systems' are in factremarkably closed when measuredagainst...criteria for openness'.13 In response,Lewis has set out those criteria schematically toproduce a profile of any given course, whichmay be more or less open along differentdimensions.14 However, deciding where acourse, in all its complexity, lies on any onedimension is by no means unproblematical.

Possible profiles of an Independent Studyprogramme and a hypothetical Open Universitycourse, using the three dimensions of Lewis'sschema, are shown in Figure Three. Thedimensions are fairly central to most definitionsof Open Learning: that access should be open,and that the student should have as much choiceas possible in the content of study, and in themodes of study.

Thus, on the first dimension, who is able tostudy, Independent Study at PEL could claim tooperate a policy of open access. The DipHE byIndependent Study accepts applicants, afterinterview, on the basis of understanding whatindependent study will involve and likelihood ofbenefitting from the course. Since its inception,the majority of students on the DipHE have beennon-traditional on one or more dimensionswithin higher education: that is, they are likely tobe mature students without standard entryqualifications and more likely than the norm inhigher education to be female, of working classorigin or from an ethnic minority.15

On the second dimension, control overcontent, an Independent Study student mayspecify the whole content of a programme ofstudy and a glance at a list of individualprogrammes will confirm immediately the vastrange of topics accommodated - over 800 in totalbeing currently pursued, several thousand overthe past 16 years. Possibilities are constrainedby the general aims of the course and criteria forregistration of learning plans, as well as bypractical considerations, such as availability ofappropriate specialist supervision andresources. At some point most IndependentStudy students will find themselves having to

tackle uncongenial things as part of the overallprogramme they have chosen to follow.Paradoxically, Open University students mayhave more scope in some cases to avoidunpleasant or boring bits of courses becausethere is more redundancy built into the coursesand their assessment.

Both the "who' and the 'what' dimensionsdeserve further scrutiny however.

The DipHE admits people likely to benefit',but, in Bourdieu's terms,16 opportunities mayonly be taken by those who perceivethemselves to have the requisite 'culturalcapital' to benefit. Access to the DipHE, or anyother educational programme, needs thereforeto be seen in a broader framework of howaccess to cultural capital is controlled inschooling and other social practices and howindividual perceptions and expectations aremediated. Equally, from the learner's point ofview, entry to higher education may demand amore or less painful revisioning of self-image,what Mezirow has called perspectivetransformation.17

Weil, in a study which included independentstudy students at PEL, has traced some of thetensions and contradictions encountered bynon-traditional students in traditionalinstitutions.18 She traces a typical pattern ofdisappointment, dislocation and re-discovery.Though arguing from a different basis thanRobbins, Weil reaches similar conclusionsabout the importance of negotiation betweenlearner and institution:

Evidence at this stage suggests a numberof disjunctions. On the one hand, there isthe disjunction between non-traditionallearners' expectations and their actualexperience of higher education. Thereare also disjunctions between the differentvalues and beliefs adult learners andlecturers bring to their interpretations ofwhat it means to generate and validateknowledge and to inhibit and facilitatelearning. Other disjunctions arise fromcompeting perspectives of teachers whohave been socialised largely within theformal education system, and non-traditional learners whose experience hasbeen mediated by age, gender, class and/or race and particular experiences oflearning outside the system...

so that

(To turn the idea of Higher Education into

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more of a reality)...we must clarify thepurposes of higher education: to make thevalues, processes and assumptions bywhich we operate open to scrutiny bythose who have not been socialised intopassive acceptance.

Similarly, Humm, after observing that, 'Manyof the techniques [of Independent Study]...areanalogous to the techniques pioneered bywomen's groups' so that "The School wouldseem to provide an ideal feminist 'space", goeson to discuss those aspects of practice whichseemed still to disadvantage women.19 Herstudy found, for example, that in collaborativeprojects women students were less likely toinitiate topics for the group; that 'concentrationon hard data and institutional approachesin...groups tended to exclude women from thebeginning'; and that tutors tended to operatetowards male students' when working withmixed groups, She concludes: t h e S c h o o r s

structure still reproduces a patriarchalmode of production. It does not control somuch as it limits by restricting the range ofoptions and tools of its women students.Gender seems to have become moreimportant in direct relation to the difficultyand uncertainty of evaluating competencesince the opportunity to demonstratecompetence is not distributed equally.

This critique of women's experiences ofIndependent Study would seem to fit with theconclusions of a wider study in the USA byBelenky and her colleagues,20 that women'sways of knowing are undervalued andrepressed in educational establishmentspermeated by the values of male ways ofknowing. Like Humm, Belenky and hercolleagues would advocate for women a style ofeducation that sounds remarkably likeindependent study:

We have argued in this book thateducators can help women develop theirown authentic voices if they emphasiseconnection over separation,understanding and acceptance overassessment, and collaboration overdebate; if they accord respect to and allowtime for the knowledge that emerges fromfirsthand experience; if instead ofimposing their own expectations andarbitrary requirements, they encouragestudents to evolve their own patterns of

work based on the problems they arepursuing. These are the lessons we havelearned in listening to women's voices.(p.299)

Though we cannot pursue further in thispaper the implications of sociological andfeminist critiques for either Independent Studyor higher education generally, we mayacknowledge a need to adopt a criticalperspective towards the construction of profilesof open learning and, perhaps, a correspondingshift in our notion of 'openness'.

Modes of studyFinally, to comment on the third dimension,modes of study, the broad umbrella of distancelearning at the Open University covers a widerange of learning methods, many of them highlyinnovative. The production of high qualitylearning texts, related educational broadcastsand, increasingly, interactive computer-basedlearning resources has been instrumental increating the very possibilities of open learning.Individual course teams too have developedinnovative modes of study. For example, a ThirdLevel Social Sciences course I have tutored,D321 Professional Judgement, requires all TutorMarked Assignments to be written in dialogueform. Within the course students are offered arationale for this approach based onHabermas's concept of the role of dialogue inemancipatory education which would bereadily acceptable to practitioners ofIndependent Study as analogous to the centralrole they give to critical dialogue betweenstudent and tutor in the learning process.21

Once again it may seem paradoxical that anemancipatory mode of learning is a mandatorycourse requirement, either in how the D321student writes TMAs or in how the IndependentStudy student is expected to relate to the tutor.In both cases I have seen some people engagefreely in the experiment offered and somebecome converted after initial reservations,while others have resisted and complained tothe last. Provided that lines of communicationremain open, the latter cases have providedsome of the most challenging encounters withstudents, demanding a willingness to re-examine practice as a tutor and to reflectcritically on the course I am operating. On bothD321 and at the School for Independent Studytutors are encouraged to contribute thosereflections to wider debate, leading to

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development of professional practicesomewhat in the manner of Schon's reflectivepractitioner.22

Is Independent Study student-centred learning?When Independent Study was established atthe Polytechnic, it was with an explicitcommitment to shifting the focus of educationalprovision from the reproduction of academicdisciplines to meeting the needs of the student.As an early course planning document put it:

An important principle of [Polytechnic]policy is to design courses to meet theneeds of prospective students rather thanto seek students to fit courses that NELP[now PEL] would like to run.23

In PEL as elsewhere in Higher Education, thisprinciple is now in line with a market-oriented,customer-led approach to course production,but in 1972 is constituted a more radical attemptto define a role for the Polytechnic distinct fromthe traditional university model. In particular,the Polytechnic was seeking to relate itsservices to the particular needs of the localcommunities in East London, as noted above.

However, as seems inevitable in thesedebates, 'student-centred' very swiftly acquiredother layers of meaning. Perhaps the mostprominent of these has derived from humanisticpsychology, most directly from the client-centred approach of Carl Rogers. Developedoriginally in a therapeutic context, Rogersextended his ideas on how professionals mightfacilitate personal development of clients fromthe analyst-patient situation to the relationship ofteacher and learner,24 In the learner-centredapproach, the teacher functions most effectivelyas a facilitator of the student's own learningprocesses. Within the School for IndependentStudy, the notion of the tutor's role as one offacilitation has gained broad currency, thoughonly a small group of staff are avowedly'Rogerian'.

Inevitably, the two notions of 'student-centredness' stand in tension with each other,the social orientation of the first seemingly incontradiction to the more individualisticorientation of the second. Just as the humanisticapproach in therapy has been criticised forpurporting to heal individuals without changingthe social relations which constitute theirillness,25 so the student-centred approach might

be criticised for offering to transform individualstudents while the poverty of the East Endgrinds on all around. In a similar vein, the notionof the professional role of facilitator could beused as a means for the lecturer to avoidengagement with the social context, to be acatalyst of learning or an unchanged changer (aposition I must admit to finding attractivemyself).26

I prefer to recognise these differences in theSchool for Independent Study without makingany attempt to resolve them here. They aredifferences, I think, which run through thewhole of education and are just as germane tochoices of approach in distance learning andopen learning. In the end, it may not be tenableto remain with a simplistic belief that educationis a good in itself or that liberal education willautomatically create citizens more able andwilling to participate in democracy.27 Thetensions between educators and learnerscommitted to emancipatory education and aneducation system geared to market needs andvocational competencies may become too greatto hold together.

Bringing together independentstudy and distance learningFor the moment, independent study-typeprogrammes can enjoy the best of both worlds,with the development of greater studentautonomy in Higher Education being funded bygovernment agencies as a key element of'enterprise education' and promoted nationallyby the Royal Society of Arts 'Higher Educationfor Capability Project' and by the CNAA.Several colleges are currently 'franchising' ourlearning model, with the staff involved learningthe ropes by writing their own learning plans,using our short course in Planning forProfessional Development by IndependentStudy. Within the Open University too,'independent learning' features increasingly asa priority in future academic developments.What might this mean in practice?

Returning now to my own dual experiences,as OU tutor and SIS tutor, I would acknowledgea great deal of learning from both.

From the Open University, I have gained,amongst other things, an awareness of the valueof high quality, well-structured teachingmaterials; some skills in providing detailed,effective and supportive feedback on studentassignments; intellectual stimulation and

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professional development from tutoringinnovatory courses; and a sense of being valuedand supported as a tutor by course teamcolleagues and regional staff tutors. On the flipside, there has been at times a sense offrustration in teaching someone else's course,over the content of which I have little control;despair (tempered with cynicism) that studentscan become very instrumental in tacklingcourse materials with TMA grades as the primefocus; that students have little incentive to gobeyond course materials; and that so little ismade of the vast experience, skills andknowledge that the students bring to theuniversity.

Equally, at the School for Independent Study,I have had first hand experience of how far thelearner can take control of her own learning;gained an appreciation of the importance inlearning of planning, doing and reflecting, aswell as abstract conceptualisation; I havegained from colleagues and students a wholerange of techniques in individual tuition, groupproject work and experiential workshops;learned to engage directly with other people'sways of learning, ways of knowing and beliefsystems, which do challenge many assumptionsbuilt into academic thinking; and seen thatstudents who might not gain access to highereducation elsewhere are capable of reachinggood Honours Degree standard in three yearsof self-managed learning.

The down side of Independent Study hascome largely from having to cope with rapidexpansion of student numbers on an inadequateresource base. What began as a marginalactivity in the Polytechnic, treated withsuspicion by some departments has grown intoa major strand of its academic provision. Yetresources, both equipment and staff, remainlocked into departments. This can meandifficulty in finding supervision for a perfectlyviable student programme, especially for non-traditional DipHE students, who are oftenperceived as Tnore work1. On the administrativeside too, our commitment to increasingflexibility of access through multiple studentintakes (two or three per year) has been difficultto handle for an academic registry geared toOctober starts. And, like other HE institutions,the Polytechnic is only recently developing aconcerted strategy to deal with the implicationsof equal opportunity policy.28

Looking now at the possibilities forindependent study in the Open University, Iwould see almost irrestible educational

arguments for including independent study asan element in educational provision for adultlearners. Enabling students to plan andnegotiate their learning brings tremendousenergy and commitment into the learningprocess. For non-traditional students, theprocess of building a learning contract fromprevious experience acts as a bridge betweenthat person's personal, social and culturalrealities and the realities of higher education.Part-time courses at the School for IndependentStudy, particularly the BA/BSc and MA/MSc andPost-graduate Diploma, have been verysuccessful in attracting professional peopleseeking an award-bearing course appropriateto their needs in a rapidly changingenvironment.29'30

Much has been achieved at the Polytechnic ofEast London, despite the tensions in developinga 'bottom-up', student-led model in an institutiongeared to top-down', staff-led provision. TheOpen University is, I suspect, no less top down1,in practice if not in intention. In its present modeof course development and delivery, thelogistics of putting a course together, with ahuge investment of time and money, canbecome the tail wagging the dog. Most of thedecisions about course content, structure andassessment may be determined at a centrallevel, leaving the students and part-time tutorsrelatively little autonomy.

The SIS model may look too radical to thoseunacquainted with it. It does require areconceptualisation of the institution, and thestaff in it, as a resource for learning. In return,through engaging in the process of negotiationwith students about their learning needs andintentions, the institution and its staff enter into adeep learning process as well.

Alternatively, components of theIndependent Study model may be built intootherwise traditional courses, as indeed theyare to some extent already. This would mean, Isuggest, upgrading the significance of thestudent's planning, doing and reflecting as validcomponents of the learning process.31 Thiscould be done most easily around projects, butcan be extended too into areas such asencouraging student self- and peer-assessment.

Perhaps the model most immediatelycompatible with the Open University would bethat used by Empire State College, New York.32

Essentially, students gain credit for priorlearning and plan a route through a modularprogramme, with opportunities to negotiate

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specific learning contracts to enhance theirindividual portfolio of accredited studies. OpenUniversity students could develop such a planwith the support of tutor-counsellors, to beregularly monitored and reviewed. Studentcritical reviews of learning could be assessedand would provide feedback to the institution onthe student experience of learning.

Of course, I am not in the business of dictatingpolicy to the Open University. My intention inthis article has been to make some connectionsbetween the different worlds of open anddistance learning and Independent Study.Above all, I have tried to indicate what, out of allthe babble of meanings and discourses,creating opportunities for independent learnersmight mean, or what we might choose to makethem mean.

Conclusions - Independence andinteractionFrom this brief analysis of some aspects of theIndependent Study model in the context of openlearning, the following tentative conclusionsemerge:• that Independent Study is negotiated study,

and that independent study programmesgenerally are negotiated programmes;

• that independent study is not synonymouswith distance learning, open learning orstudent-centred learning, though in any oneperson's programme of study it might at sometime mean some or all or none of these things;

• that open learning cannot be achievedsimply by a course structure, or course aims,or particular educational technologies (in thecase of Independent Study, the 'soft'technology of a learning plan);

• that the 'open-ness' of an educationalprogramme cannot be evaluated in isolationfrom the broader patterns of socialrelationships within which it is embedded;

• that attempts to implement greater studentautonomy in learning do not offer easysolutions to problems of control andempowerment, but they do pose thequestions more sharply (and sometimesmore painfully);

• that allowing the student to bring into theinstitution her or his social and culturalexperience challenges the tutor, theinstitution and the educational system torespond to the cultural diversity andindividual needs of adult learners.

In these respects, the tasks of developingopportunities for independent learners are alsothe tasks of developing more equitable humaninteractions.

References1 Gaskell, A. and Mills, R. (1989) 'Interaction andindependence in distance education - What's beensaid and what's been done', Open Learning, Vol.4No.2, pp. 51-52.

2 For more detailed accounts of courses at the Schoolfor Independent Study, see: Stephenson, J. (1988)"The Experience of Independent Study at NorthEast London Polytechnic' in Boud, D. (ed)Developing Student Autonomy in Learning,London; Kogan Page; Robbins, D. (1989) The Riseof Independent Study; The politics and philosophyof an educational innovation, 1970-87, MiltonKeynes; The Society for Research into HigherEducation and Open University Press; and Percy,K. and Ramsden, P. (1980) Independent Study: TwoExamples from English Higher Education,Guildford; Society for Research into HigherEducation.

3 NELP (1972) Interim Report of the Working Partyon the Diploma of Higher Education, London; NorthEast London Polytechnic.

4 Hinds, E. (1987) The School for Independent Studyand International Links, ZiffPapiere No.69 Hagen;Zentrales Institut fur Fernstudienforschung,FemUniversitat.

5 Garrison, D.R. (1989) Understanding DistanceEducation: A Framework for the Future, London;Routledge.

6 Daniel, J.S. and Marquis, C. (1979) 'Interaction andindependence: getting the mixture right',Teaching at a Distance, No. 14, pp.29-44.

7 Wedemeyer, C.A. (1971) 'Independent Study1 inDeighton, L. (ed) Encyclopaedia of Education,Vol.4 pp.548-557, New York; MacMillan.

8 Wedemeyer, C.A. (1981) Learning at thebackdoor: Reflections on non-traditional learningin the life-span, Madison; University of WisconsinPress.

9 Morgan, A. (1985) What shall we do aboutindependent learning?', International Council forDistance Education Bulletin, 15, pp.47-53.

10 Boud, D. (ed) (1981; Second Edition 1988)Developing Student Autonomy in Learning,London; Kogan Page.

11 Saddington, J.A (1990) 'Independent Study: fromTheory to Practice', unpublished paper, presentedat the Kenton Conference, East Cape; availablefrom the author, Dept. of Adult Education andExtra-Mural Studies, University of Cape Town,South Africa.

12 Robbins, D. (1989) The Rise of Independent Study:The politics and philosophy of an educationalinnovation, 1970-87 Milton Keynes; The Society forResearch into Higher Education and OpenUniversity Press. Robbins takes the issues further

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in (1990) Analysing the process of institutionallegitimation, Occasional Paper No.l, London;Polytechnic of East London, Group for Researchinto Access and Student Programmes.

13 Rumble, G. (1989) "Open learning', 'Distancelearning1 and the misuse of language', OpenLearning, Vol.4 No.2, pp.28-36.

14 Lewis, R. (1990) 'Open learning and the misuse oflanguage: a response to Greville Rumble', OpenLearning, Vol.5 No.l, pp.3-8.

15 Bradbury, P.S. (1981) 'Entry into Higher Educationfrom areas of low take-up rate', paper presented tothe SRHE Conference Biases in Higher Education,Guildford; SRHE.

16 Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J.C. (1977)Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture,London; Sage.

17 Mezirow, J. (1985) 'A Critical Theory of Self-directed Learning' in Brookfield, D. (ed) Self-Directed Learning: From Theory to Practice, NewDirections for Continuing Education, No. 25 SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass.

18 Weil, S.W. (1986) 'Non-traditional Learners WithinTraditional Higher Education: discovery anddisappointment', Studies in Higher Education,Vol.11 No.3, pp.219-235.

19 Humm, M. (1983) Women in Higher Education: ACase Study of the School for Independent Studyand the Issues for Feminism', Women's StudiesInternational Forum, Vol.6 No.l, pp.97-105.

20 Belenky, M.F. et al (1986) Women's Ways ofKnowing: the Development of Self, Voice andMind, New York; Basic Books. This is reviewed inO'Reilly, D. (1990) Women's Time and Women'sLearning1, International Newsletter forIndependent Study, No. 13, pp.6-14.

21 See, for example, Mezirow, J. (op cit, ref 23) orBoud, D., Keogh, R. and Walker, D. (eds) (1985)Reflection: turning experience into learning,London; Kogan Page.

22 Schon, D.A. (1983) The Reflective Practitioner,New York; Basic Books.

23 NELP (1972) Interim Report of the Working Partyon the Diploma of Higher Education, London; NorthEast London Polytechnic.

24 Rogers, C. (1983) Freedom to Learn for the 80s,Columbus, Ohio; Charles E. Merrill.

25 See, for example, Jacobi, R. (1975) Social Amnesia:A Critique of Conformist Psychology from Adler toLaing, Sussex: The Harvester Press or Lasch, C.(1979) The Culture ofNarcissim: American Life inan Age of Diminishing Expectations, W. W. Norton&Co.

26 O'Reilly, D. (1989) 'On Being an EducationalFantasy Engineer' in Weil, S. W. and McGill, I. (eds)Making Sense of Experiential Learning: Diversityin Theory and Practice, Guildford; SRHE and OpenUniversity.

27 See, for example, Brookfield, S.D. DevelopingCritical Thinkers: challenging adults to explorealternative ways of thinking and acting, MiltonKeynes; Open University Press. This book is verymuch in the tradition of Lindemann and Dewey.

28 Williams, J. et al (1989) Words or Deeds? A Reviewof Equal Opportunity Policies in Higher Education,London; Commission for Racial Equality.

29 See Tight, M. (1989) 'Part-time higher education asopen learning', Open Learning, Vol.4 No.2, pp.3-6for an overview.

30 For part-time recruitment onto the PostgraduateProgrammes by Independent Study, see O'Reilly,D. (1990) 'A Third Model for Part-Time HigherEducation', Association for Part-Time HigherEducation Newsletter No.8.

31 I have not discussed experiential learning in detail,to avoid yet another layer of discourse. See Henry,J. (1989) 'Meaning and Practice in ExperientialLearning', in Weil, S.W. and McGill, I. (1989) op cit.

32 See Granger, D. 'Open learning and individualiseddistance learning at Empire State College', OpenLearning, Vol.5 No.l, pp.24-30.

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