Towards Open Distance Learning for Future: Practices and Challenges in Sri Lanka

Abstract

The greatest challenge in the 21st century for higher education is the recognition of relevance, which is the need to adapt to the immediate needs of the society by produce an employable or employability graduate. ODL has the potential to provide higher education while the personnel remain in employment to continue servicing the market. It is a form of education that combines the world of work with learning with mutual benefit. The Open University of Sri Lanka is now moving towards the 5th generation ODL technology supported by a combination of online-and blended teaching and learning techniques. Today it caters to a student population of about 40,000 learners who offer courses through the Faculties of Education, Engineering, Natural Sciences, Health Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences and Management Studies. Together they offer about 67 study programs. The ODL as a mode of learning has the prime objective of facilitating learners who were mostly unreached education or employed, who were denied tertiary, adult or lifelong education due to the various barriers that prevented them from continuing education. While for these groups of students technology is an effective strategy to overcome such barriers, the use of sophisticated technology which imposes additional barriers to pursuing education, should be considered with care.