THE UNIVERSITIES

עמוד:38

from among the academics of E . U . and from academics ot the conventional universities in Israel . About 250 academics of these universities have , at one time or another , taken part in the writing of E . U . courses . The printed material and the learning aids are there for all to see . It has been recognized that the academic level of E . U . courses compares well with that at the conventional universities . If the universities decide to adopt the individualized , guided selfstudy method , I imagine that they would initially do so for some subjects of first-year studies and extend this method over the next ten to fifteen years to more subjects and to second- and third-year studies up to the B . A . and B . Sc . degrees . To achieve this , they might wish to create their own media-mix of learning material . For some of their courses , they might perhaps adopt some of the learning material which has been prepared by E . U . A course , once it has been put together by E . U ., could serve 50 , 000 students as well as it serves 10 , 000 . The conventional universities would , in the matter of guided self-study , even have an advantage over E . U . The students of E . U . are at work , and study "at a distance , " with only occasional visits to the study centres . The students at the conventional universities devote all their time to studies ; they are at the universities and are in frequent contact with their educators . The universities would turn their lecture rooms into study centres ; they would supply the tutors from among their academics . The students would be given individual tutorials by the faculty . The term test and the examinations would be set by the universities and they would award the Bachelor's degree to their students . As mentioned above , the average ratio of student to faculty at thS ! conventional universities is , at present , 11 . 5 to 1 . A ratio that exceeds 10 to 1 at a conventional university is considered unduly high , yet financial pressures may lead to even further increases of this ratio , with a resulting loss of efficiency . The adoption by the universities of guided self-study would lead to a higher ratio of student to tutor possibly 20 to 1 without detracting from the quality of learning . A restructuring in the direction of guided self-study might , at first sight , suggest the likelihood of redundancies of university fac-

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