From policy to practice: One university's experience of implementing strategic change through wholly online teaching and learning

Abstract

One institution's attempts to implement an ambitious wholly online learning policy is examined in the Australian higher education setting. The conditions that led to a diversity of models of wholly online unit development are considered, along with teachers' design intents in establishing their online teaching and learning environments. The emphasis of the analysis is on those wholly online units created or redeveloped from existing offerings which held out the greatest possibilities for what we have categorised as 'transformatory' learning and teaching as related to the development of highly valued lifelong learning capacities in students. Organisational learning from the offering of the first major suite of wholly online units is outlined and impacts on policy reformulation described. The case study concludes with a consideration of more general lessons learnt from policy driven initiatives directed at transforming teaching and learning in higher education.