Week 7, Distance Learning in China

We seem to think of distance learning as something new and radical, but China has been using television and telephones to educate people for years. During the period from 1960 to 1966, more than 8,000 students graduated from the Beijing Television University.
According to the article there are four kinds of television classes: classes run by local government bureaux, classes run by factories and mines, classes run jointly by medium-sized or small work units and classes run by local TVUs at various levels to cater for fresh secondary-school graduates waiting to be assigned jobs.

It is imperitive that TVUs adopt textbooks used in conventional universities and to choose academics with a university teaching background as presenters, so that a high standard of tuition can be guaranteed. These two measures have proved to be effective.

There is a question of how much TVU's cost, and are they effective. The amount of budget varies from place to place because of the unbalanced economic development in different parts of the country. It is also important to note that in general, TVU students are free from tuition fees except free viewers and listeners who have to pay for registration and examinations. This encourages more people to use TVU's as it is so much cheaper than studying at a college or university.