This issue contains a special feature about the NORDIC Project which has promoted an interesting concept about Knowledge Brokerage. Slowly, telematic based learning services are beginning to develop, but most are still at a project stage and have yet to become sustainable activities. However, interest in the potential is certainly growing rapidly. One indication of this is that over 500 people will be attending the Online Educa Berlin Conference later this month. On the down side, however, most of the speakers come from the academic world and the organisers have had difficulty getting companies to describe and demonstrate commercially run telematic-based learning services.
But as interest increases and more choices become available for the acquisition of knowledge and skills, the role of the knowledge broker will become more important to help individuals and organisations make decisions as to what is most appropriate to their own needs and within their own context.
Equally there is a need to help the "early adopters" who are piloting new telematic based learning services, to guide them towards operating sustainable services. This involves the "process of innovation transfer". However, much still has to be learnt about this process. There has been over ten years experience of encouraging technology and innovation transfer within the EC funded SPRINT programme, but it is disappointing that this appears to have had very little impact on the projects that were funded by the EC under the Third Framework "Telematics for Flexible and Distance Learning Programme". It is hoped that this issue will be addressed within the "Telematics Applications for Education and Training" Programme. Details of these new projects have been announced in this newsletter.
The recently published Educational Multimedia Task Force Report perhaps does not say anything new, but at least it does highlight the potential importance of this sector of the market to policy makers. It is hoped that the Commission will not just point to existing initiatives that they are already activating, but will more clearly re-focus future initiatives in this direction. However, it is very unlikely that new money will be found for future activities. It is also hoped that Member States will also now start to see the potential importance of the Educational Multimedia Telematics market - particularly as a creator of new jobs in small and medium enterprises. Europe has a potential competitive advantage in this area with a long and well established educational tradition and also with the world's most commonly used languages being native to Europe.
Policy makers should not only look towards developments in Educational Multimedia Telematics as a means of enhancing learning - then ask how can we pay for them? - They should also think of these developments offering the potential for job creation in a new but rapidly developing industry.