Ron Beyers has teaching experience primarily in the sciences and technology related subjects. Having interfaced with the educational as well as the business worlds, he has challenged existing paradigms in education by utilizing technologies in new and exciting ways, in a learning community that is connected through ICTs. As chairperson of Gauteng Schools Network, coupled to serving SchoolNet South Africa on the Board of Governors, and the CSSA Gauteng branch, he is strategically placed to assist in getting more schools connected. He has also co-authored some twenty-two books in Technology Education for Outcomes Based Education.

Abstract

A Connected Learning Community (CLC) is a concept that is new to South Africa. It has its origins in a collaborative venture between Microsoft, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Gauteng Schools Network, SchoolNet South Africa, and St Alban's College. The College has been experimenting with new methodologies and technologies for several years, in an attempt to come to terms with a paradigm shift in education towards Outcomes Based Education (OBE). There is also a real need to enhance the quality of the output from the College, namely the model St Alban's Graduate, by equipping him with more essential skills for life, in a learning environment which is highly connected through the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs). This is not a problem that is exclusive to the College.

The original Connected Learning Project (CLP) was set up with thirty students with a wide range of abilities. The group was provided with a venue that had open access to the campus-wide network, as well as the Internet, via laptops. Five subjects were identified based on the interests and abilities of the teachers: English, Mathematics, Geography, General Science and History at grade nine level. The pupils covered the same work as their counterparts but the essential difference was the manner in which they interacted with the content. The Internet was there to provide the platform for access to and publication of information. Self-study and group work were given high priority. Another essential component was the transparency of the educational process, primarily to the pupils, but also to the parents, where the teachers publish schedules, including dates for assignments and tests, resources, activities and test results on the CLC home page off the College web site (http://www.stalban.pta.school.za)

This project has been very successful in providing a dynamic environment for the pupils to take greater responsibility for their own learning, while acquiring essential skills in the fields of communication, collaboration, lateral thinking, problem solving, presentation, internet publishing, animation, and a host of other social skills. The project has produced a number of other tangible benefits, namely a growing pool of invaluable teaching and learning resources which have been developed by the students as part of their classwork, and which were then added to an Intranet. An outcome of the project so far, is that the whole College is now committed to a predetermined process which will leapfrog the organization into the next century. In establishing a well-defined strategy for the next three years, the College has a firm foundation for the next phase in the developmental process, especially as the country moves to a phasing in of OBE. What has emerged is the necessity to formalize the process in terms of sharing information in a common vision. The first strategic plan to emerge encompassed an ICT plan, which was transformed into a general plan for the CLC project. In developing the CLC plan, possible implications for all members of the community were spelt out, coupled to a detailed plan of action, including long-term budgetary implications.

The need for change emerged after several years of wrestling with a variety of different technologies. The visionaries sketched possible scenarios of how technologies could be employed at the College. The greatest stumbling block in the process was identified as the desire to create a technological push in the absence of any real educational reform. There was a natural resistance to change from the staff as no change management strategies had been implemented. Off the shelf technological solutions to many problems in education are readily available but the greatest dilemma we face, are the ‘warmware’ issues, namely convincing people of the need for change and deciding which solution to implement, given the circumstances. As organizational change pioneer Richard Beckhard put it, ‘People do not resist change; people resist being changed.’ Peter Senge (14)

The biggest breakthrough came with the development of the strategic plan, where it soon became evident that the technological push was the wrong way to have approached the educational scenario. The fundamental change came about when the IT department transformed itself into a service-orientated directorate to meet the needs of a redefined College vision. In essence, the role of IT at the College was transformed from a 'technology push' to servicing the needs of an 'educational pull'. This transformation had major implications in that the focus shifted to the 'business of education' rather than to trying to promote the use of technology in the absence of an organizational reform strategy.

It is important to understand change, especially in a technologically saturated environment. Unfortunately the technology objectives are a moving target and the rate of change is rapidly escalating. Coupled to this problem is the skills gap which is emerging between where the educators are currently, where technology is going and where the learners are operating. No sooner have educators mastered a new skill on a software package, than a newer version emerges. In such instances ‘technological adaptability’ become a key issue, coupled to the willingness to experiment in order to facilitate skills transfer in new and more dynamic environments. The youth of today are generally at ease with new technologies, as their minds have not been molded into fixed cognitive paths. This ‘net generation’ have highly adaptable minds, which can and must be extended further.

One of the outcomes of the project is to extend the process to the whole College by challenging all members of staff to employ technology to add greater value to what they are currently doing. Yes, it will involve a transformation, from what the educators are currently doing in terms of processes, to doing thing better and more cost effectively using ICTs. Change management and viewing the business of education in terms of knowledge management will provide the essential mind shifts to new and exciting educational possibilities.

Schools should be primarily involved in the transfer of knowledge, information and skills, in the context of a learning environment that also presupposes the inculcation of values and attitudes. Dunham suggests that 'Two of the most popular interpretations of knowledge are knowledge as understanding and knowledge as information -- that is, we have knowledge if we understand something or we have knowledge if we have information in some form.'

In today’s world the emphasis is on change and schools must adapt to the demands of the information age as well as a changing society. The ultimate test of the value of any school must surely be the quality of the end products of the system, namely, the students, and how well they are equipped to cope with life in a modern technological world.

The ‘new world of business’ is characterized by high levels of uncertainty and inability to predict the future according to Malhotra. The only thing that we can be certain of is change. How any organization and the individuals within the organization cope with this change will provide the competitive edge. Like any other industry, education must be viewed essentially as a business unit, especially where school budgets are running into thousands, if not millions of Rands. This component will have to receive higher priority if these institutions are to survive in a more stringent economic climate. The 'business of education' will play an increasingly important part in the future and schools need to take cognizance of this.

A proposed model for the 'business of education' assumes that an educational institution can no longer be administered as an academic facility only and that the effective management of the financial resources is an assumed fact. If the educational institution is treated as a business, then it must have clients who are there to do business, namely the pupils, who expect to receive the best possible service in order to emerge from the system with an education that reflects their true innate potential. In many cases, it could be argued that schools cater to the demands of the parents and changes in society which ultimately have an effect on the decisions that are taken and the types of activities that take place in the classrooms, without due consideration to all the needs of their clients.

A major shift in the 'business of education' model is that the pupils should be regarded as the clients and that the schools make more of an effort to address their specific needs. In the same way a company like Coca-Cola has to take into account the needs of its clients when introducing a new product. Business is business, and if the clients needs are not met, the business will not survive. Learning experiences from other areas need to be shared in order to ensure that the same mistakes are not made. At the same time, the type of personal service will also change to accommodate the more pupil-centred approach demanded by the Outcomes Based Education (OBE). This needs-driven approach to education will provide the necessary platform for the transformation of the educational system and those involved in it.

"Dazzled by trendy management strategies and baffled by technology feeding frenzy that puts more powerful computer hardware and software on every desktop, we often forget the ultimate purpose of business strategies and technologies: To improve the performance of individuals within the organization and the competitiveness of the organization as a whole.

Motivation, compensation, restructuring of tasks and better tools are the traditional methods for improving performance. While these tools are still valid and important, they may detract us from the simple truth that in an information-based economy, knowledge (not raw information) is the implicit underpinning of all results-orientated human activity - as well as an explicit organizational resources.

So there is only one way to ensure that we dramatically improve overall performance; improve the ways in which we create, manage, and transfer knowledge. " Barclay and Murray

It has often been stated that schools should reflect changes in society. In the information age, recent trends in business have suggested a new approach, referred to as Knowledge Management. This new approach has provided essential leverage mechanisms for companies to transform the ways in which they do business. Any company wishing to survive in a fiercely competitive environment will have to pursue all possible strategies in order to survive. Knowledge management is one of these strategies, and if schools subscribe to a ‘business model’ of education, they too have the potential to apply these strategies in order to ensure their competitiveness. Simply translated, schools need to be better prepared to equip pupils with the essential skills to reduce the gap between the educational environment and the real world and hence to become more productive.

"Knowledge is increasingly seen as a primary business asset and knowledge management as a key differentiator between firms in the late 1990s. Integral to the implementation of knowledge is understanding the organization's information flows and implementing organizational learning practices, which make explicit key aspects of its knowledge base. Knowledge management is not about managing or organizing books or journals, searching the Internet for clients or arranging for the curriculum materials. However, each of these activities can in some way be part of knowledge management spectrum and processes."

Knowledge management is about enhancing the use of organizational knowledge through sound practice of information management and organizational learning. The purpose is to deliver value to the business.

It rests on two foundations: utilization and exploiting the organization's information (which needs to be managed for this to occur); and second, the application of people's competencies, skills, talents, thoughts, ideas, intuitions, commitments, motivations, and imaginations." Broadbent

"..The trend in knowledge management will have little to do with technology, and a lot to do with corporate culture." Hibbard and Carrillo

"As knowledge workers are inundated by ever increasing quantities of information, it's time to take a new look at the old adage 'it's not what you know, but who you know.' Often an organization's most valuable knowledge resides not in explicit forms such as documents, database record and web pages, but in employees' experience and know-how" Offsey

Broadbent refers to the tacit knowledge that people carry around with them in their heads, which is critical information, and it is this information that needs to become explicit in order to be shared with other colleagues in order for others to draw benefit from it. "Knowledge management practices aim to draw out the tacit knowledge people have, what they carry around with them, what they observe and learn from experience, rather than what is usually explicitly stated." (Broadbent). The true value, it may be argued would lie in making the information more explicit and then employing technology to tease out the ‘potential knowledge’ that lies buried beneath information and experience which now needs to be shared through knowledge management processes. It is for this reason that educators form an integral component of the teacher-pupil relationship, as they are the key to unlocking some of the ‘potential knowledge’ which is difficult to achieve using other technological options.

Hoyt Consulting in a paper entitled Knowledge Creation Cycle refer to "personal knowledge which is created through the experiential exposure to information". On the other hand "collective knowledge is viewed in terms of information within the context of the organization." One may argue that the true value of knowledge must surely emerge from the personal experience of knowledge, which is then integrated into the collective knowledge which, using modern filtering technologies, is capable of extracting even more meaningful knowledge.

Knowledge management is a relatively new concept but is reasonably well documented. It is not the aim of this article to explore all the different facets of knowledge management but rather to explore some of the possibilities and implication for the 'business of education' model and briefly how it can be expanded to include education within the context of the CLC project.

"It is often helpful to view the process of knowledge management as a series of transactions or activities between entities (people and organizations). These activities are Buying (buyers seeking knowledge), Brokering (connecting those buying with those selling) and Selling (holders of knowledge that are selling that knowledge). The currency of the transactions between these activities is relevant knowledge. The interesting part of thinking in terms of an economic transaction is that each entity has the ability to decide whether to participate in a given transaction. " HOYT Consulting

In striving to convert any educational system, it is critical that change is initiated from the highest possible level. Without the necessary authority, no person lower than chairperson will be able to effectively transform an institution. Even if the chairperson or principal delegates the responsibility, after having proclaimed the agreed intentions, it is still critical for all concerned, that the decision emanates from the highest position. In such instances the evolution of the management system can be coordinated to produce a far more effective organizational unit.

In a knowledge management environment all people are viewed as assets and not merely employees. It is the intellectual property that is the crucial element and not merely the physical processes that teachers are involved in that counts. Many teachers have taught for several years but they have one year of teaching experience. They have merely reproduced what they prepared for in the first year, and yet these teachers are often regarded as valuable in traditional organizations.

Another important element that is often overlooked in any educational institution is the intellectual potential of the learners, which may often exceed that of the educators in certain areas, especially with reference to modern technologies. It is the harnessing of this potential that will provide exciting possibilities in the future. Pupils in the CLP project have been provided with the skills to utilize technology and given the freedom to use it in new and innovative ways in their interactions with curriculum. In many respects, one can ‘see into’ the creative minds of the learners as one observes the by-products of their educational experiences, namely their projects. It is these by-products that can serve as valuable resource material for further teaching and learning as the learners demonstrate what they know best, by producing web pages, power point presentations, animated graphics and complex presentations as part of their everyday education outputs. Teachers need to be encouraged to create more opportunities for pupils to exercise greater freedom and responsibility through working independently, ahead of schedule.

The foundations for the CLC project were laid approximately five years ago when the College was wrestling with issues of developing an information repository. The Internet provided the vehicle to achieve this and an 'Intranet' was conceived. This served as a repository of information for teachers to develop courses, customized for pupils. The most important contribution to the Intranet came from the pupils themselves, with a significant proportion of the College trained in raw html coding as well as elementary web page construction. Equipped with these skills, the pupils were given the freedom to explore their creativity within the context of new learning environments. The pupils had to collaborate in teams with roles assigned to cover such issues as research, story boarding, graphics, html coding, interviews, data analysis, and so on. Ultimately, each member of the team contributed to the project in different ways and the best projects were then published on the Intranet. This served to stimulate others to produce work that would be published for others to refer to, as well as serving as an invaluable teaching and learning resource.

In any organization there are the traditional administrative functions to perform and the main emphasis has always been on the proficiency with which the admin workers have performed this function. What is needed is the transition to knowledge workers who are able to utilize existing information and extract more from the same information. In such instances the workers’ outputs would have changed and can lead to the spawning of innovation.

In an educational context, it is the knowledge workers who are going to make a difference to the overall output of the organization. Yes, educational institutions, such as secondary schools, are measured by the quality of the students that they produce. This implies that the learners themselves must, in fact, be taught to become knowledge workers who have acquired the skills and who are able to demonstrate that they have done so. This means that the students must be are actively involved in the construction of their own knowledge rather than responding to the bells and whistles associated with a behaviouristic model of education. The Constructivistic methodology certainly has a major role to play in this learner-centered approach.

Turning now to issues related to the CLC project, more explicit comparisons need to be drawn between knowledge management issues and what is being practiced as a whole school approach.

Operating with a dynamic staff, coupled to a saturated technology environment and a need to pioneer new areas, the College inadvertently embarked on a process of knowledge management as long as six years ago. An Intranet was developed to house the useful resources developed by both teachers and pupils, a variety of on-line courses, daily news items, and so on. This served as the critical backbone for the development of the CLC project at the College.

Recent developments include the in the formulation of 'standard operation procedures' for all aspects of life at the College, from policies for bicycles, to the Academic and Technology plans, how to book a bus, and so on. This information originally resided with the individual staff members who were responsible for their respective areas. This tacit information has now been captured electronically and will be transferred to a database in the near future to enable all staff to be able to interrogate the information in order to unlock the 'potential knowledge' that Broadbent referred to by enhancing the use of organizational knowledge.

Increasingly, the success of an organization depends on providing employees with the information they need to make the best decisions. Effective knowledge management systems give the employees fast access to data, enabling them to analyze information easily and to collaborate with colleagues, regardless of location. (Microsoft)

The ultimate goal of knowledge management must be to improve performance. In this respect, the provision of on-line schedules and content will enable the more able students to meet all the requirements of the courses more efficiently, and then utilize the remaining time for their 'own' purposes. Self-discipline must also be one of the ultimate goals of education and what better way to achieve this? The result of this scenario is that teachers are left will smaller classes to 'teach' increasing their efficiency and in so doing may be able to teach more lasses with the extra time that has been generated. This scenario has the potential to translate to a more efficient system, assuming that the teachers are willing to operate in such in such an environment. Self-motivated students have the potential to thrive under such conditions, to the point where they could meet all the requirements to be promoted to the next grade and complete their schooling in a shorter period of time. The social impact of such learning strategies would have to be investigated further.

The College has grappled with the idea of pupils having to go to technology as opposed to turning to technology to solve a problem. The construction of a multimillion Rand computer centre meant that the students had to leave their traditional classes and move to the technology. In terms of the mindsets of the learners, they had to shift their focus from, say, a science lab to the computers and somewhere in between tended not to make the connections. The scenario of having either laptops available or computers in the classrooms connected to the networks needs to be investigated further as the College extends the campus wide network.

Access to knowledge, made tangible in an Intranet based repository, coupled to different didactical approaches to the use of ICTs in the classrooms, has had a tendency to motivate more learners to experiment with and develop new skills, which cannot be assessed in the traditional educational framework. Collaboration, lateral thinking, creativity, problem solving, mouse skills, etc.. are just some of the facets of education that need to be reflected upon in the move to continuous assessment in the Outcomes Based Education being implemented in South Africa.

Since the introduction of the Internet to the College some four years ago, a number of changes have taken place. Formal training in IT has been downgraded to short orientation course for all students new to the College. IT has been formally integrated into all subjects in a variety of ways, from teaching web-publishing skills to Power Point presentations and detailed portfolios. There is a definite move on the part of the pupils to submit more project work in electronic formats in preference to hard copy. It is these resources that are added to the repository, which would otherwise have been lost, as pupils tend to discard work of this nature after assessment.

Web based training has formed an integral component of both staff and pupils. The necessity for staff training was identified as a key factor to the success, and in-house courses for staff have become to order of the day. This process has been integrated into an extensive outreach program as well as a growing inreach program.

Reynolds identifies collaboration as a major obstacle to knowledge management. He states that "the cultural problems stem from old habits of hoarding knowledge. In particular, getting people to share their knowledge requires not only new processes, but also a new covenant between employer and employees." The CLC project places great importance on the sharing of knowledge through the promotion of group work as a major teaching strategy. If pupils are to succeed in life in the business world, team work must be another skill in their tool bag for life.

Theme days are a highlight of the term for both staff and pupils, not because traditional classes are suspended for the day, but as a result of the team work that is needed in the collaborative processes of working on a common focused task. The day usually involves the use of a variety of technologies and the various groups are under time constraints to develop web pages, do Internet searches, and conduct NetMeetings and videoconferences. One could argue that all of these activities are there to ensure that the emphasis is on the sharing of knowledge, rather than hoarding it for personal gain.

The emphasis of the work in a CLC environment has certainly not been placed on the technologies. Yes, laptops have been used for one class but future plans to expand the project do not have laptops as the only option. On the contrary. The strategic plan for the whole College approach will have the vast majority of classes operating without laptops, but with access to the information via other technologies. The important thing is to create a learning culture for knowledge management to take place within a CLC environment which can ultimately lead to new knowledge.

The establishment of knowledge management practices at school levels has national implications. What is needed initially is to reestablish a culture of teaching and learning in the classroom as a matter of priority if the country is to make any meaningful economic growth. This will entail some tough, but necessary decisions. In the meantime it is crucial that schools develop new strategies to cope with change, especially with respect to modern business trends. By becoming more business orientated, schools can gain a competitive edge, while at the same time orientating more pupils to cope with life in a technological world. The development of more competent knowledge workers must become a high priority for all educational institutions. According to Barclay and Murray, there is a need to develop more knowledge management professionals and it is suggested that the CLC project is one way of ensuring more students will be better equipped to make more meaningful changes in the workplace. Knowledge management must become a day-to-day process where educators are valued more for their intellectual property than as teachers who process pupils.

'These day it's not who you know, but what you know-and who you share it with', (Hibbard and Carillo), which is also suggested by Offsey. This culture must be inculcated in the minds of the students where a CLC type of environment can go a long way to addressing some of these issues. 'Access to and use of information technology, particularly in educational settings, is a perquisite to building the skills base that will allow our citizens to function productively in the information society of the next century'.(CEO Forum)

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Broadbent, M. "The phenomemnon of Knowledge Management : What does it mean to the Information Profession"; http://www.sla.org/pubs/serial/10/may/broadben.html

Barclay, R. and Murray. P,"It's all in your head."; http://www.ktic.com/topic6/KMHEAD.HTM

CEO Forum, "School Technology and Readiness Report - A link to Betters Learning"; http://www.ceoforum.org/   

Dunham, R. "Knowledge: the business battleground"; http://www.ktic.com/topic6/KMBATTLE.HTM

Hibbard, J. and Carrillo, K.M. "Knowledge Revolution - Getting Employees to share what they know is no longer a technology challenge - it's a corporate culture change". http://www.technoweb.com/se/directlink.cgi?IWK1980105S0023

Hoyt Constulting, "The Knowledge Creation Cycle"; http://www.hoytconsulting.com/perspectives/kmcreation.htm   

Malhotra, Y (1988), "Knowledge Management, a view from the Front Line," http://www.brint.com/interview/maeil.htm

Microsoft, "Digital Nervous system, Knowledge Management."; http://www.microsoft.com/dns/knowledgemgt/default.htm

Offsey S. 'Finding who knows what. It's the People, Stupid"; http:// www.dataware.com/km/october.htm

Reynolds (1998) "Knowledge Revolution -- Getting employees to share what they know is no longer a technology challenge - it's a corporate cultural change." January, 05, 1998, Issue : 663, Section : Hot in '98 : Knowledge Management ; http://www.techweb.com/se/directlink/cgi?IWK19980105S0023