The Balance among Quality, Scale and Effectiveness——AnEmpirical Study on Scale Effeet in Teaching Venues at Prefecture and City Level of Radio TV Universities in China

摘要

ODL (Open and Distance Learning) is a new field for exploration in the "CCRTVU: Developing New Ways to Cultivate People of Talents and the Open Education Pilot Project (1999-2007)" of the "National Modern Distance Education Engineering". As the "bridge head", teaching venues are playing an important role in the filed of open and distance education. In China's ODL system, over 70% enrolled students are from Radio and TV Universities (RTVUs). Many off-campus teaching venues of e-colleges in 67 conventional universities have been established in RTVUs at prefecture and city level. How to coordinate the relationship among teaching quality, scale and effectiveness? In this article, the authors have done a direct survey on the data of distance education cost over the past consecutive 4 years in 21 RTVUs at prefecture and city level from 3 provinces (Xinjiang, Hunan and Fujian) in China's western, central and eastern areas, and empirically studied the scale effect in teaching venues at prefecture and city level under the hypothesis condition---teaching effect of ODL and conventional education is the same. The study result illustrates that the average student cost of RTVUs at prefecture and city level demonstrates a scale economyfeature, that is, with the expansion of enrolled student scale, there is a fall in the average student cost. The study indicates that there are large differences between average student variable cost and average student cost, which shows a possible average cost reduction in RTVUs at prefecture and city level. In terms of geographical differences, some imbalances of development have been found among RTVUs at prefecture and city level owing to different economic & geographical location and different economic development levels. A quadratic form regression model has been established for doing this research in the perspective of education economics. The results of the regression shows that the optimal enrolled student number of RTVUs nationwide at prefecture and city level is around 7,800. For provinces, the most optimal enrolled student numbers are as follows: 9,100 for Fujian, 3,800 for Hunan, and 2,200 for Xinjiang, which can serve as the reference for expanding scale economy in ODL. The research finding of the article also indicates:when evaluating the changes in student average cost resulting from the changes in scale, the problem of how to determine investment direction arises. It is suggested that more input which benefit the quality improvement of distance education should be made, for instance, the input to quality courses development and learner support should be further strengthened to balance quality, scale and effectiveness.