Response to "Promoting Access in Open Distance Learning"

Written by Mirriam Lephalala and Cathy Pienaar, this article focuses on distance learning institutions and widening student involvement in South Africa. One of the key points about the article is that writing centers have become an “integral part of learner support in higher education”. Moreover, the article talks at length about the University of South Africa and its striving agenda for widening community access. The article goes on to reveal some of the answers to reoccurring questions concerning diversity among the UNISA (University of South Africa) student population. For example, one of the questions was what does widening student participation mean? This involves a two phase process: firstly, an increasing number of students from disadvantaged backgrounds should be accepted and secondly there should be a increase in diverse learning for these students.
While diversity was one key point in this article, the introduction of a writing center at UNISA was another. It was recognized that the University was failing at supplying academic student support structures. Students with diverse backgrounds need support structures that can be overtly provided, because many of the students:
• Are first generation university entrants in their families and have little or no knowledge of what university education entails
• Speak English as a second or third language
• Have limited access to the financial, material and emotional support necessary for university success
The article states that by 2003 it became obvious that there was an urgent need to improve these Student Structures and to establish a writing center, which they did. The first services were offered to students in September of 2003 and included:
• Face to face tutoring where students were assisted with problems related to all stages of the writing process, from brainstorming for ideas to revising and editing final drafts
• Regular workshops that focused on a variety of topics, such as business writing skills and strategies for improving written drafts
• The START program, which consists of a variety of self-study reading comprehension worksheets
• The “Reading Excellence” computer program to improve reading skills
In 2006 the article states that the writing center changed its name to the UNISA Academic Literacies Center as the number of services offered by the center was increased. Currently, it offers reading, writing, quantitative literacy as well as information literacy services. The article goes on say that there are currently 18 UNISA writing centers spread throughout South Africa.
The conclusion of this article further reiterates the importance of writing centers becoming an “essential part of distance educations like UNISA”. IT goes on to state that a writing center should no longer be regarded as a service that is complementary to the course content, focusing only on giving students the necessary assistance to understand the course content. The improved and upgraded UNISA Academic Literacies Center aims to “assist all learners to achieve a high quality of learning, and the services are available to all learners at any stage of the learning process”.
I really liked this article and the simplistic ways it dealt with complex issues such as diversity and prosperous centers of writing and learning.