Distance Learning or Resident Educational and Training Programs? Possible Solutions to the Effectiveness Dilemma in Military Education

Abstract

Distance learning used to be a highly coveted reality before the outbreak of Covid 19 pandemic. When prompted as an emergency solution, it offered manifold avenues of creativity and adaptability for educators and institutions. All of them were essential to overcome many of the stumbling blocks raised by the impromptu transition or transfer from face to face educational and training programs to distance learning solutions. However, once the WHO declared the end of the pandemic and even though the public discourse is still focused on the importance of technology and the added value it provides in all walks of life, the return of many educational and training institutions to the delivery of face to face educational and training programs tends to become the norm. The current article focuses on the necessary prerequisites for establishing distance learning programs as viable, effective and sustainable counterparts of residential programs. It offers a bird’s eye view on a select number of time-tested perspectives, processes, models in the field of education and training that can be employed to assure distance learning programs’ effectiveness as informed by conceptual dimensions like end users’ needs, technology enabled design of DL programs, participants’ support, and learners’ engagement. Thus, it can assist strategic decision-making in the field of distance learning education and training programs as well as the formulation of appropriate guiding questions concerning the effective design and development of such programs.