Text 4

Online World Adds a New Dimension (Part II)

 

British Telecom has devised a base framework for distance learning. Launched this February, Solstra is the result of two years’ research and development based on input from a panel of experts. ‘We assembled a team of around 35 training experts drawn from academia and corporate human resource departments to see where the network could contribute,’ explains Mick Durham, manager of the Solstra distance leaning development program.

Mr. Durham says that Solstra Administrator supplies the mechanisms to monitor employees’ progress, carry out assessments and award appropriate accreditation to those who have completed course modules successfully. ‘This is where companies can really save money and get some real benefits.

Not only organizations can control the delivery of training content to employees, they can use Solstra to monitor personal development,’ he adds. ‘This is becoming increasingly important where legislation requires companies to meet compliance criteria – and prove that their employees have received the proper training.’

Paul Pestell, training manager for distance learning at Ford in the UK, has been closely involved in the development of Solstra and is testing it in a ‘live’ environment. ‘We are still testing it for the purposes of making it available across our company intranet. It is a long process and, inevitably there is some resistance because of unfamiliarity with the approach. Everybody sees its potential – but they don’t want to rush in too quickly.’ Mr. Pestell says Solstra is Ford’s first attempt at using the intranet as a delivery method for distance learning. The long term possibilities are considerable, however. ‘At the moment we have CD-Rom and Laser-disk based training – but the Internet is fairly new. But because its Internet based, we can potentially deliver training materials to any Ford installation in the world.’

Solstra also provides a flexible framework for Ford to combine existing training media like CD-Rom with the intranet-based materials. This is particularly important for some of the training courses that Ford uses, involving large amounts of training materials. ‘The web also gives Ford a lot more options when it comes to employees making their choices clear. What we have discovered with the web-based systems is that we can use it to help employees decide for themselves how they receive training.’

Distance learning does not necessarily work for everyone so Ford has built in links on the web pages to let people register for classroom training if they wish. Mr. Pestell expects to be able to explore the administration features of Solstra even further – and use it to monitor distribution of training and other sorts of information.

 

Answer the following questions:

1. The result of what is Solstra?

2. How can Solstra be used?

3. What purposes is Ford still testing Solstra for?

4. How can Ford deliver training materials to any its installation in the world?

5. What is particularly important for some of the training courses that Ford uses?

6. How does Mr. Pestell expect to be able to explore the administration features of Solstra?