TO: Takashi Utsumi
Robert Gordon
Myron Nordquist
Ichiro Watanabe
FROM: Ben I. Haraguchi
Foundation for the Support of the United Nations
RE: Burns Telecommunication Center and Montana State University
Philippine Distance Education Pilot Project
DATE:

I.     MISSION STATEMENT (MONTANA PARTICIPANTS)

The Burns Telecommunication Center ("BTC") was open in February 1997 as a self sustaining, state-of-the-art, multi-purpose, instructional (tele)communications facility at Montana State University ("MSU") to assist individuals, schools, not-for-profit organizations and businesses in using multimedia, telecommunications, and networking technologies to enhance their programs and services. It develops multimedia materials, supports distance learning and training, and provides opportunities for professional development in agriculture, engineering, rural medicine, and business. Its stated goal is to provide new models for distance learning not only to residents of Montana but to peoples all over the world so that they may be able to take advantage of Montana State University for educational and professional development.

By establishing and expanding the internet connections and increasing bandwidth between the United States and the Philippines (and eventually the remainder of the Pacific/South East Asia region), between the United States and Europe (and eventually Africa, Russia, NIS), and between the United States and South America (and eventually Central America and the Caribbean) the participants intend to provide BTC/MSU with the incentive to create and the means to deliver new models of distance learning to peoples all over the world and enable them to take advantage of and earn degrees from Montana State University for educational and professional development.

The purpose of the Philippine Distance Education Pilot Project is to connect the United States and Japan to the Philippines as the first step toward establishing a two-way, broadband digital satellite network for educational, medical, and developmental assistance for the Pacific/South East Asia region. The participants seek to establish and institutionalize available and sustainable distance education program between BTC/MSU and the Philippines Open University to enable students in the Philippines to take distance education courses developed at or recognized by and earn a degree from BTC/MSU. The participants will promote the international exchange of medical knowhow, and establish a new affordable means of providing development training and assistance from the United States to the Philippines and from Japan to the Philippines. With the experience and lessons learned from the Philippines, the participants intend to expand their efforts to other underserved areas of the Pacific/South East Asia region and enlist new partners in this cooperative effort.


II.    BACKGROUND

1.   GENERAL GOALS AND ASSUMPTIONS:

The participants seek to improve the quality and availability of international educational exchange, medical knowhow and development training through the use of telecommunication and information technology. The participants’ goal is to achieve global education, access to medical knowhow and facilitate development training across national boundaries by developing a cooperative infrastructure, in order to utilize and enlarge on existing and developing distance education courses, educational exchange and development assistance programs, and medical knowhow exchanges through telecommunications into a worldwide system. The participants seek ultimately to provide underserved people of the world with access to educational excellence at an affordable price, medical knowhow from the world's finest sources, and development assistance and training. Students will be able to access resources with a far greater variety of educational philosophies, courses, and instructional styles than they could ever encounter on a single campus. Hospitals in underdeveloped areas will be able to arrange for and access diagnostic and surgical services and obtain medical knowhow from leading medical institutions in their own country and throughout the world. And the developed nations will have a means of interfacing and providing development assistance and training to underserved peoples and institutions in a more cost effective manner.

To accelerate the acceptance and expansion of electronic distance education, it will be necessary to provide through the internet at affordable cost both a quality education and a university degree (bachelor, masters, and/or doctoral degree) from accredited universities which degree will be valuable to and desired by the potential recipients. Both the education and the degree most lead to a better and/or more economically rewarding life. Otherwise prospective recipients will not spend the time or monies required to obtain such education and in turn generate the financial returns to the providers and developers thereof necessary to initiate or sustain their efforts. This is especially true when the internet education crosses national boundaries. A foreign degree obtained via the internet must be of value to the recipient either in his/her home country or lead to improve opportunities for him/her abroad.

Higher bandwidth at affordable costs are becoming increasingly available in the United States as commercial enterprises battle to provide high speed data services and conduct commerce over the internet. The costs of modems and the cable/telephone line services or satellite hookups required for increased bandwidth will soon be within reach of many internet users in the United States. With rapid expansion of higher bandwidth use, we expect the development in the United States of improved multimedia educational materials and courses. Educators and commercial developers will soon be able to create educational courses with interactive, high quality audio, 3-D animation, full color, full motion video where students can download materials, study at their own pace until mastery, participate asynchroneously in exchanges with teachers and classmates through e-mail which exchanges have proven to be of quality, and leave for the teacher a written computerized record of the student's participation and performance by which he/she can be evaluated.

Broad bandwidth will be required for the effective use of the internet in telemedicine and to accommodate rapid advances in interactive teleconferencing and the need for high quality audio, graphics, images, full-color, full motion video in providing development training and assistance. Medical services and development assistance can be provided at less cost to any remote area in the World within the broadband satellite digital Internet network serving that region.

2.   BACKGROUND OF GLOSAS/USA AND GLH

This pilot project for the Philippines and the Pacific/South East Asia region is part of a larger effort to establish and/or accelerate development of regional networks for North and South America and for Europe and Africa.

This effort was initiated by The Global Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A. (GLOSAS/USA), a publicly supported, not-for-profit educational organization. GLOSAS/USA is a consortium of organizations dedicated to the use of evolving telecommunications and information technologies to further advance world peace through global communications. GLOSAS/USA fosters science and technology based economic development to improve the quality of life.

Over the past two decades GLOSAS/USA played a major pioneering role in extending U.S. data communication networks to other countries and deregulating Japanese telecommunication policies for the use of e-mail (thanks to help from the late Commerce Secretary, Malcom Baldrige). This triggered the de-monopolization and privatization of the Japanese telecommunication industry. This movement has later been emulated in many other countries. Over 100 countries now have access to internet and 180 have access to e-mail.

Beginning in 1986 GLOSAS/USA organized and conducted a series of worldwide videoconference which came to be called the "Global Lecture Hall" ("GLH")(TM). These conferences originated at university campuses in the U.S., Italy, Brazil and Hungary, and spanned the globe. It employed inexpensive media accessible to less developed countries. These events were characterized by the involvement of participants at many sites, using several media to facilitate interactions among them.

GLOSAS/USA's experience with GLOBAL LECTURE HALL’s worldwide videoconferencing activities over the past 12 years has led to the development of new models for distance education using interactive videoconferences with various delivery technologies and several teacher training workshops to develop countrywide or region based electronic universities around the world. GLOSAS/USA organized The Consortium for Affordable and Accessible Distance Education ("CAADE") comprised of educational institutions, government and quasi-government agencies, foundations and corporation to develop and demonstrate new high performance electronic communications infrastructures which combine the efficiency and affordability of computer mediated multimedia systems via plain old telephone service ("POTS"), low to medium speed terrestrial internet, wireless telecommunications, satellite broadcasting and computer conferencing technologies.

A GLH videoconference was held on October 21, 1998 from Manaus, Brazil. This GLH demonstrated the feasibility of connecting the Amazons with all of South America, Japan, the United States, Finland and Ukraine via AMAZONSAT and the Internet, reviewed current trends in Web Teaching, HDTV, SDTV, multicasting, digital data transfer via terrestrial wireless, and two-way, broadband digital medical diagnosis and surgical training through the use of HDTV. As an outgrowth of this GLH and as a pilot project for South and Central America and the Caribbean, GLOSAS/USA is currently exploring with SIVAM their desire to establish a broadband digital satellite network in Brazil for medical use. This network will be similar to the two-way broadband digital network developed by the Medical Information Network by Communication Satellite for University Hospitals ("MINCS-UH") at Tokyo University which currently connects 20 (soon to be expanded to 30) University Hospitals in Japan.

In August at the next GLH in Tampere, Finland, Dr. Robert Rodrigues of the Pan American Health Organization will lead a group to brainstorm the establishment of a two-way broadband (45 Mbps) digital satellite network for medical and other uses to serve North, Central, and South America and the Caribbean. Dr. Tapio Varis, of the University of Tampere will lead a group to brainstorm establishment of a broadband satellite network in the African region. Ben I. Haraguchi, President of the Foundation for the Support of the United Nations, Inc. ("FSUN") will lead a group to brainstorm establishment of such a network in the Pacific/South East Asia region beginning with the Philippines.

3.    RFP FROM THE PHILIPPINES

In June 1998 the Institute of International Relations ("IIE") received the following RFP from the University of the Philippines Open University ("UPOU"):

The University of the Philippines Open University
Telecommunications, Information Technology and Telehealth Network

The TITAN Project

Background

The University of the Philippines Open University was set up to accomplish three main objectives: democratize access to quality higher education; develop a system of continuing professional education; and contribute towards upgrading the quality of residential instruction in the university by developing innovative instructional materials and technology. It is clear that a well designed and appropriate telecommunications and information technology infrastructure support is the only way to realize these goals. Also the UPOU has long term plans in telehealth and multimedia learning and these would need other special requirements. The UPOU would therefore like to establish a comprehensive, system compatible and flexible network to cater to these varied needs. At the present state, the UPOP receives most of its support from the government and as such we cannot afford to make the wrong choices. A feasibility study which would entail the following would assist the UPOU in this endeavor:

1. Evaluate the telecommunication industry of the Philippines in relation to instructional delivery.
2. Identify a pool of consultants who shall help the UPOU meet its needs in telecommunication, information technology and telehealth technology.
3. Conduct an industry scan to determine the array of technologies which can be used for the delivery and administration of open and distance leaning in the Philippines.
4. Undertake an assessment to determine the most appropriate technology for the open and distance learning programs of the UPOU.
5. Assess the human resource development requirements which would enable UPOU to utilize alternative educational technologies.
6. Assist in preparing a list of institutions and firms which could provide required facilities and financing.
7. To draft a master plan for a telecommunications, information technology and telehealth network for the UPOU.
8. Establish a tie-up with a US institution which shall be able to assist the UPOU in maximizing the network capabilities.
9. Do a pilot demonstration of the designed network.
10. Computer delivered courses Multimedia Learning Materials Production Telehealth Laboratory evaluate the results of this pilot demonstration.

Strategies

The project will be implemented in phases and will last for a year. The phases are divided according to the following:

Countrywide assessment and evaluation                                         2 months
Systems Design                                                                                     1 month
Pilot Demonstration                                                                               7 months

Sustainability

The project shall have the following sources of funding in the after completion of the feasibility study:

University of the Phils. funds

Dept. of Transportation and Communication
Dept. of Science and Technology
Dept. of Health
Commission on Higher Education

These agencies are all stakeholder of the open and distance learning programs of the UPOU as such a portion of their budget has already been set for their continuing education projects. A cooperative fund from these agencies can very well provide the financial support to sustain this telecom-IT network.

Budgetary needs

Assessment, Evaluation and Systems Design                                 $450,000
Pilot Demonstration                                                                                $350,000

4.    CALL FOR COLLABORATION

Upon receipt of the RFP, Robert Gordon of the Institute for International Education ('IIE") reached out to GLOSAS/USA and FSUN, who in turn reached out to the Burns Telecommunication Center and Montana State University to organize a collaborative effort to respond to UPOU's RFP. The Philippine Distance Education Project (PDEP") addresses the need for international assistance and collaboration identified in the RFP and is not intended to be a proposal in response to the RFP. In particular PDEP will address the following needs:

a. establish a tie-up with US and Japanese institutions which shall be able to assist the UPOU in maximizing its international network capabilities;

b. do a pilot demonstration of its designed international network;

c. international delivery over the computer and the Internet of multimedia learning materials, medical diagnostic services, and development training.

5.    THE INTERNET AND BROADBAND SATELLITE NETWORKS IN JAPAN

The inter-university Internet in Japan has a backbone bandwidth of 45 Mbps, extends to Thailand, and is currently connected to the United States at 45 Mbps. The U.S. connection will be upgraded to 165 Mbps in April of 1999 and will provide an affordable means of conveying educational materials, medical services, and developmental assistance intended for the Philippines between the United States and Japan with the United States and/or Japan serving as the relay station(s) to the Philippines.

The network center for the Medical Information Network by Communication Satellite for University Hospitals ("MINCS-UH") at the University of Tokyo connects more than two dozen university hospitals around Japan with two-way broadband (45 Mbps) digital satellite channels for medical diagnosis with HDTV. The total cost of the system was about US$40-60 million with each receive/transmit earth station costing about $1 million. Current usage rate at each station is about 3 - 6 times a month. The network center for Space Collaborative System ("SCS") at the National Institute of Multimedia Education ("NIME") in Chiba Prefecture, Japan connects about 50 (soon to expand to 100) universities in Japan with two way broadband (1.5 Mbps) digital satellite channels. The total cost of this system was about US$100 million with each receive/transmit earth station costing about $2 million. Though currently not connected to the Internet, both MINCS-UH and SCS with digital HDTV can be made compatible with and incorporated into the Internet.

In addition the Japan Foundation/Japanese Language Institute has a network of earth stations with an analog satellite covering Far East Asia and the Pacific Rim countries.

At present a broadband connection between Japan and the Philippines does not exist. Neither MINCS-UH nor the SCS satellites have the footprints to reach the Philippines today. A large satellite dish (at a cost of approximately $10,000,000) may be required in Manila to establish broadband Internet satellite connection between Japan and the Philippines.

6.   THE UNITED STATES AND THE PHILIPPINE, WITH THE UNITED STATES AS A RELAY STATION FOR JAPAN:

[Mark Andrews:

Pls insert one or two para here -- referring to the Hawaiian Interests below.]


III.   MISSION STATEMENT

1.    JAPANESE PARTICIPANTS

By establishing and expanding the internet connections and increasing bandwidth between Japan and the Philippines (and eventually the remainder of the Pacific/South East Asia region), the participants intend to provide the Japanese University Hospitals, Universities and ODA providing institutions and government agencies the incentive to create and the means to deliver to the people of the Philippines medical diagnostic services, Japanese language instruction, and development training through the Internet in a new affordable manner. With the experience and lessons learned from the Philippines, the participants intend to expand these efforts to other underserved areas of the Pacific/South East Asia region and enlist new partners in this cooperative effort. Specific interests of Japanese could be;

1.1 The technical knowhow of the currently existing, excellent broadcasting technology with HDTV (e.g., MINCS-UH or SCS) can be exported to various overseas countries.

1.2 Japanese ODA funds can be utilized for necessary equipment of this system which will be manufactured by Japanese electronic companies and which will be donated to participating parties. The necessary satellite transponders over the Pacific are also to be provided by the Japanese ODA. This will then stimulate Japanese economy and promote Japanese image in overseas countries.

1.3 As working together with Americans, Japanese can learn from Americans how to incorporate Internet into the broadband digital satellite networks. On the other hand, American can learn from Japanese on the broadband digital broadcasting via satellite. This is the cross pollination and -fertilization of their technologies each other to produce a hybrid technology.

1.4 Japanese and Americans can jointly produce multimedia coursewares.

1.5 Students of participating countries around the Pacific can receive any courses from the educational institutions of those countries.

1.6 Active or retired teachers can teach their students in participating countries from their offices or homes.

1.7 This project will provide Japanese with a hope to lead the global knowledge society, and thus, in turn, making them to be global citizens.

2.   INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION (IIE)

[To be filled in by Bob Gordon -- with IIE’s extensive networks of educational institutions around the world.]

3.   HAWAIIAN PARTICIPANTS

[Mark Andrews:
Pls insert here your summary descriptions how your Hawaiian colleagues can provide their services once when our proposed broadband Internet network around the Pacific/Asia will be established, as collecting one or two para each from the designated persons of following organizations -- particularly, pls emphasize the important location of Maui as a hub of this proposed network for technical information on the availability of broadband for educational, medical and developmental training purposes.

3.1  Maui Community College

G. Robert (Bob) Converse -- particularly on the vocational training courses.

3.2  Maui Research and Technology Center

Tom Wright -- on the web teaching materials, availability of conference rooms for face-to-face mtgs (which is very important for initiating successful distance education courses).

3.3  PEACESAT

Norman H. Okamura and/or Christina Higa -- hard track record of distance education via satellite, particularly on recent digital data transmissions.

3.4  Maui High Performance Computing Center (MHPCC)

Robert E. Dant -- availability of broadband Internet from the mainland and of super computer capability for many of research collaborations.

3.5  Pacific Disaster Center

Mont J. Smith -- track record of disaster management with gaming/simulation approach, particularly with typhoon in Philippines.

3.6  Center of Excellence in Disaster Management & Humanitarian Assistance

Robin Hayden and/or David G. Haut -- with Army’s involvement in civilian sector.

3.7  Information Systems Support, Inc.

Victoria Garshnek -- availability of telemedicine and healthcare information.

3.8  University of Hawaii/Curriculum Research & Development Group

Donald B. Young and/or John H. Southworth -- availability of curriculums for K-12.