Reducing the distance in distance education

Abstract: Tutor Marked Assignments (TMAs) are the major mechanism by which OpenUniversity (OU) students receive feedback on their academic progress. Thispaper shows how the OU has used ICT to improve both the quality of feedbackand speed of response to student work, reduce feelings of isolation and make theuniversity seem less remote. The paper examines the system for onlinesubmission and return of TMAs, their on-screen marking, and the automatedprocessing of scores and feedback. It shows how the...