6. Open Learning — An Opportunity for Growth or a Case of Paradigm Lost?

The ways in which the Manpower Services Commission (MSC) intends to move towards “an organismic commonality of value directions” (i.e. once people open themselves up to an experience, they discover others of like mind who are able both to support and reinforce them in their own development) are outlined. The MSC needs to ask their students the kind of questions that help them make their experience explicit and thereby make it accessible and open to others. A model is presented that can give a clue as to how to present open learning material to potential students to evaluate what is an offer and what is possible. Quality can only be appreciated and not experienced. It is a function of what is best for an individual in a particular context. It is a unique interaction between what is best from the provider's point of view, what is best from the learner's point of view and what is best in the particular context in which the material will be used.