UDEEEWANA: A new distance education association

UDEEEWANA –United Distance Education For Eastern Europe, Western Asia, Northern Africa- is suggested as a new association for the region Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Baltic, Turkic Republics, Caucasians, Middle East, Arab Peninsula and North Africa which are included the countries such as Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Georgia, Jordan, Hungary, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Morocco, Northern Cyprus Turkish Republic, Norway, Oman, Palestine, Poland, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Syria, Tajikistan, Tatarstan, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and so on.

WHY UDEEEEWANA IS NEEDED?
It is mentioned in the book which is titled as “eLearning Practice…. 2010, that eLearning offers many opportunities for individuals and institutions all over the world. Individuals can access to education they need almost anytime and anywhere they are ready to. Institutions are able to provide more cost effective training to their employees. eLearning context is very important. It is common to find educators who perceive eLearning as internet-only education that encourages a static and content-focused series of text pages on screen. While eLearning started in the early 1970s with mainframe computing, it really didn’t take off until the advent of CD-ROMs and the World Wide Web. Multimedia CD-ROMs in the early 1990s allowed us to develop programs that had color, action, and interactivity. These were a major advance over text on monochrome screens that characterized educational computing in the 1980s.The years of 1990s and 2000s a new learning landscape is a multichannel learning environment that can be seen as a “complex adaptive system”. For the most part, this environment is “self organizing” and because of that it is difficult to exactly predict how it is all going to turn out in the next five years. There is also a trend seen in the transition from training to learning that leverages the power of the Internet to go beyond eLearning through knowledge management, competency management, and performance support and to HR processes like performance management, talent management, succession planning, and hiring. From the Web 2.0 to Web 4.0 (and eLearning 2.0) technologies are driven by collaboration.

Today’s learning and education technology is developing with overwhelmingly what we guess for tomorrow. In those days eLearning technology application changed its structure by combining via new discussion technologies such as mLearning, tLearning and uLearning. Multimedia on the internet, telecommunications, wireless applications, mobile devices, social network software, Web 2.0, Web 4.0 etc are radically redefining the way people obtain information and the way to learn.Policymakers, international organizations, higher education institutions and researchers in the field of education agree that Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) have the potential to stimulate international collaboration, to create flexible learning paths and to open the borders of the university.

Western and Eastern Asian nations are increasingly embracing eLearning in education and training, both within their classrooms and in distance education. E-transformation has been much slower in the education systems of the Eastern Europe, Nordic, Turkic, Middle East, Arab and North African countries. It is, therefore, considered timely to conduct an inquiry into the ways and extent of eLearning in these countries, the factors driving and constraining such developments, and how progress might be further encouraged. Searching the literature, it is possible to find reports, accounts, research findings and conference presentations on eLearning in these countries but many of these are in languages other than English. English language developed in collaboration with colleagues in these various countries and so will be a first and of international significance. Many of the institutions in the countries to be reviewed also make extensive use of traditional teaching and methods and media, so it will not consider for these countries only eLearning and mobile or mLearning in isolation but in blended or mixed-mode learning, both in classroom environments and in distance education.

This project is mentioning the distance education practices in Turkey, and will examine and discuss the role of leadership which should be undertaken by Turkey patronage in the region of Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa regions countries. It is a well-known fact that the international distance education organizations in the world are not well organized and functional in this area or for the regional distance education institutions. And De institutions are not organized up to now in the region of Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa regions countries. To fill this gap, it will be argued that Turkey might have a leadership role in the distance education field in the region and can organize the practices of the regional countries in academy and practice. Based on this argument, the structure of the potential organization and the regulation of the organization will be discussed. And also, the draft of the constitution of the recommended association will be presented, which will be regulated and redesigned in accordance with the others. Thanks to this council, nearly more than 50 countries will have the chance to introduce their distance education practices to the world. Expected these countries can use UDEEEWANA to discuss practical and scientific issues via conferences or journals, and they can even establish sub-distance education associations in their region or in their countries. Some of these countries are Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Georgia, Jordan, Hungary, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Morocco, Norway, Oman, Palestine, Poland, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Syria, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and so on.

Please share with me your valuable thoughts at any level. Since UDEEEWANA will crown with your support and valuable participants.

Prof. Dr. Ugur DEMIRAY,
Founder President of UDEEEWANA

Prof. Dr. Ugur DEMIRAY, Anadolu University, TURKEY

Ugur DEMIRAY is professor of Communication Teaching in the School of Communication Sciences of Anadolu University, Eskisehir, Turkey. He holds Undergraduate B.A. in 1981. And also Ph.D. degree completed at Anadolu University, in May 1986. His researches are dealt with distance education application of Anadolu University, Ministry of Education and by other universities in Turkey. His researches on communicational gaps of distance education students with their institution, also interest also lies towards the profile of distance education students, and relationship of graduates and job market in Turkey. He is also interested about changing of ethical behaviors around the world by inserting technological developments to the educational field especially distance education applications on marketing of distance education programmes and eLearning. In addition, his studies are focused on distance education field and scholarly online journalism especially on DE. He has an extensive experience publishing e-journal on distance education internationally under the patronage Anadolu University since 10 years, named, TOJDE-Turkish Online Journal for Distance Education. TOJDE is a peer-reviewed quarterly e-journal. He is also an editor, consultant editor, reviewer for more than 15 international journals which are deal with distance education and educational technology.
In addition, he has responsibilities on advisory boards and as referee for conferences, symposiums, and panels. He has co-authored and individually contributed chapters in some Turkish and international books. Up to now he has around 15 imprint or eBooks dealt with distance education and many articles, which has been published national and international journals. Currently he has GLOKALde edtor-in-Chief responsibility since 2015 January.
Prof. Dr. Ugur DEMIRAY
Anadolu University Yunusemre Campus 26470-Eskisehir TURKEY
Emails: info@UDEEEWANA.org UDEEEWANA@gmail.com
udemiray@anadolu.edu.tr or udemiray33@gmail.com
URL1: http://www.ugurdemiray.com
URL2: http://www.midasebook.com
URL3: http://tojde.anadolu.edu.tr