Advanced Distributed Learning

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ADL (Advanced Distributed Learning) The ADL Initiative was launched in 1997 through the sponsorship of the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as a public-private sector partnership to harness the power of common web-based technology standards in order to stimulate rapid growth of a dynamic knowledge economy. The ADL Vision is to provide access to the highest quality education and training, tailored to individual needs, delivered cost-effectively anywhere and anytime.

It was thought that widespread adoption of open-architecture standards would provide large-scale efficiencies in production and distribution of reusable learning content that would drive-down costs to users while increasing quality. Predictions of efficiency and effectiveness were derived from prior studies of interactive instruction and use of one-on-one tutors which have demonstrated a "two sigma shift" in learner performance. Within DOD use of ADL was expected to reduce the cost of thousands of "high driver" military courses by one third, thereby reducing the cost of individual training in DOD by $5 billion per year.

SCORM is the current specification of the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative and a mandatory requirement for the design, development and management of Department of Defense (DOD) courseware development efforts. The Office of the Secretary of Defense has established several ADL Co-Labs to support cooperative development of common standards, tools, guidelines and promote sharing of reusable content. SCORM was developed as a result of extensive collaboration across the public and private sectors. President Clinton issued an Executive Order identifying ADL as the model other Federal Agencies should follow in developing and distributing online learning in the Federal Government. DOD subsequently issued a Directive requiring the military to adopt SCORM. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the Department of Labor (DOL) have also assumed major roles in promoting use of ADL and the SCORM standard. Several major information technology companies have adopted SCORM into their commercial products and services. Many other countries are also actively pursuing wide-spread use of ADL SCORM.

Several significant challenges must be overcome before the ADL Initiative can realize its vision and goals. Some of these include:

(1) A basic premise of ADL is that (most) knowledge can be readily codified in more or less static form that can be efficiently tagged, stored, accessed, distributed and tailored to individual learner needs, anywhere and anytime. This assumption tends to overlook the dynamic nature of knowledge and the potential for significant variance in the individual learner's situation, aptitude, culture and context. It also reduces the focus on learning to individuals rather than teams and organizations. The Global War on Terrorism, which is known for its inherently unpredictable asymmetric threat, is causing DOD and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to shift the focus from individual performance to the adaptive behavior of complex dynamic teams.

(2) A much more efficient approach is needed for designing, developing and distributing high quality learning content that can be tailored to individual needs. The traditional ISD model implemented by courseware developers is far too time consuming and expensive. It is difficult to quickly access and efficiently re-use modular pieces of ADL SCORM because of lack of a common instructional strategies and taxonomies.

(3) The slow pace and high cost of developing "sharable content objects" has resulted in a paucity of ADL compliant courseware. Similarly, the slow pace and high cost of developing the SCORM standard has caused the Advanced Distributed Learning Initiative to fall behind other faster moving web-based learning tools and environments such as massively multi-player online games, podcasts and virtual worlds.

(4) The design and functionality of the current generation of Learning Management Systems (LMS) makes it difficult to share critical information about the learner across stove-piped LMS environments. The cost model for LMS vendors tends to reinforce organizational stove-pipes rather than enabling a more open and dynamic learning environment.

The current direction of the ADL Initiative appears unclear. There are indications that the ADL sponsors in the DOD plan to transition the SCORM standards work to an international organization such as LETSI who intend to charge a fee of $10,000 (US) to participate and they also intend to obtain commercial rights for the intellectual property that stems from the extensive public-private sector collaborative development of standards. Others are advocating a transition of the ADL Initiative from government control to entrepreneurs and innovators in the private sector who are in a better position to collaborate openly in order to accelerate the rapid development of a dynamic Global Knowledge Market.