High costs and logistical problems can keep people from attending important centralized training activities. But if you can't take the trainee to the workshop, why not bring the workshop to the trainee?

An AVSC workshop showed that videoconferencing is an exciting way to make training activities more accessible to more people. In videoconferencing, individuals or groups in different locations communicate through audiovisual equipment that is connected to a satellite or to telephone lines. It creates a "virtual" reality of being in the same room for people who may be physically very far away from one another.

An AVSC Experience

AVSC was invited by the North Carolina Department of Environment, Health and Natural Resources to conduct a workshop on counseling for sterilization on April 8. The workshop, which was held at the School of Public Health in Chapel Hill, was simultaneously videoconferenced to 10 sites around the state. Nearly 100 people participated.

As this was AVSC's first experience with videoconferenced training, a great deal of preparation was involved beyond what normally goes into a face-to-face training. We had to do research to learn what modifications had to be applied not only to our training curriculum and materials, but also to the routine responsibilities of the trainer.

For example, we learned that a number of our visual aids had to be redone to fit a new format. We also needed to determine the responsibilities of the trainer and the technical staff and to prepare instructions for site facilitators on how to conduct "off-line" activities.

Videoconferenced training requires exactness in the instructional design: there is little leeway for the trainer to recover from mistakes or to change teaching methods or content in midstream. About 5 to 10 percent more time must be added to training to allow for the alternation (or switching) between originating and conferenced sites. These breaks in transmission are programmed into the training session.

Looking Toward the Future

Trainers can do almost everything via videoconferencing they can do in a classroom. By adjusting to the demands of the technology, they can create the same successful learning experience.

In the United States alone, as many as 40,000 videoconferencing centers exist, including universities, major medical centers, businesses, and major telephone carriers. These institutions have made the initial investments for equipment and network installations, which is where the bulk of videoconferencing costs lies. Organizations like AVSC can then purchase videoconferencing time from them. Establishing partnerships with institutions that have videoconferencing capability may be a next step for AVSC in distance learning.

Phyllis Butta is the quality services advisor for AVSC International's programs in the U.S., Canada, and Eastern Europe. Ellen Eiseman is the training programs advisor for AVSC International.