The International Council for Distance Education (ICDE) announced at the close of this year’s conference in Sun City, South Africa, that its next conference will be held at the Sheraton Centre in Toronto between 17-19 October, 2017. The host will be Contact North/Contact Nord and Maxim Jean-Louis, its President – CEO, will be the President of the Organizing Committee of the 27th World Conference.
ICDE
The International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE) is a global membership organization and provides leadership in open education, flexible, online and distance learning, including e-learning. Its members include stakeholders working in educational institutions, school authorities and the commercial sector, as well as individuals. ICDE has a formal consultative status with UNESCO and promotes the core value of UNESCO: the universal right to education for all. To support this ideal, ICDE relies on the unique knowledge and experience of its members around the world, in terms of development and use of new methodologies and emerging technologies.
ICDE was founded in Canada in 1938 as the International Council for Correspondence Education. Today it has worldwide members in more than 60 countries.
The ICDE Permanent Secretariat has been located in Oslo, Norway since 1988. ICDE receives funding from the Ministry of Education and Research of Norway and from membership fees.
For more information about ICDE, please visit the website at www.icde.org.
Contact North
Contact North/Contact North was established in 1986 by the Government of Ontario. A key component of its activities is to provide residents of the province equitable access to postsecondary education and training opportunities through its 112 centers of online learning, often located in remote communities without any post-secondary educational campuses.
Thus Ontario students have the ability to participate through Contact North/Contact Nord in online courses and programs, in French and English, from Ontario’s 24 public colleges, 22 public universities and 250 literacy providers, as well as access basic skills training, without having to leave their community. Contact North/Contact Nord’s headquarters are in Thunder Bay and in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada.
For more information about Contact North/Contact Nord, please visit its websites at teachonline.ca/home and studyonline.ca/
Further information
I first came to Canada in 1982 to attend the ICDE conference in Vancouver. It was at this conference that it changed its name from ‘Correspondence’ to ‘Distance’. These conferences enable one to get a very good oversight of the world of distance education.
I will be providing updates as more information about the conference becomes available.
Dr. Tony Bates is the author of eleven books in the field of online learning and distance education. He has provided consulting services specializing in training in the planning and management of online learning and distance education, working with over 40 organizations in 25 countries. Tony is a Research Associate with Contact North | Contact Nord, Ontario’s Distance Education & Training Network.
