Page 34 - Universitas Terbuka Center of Excellence In Asia 2010 and The World 2020 (A Journey Towards a Leading Open and Distance Education Institution 1984-2008)

Signing the promotio n document
of the firs t Rector of UT

In the mind of the politicians, decision makers, President and the Minister
of Education and Culture, UT was expected to use satellite Palapa (Television

and Radio) for delivering the courses. After seeing the United Kingdom Open
University (UKOU) in Milton Keynes , Great Britain, operated, the Minister thought

that Indonesia was not able to carry out DE like in UKOU , because they used
·sophisticated and expensive technology especially television technolo·gy which

was used in UKOU supported by British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) . He
had another determination that UT had to be immediately opened, because if not,

there were too many students within the college age group that would be
unemployed and not be accommodated in the universities. He also realized that

in the developing country like Indonesia, it was not television that became the
main medium to deliver the courses, but printed course materials, thus television

was only used as supporting media.

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