Developing New Working Methods in Medium Cycle Higher Education: A Preliminary Study for an Ecological Approach to Learning

This paper outlines the intentions of a research and development project running from January 2011until July 2014. The project, called FlexVid, aims at developing new structures and working methods for university college education. The intentions are 1) to make it easier for students to join and complete a higher education study, independently of the geographic, social and cultural distance from their home 2) to intensify collaboration between the university college and local enterprises. ICT-based satellites are supposed to facilitate a close collaboration with local enterprises and authorities and reinforce the integration of current issues from every-day life in the enterprises into the educational programs. To do this, we need 3) to rethink the way teachers and students usually work and intensify the problem based approach in the educational programs.