disruption

If the vision of the “Web3” comes to fruition, how might these developments impact the future of lifelong learning? [Christian]

On 12/13/2021, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Asia, Australia, Blockchain, Canada, career development, change, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, copyright/ownership/NFTs, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, cryptocurrencies, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, disruption, education technology, emerging technologies, entrepreneurship, Europe, experimentation, Facebook / Meta Platforms, faculty, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, higher education, ideas, India, innovation, instructional design, internet, IT in HE, K-12 related, law schools, learner profiles, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, lifelong learning, Metaverse, Michigan, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, online learning, online media, skills, society, staying relevant, streams of content, surviving, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, tools, training / L&D, UK, United States, vendors, web-based collaboration, Web3, by Daniel Christian

The next age of the internet could suck power away from Big Tech while living on the same backbone as cryptocurrencies. Here’s what to know about Web3. — from businessinsider.com by Katie Canales

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

Web3 is the next generation of the internet and will exist on the blockchain.
It will be decentralized, meaning it won’t be controlled entities like Facebook or Google.
Twitter, GameStop, Reddit, and VC firm a16z are all putting resources into building Web3.

…

One aspect of the metaverse is that users will hopefully be able to go virtually from platform to platform with one single account — just like we will in Web3.

And NFTs, one-of-a-kind tokens representing your ownership of a virtual good, could be more easily bought and sold with cryptocurrencies within a space like Web3.

From DSC:
How might “Web3” translate into the future of lifelong learning? Here’s one vision/possibility:

Each person would have a learner profile/account that could seamlessly log into multiple education/training providers’ platforms and services. The results of that learning could be stored in one’s cloud-based learner profile. This type of next-generation learning platform would still need subject matter experts, instructional designers, programmers, and other team members. But the focus would be on building skills — skills that an artificial intelligence-backed interface would demonstrate are currently being requested by the modern workplace. This constantly-being-updated list of skills could then link to the learning-related experiences and resources that people could choose from in order to develop those skills.

The following vision/graphic also comes to my mind:

The Disruption Of Legal Services Is Here — from forbes.com by John Arsneault

Excerpt:

For the first time in those 12 years, I am now convinced we are on the precipice of the promised disruption in legal. Not because anyone in the law firms are driving toward this — but because venture capital and tech innovators have finally turned their attention to the industry.

Legal services are a much smaller overall market than, say, retail, financial services or biotech. In the world of disruption and the promised gold rush for the companies that do the disrupting, size matters. Legal has just been low on the industry list. Its number is now up.

It’s easy to Monday morning quarterback that industry now. Easy to see how big of a threat Amazon was to those companies. But when you are being rewarded for doing what you have always done and what your predecessors always did, it’s easy to miss what is around the bend. By the time those companies’ executives realized Amazon was a direct competitor with a much better fulfillment model, it was too late.

Discovery Education Collaborates with AWS to Enhance Recommendation Engine — from discoveryeducation.com

Excerpt:

SILVER SPRING, MD [On Monday,?September 27, 2021] — Discovery Education—a worldwide edtech leader supporting learning wherever it takes place — announced that it has enhanced its K-12 learning platform with Amazon Web Services (AWS) machine learning capabilities. The pioneering use of machine learning within the Discovery Education platform helps educators spend less time searching for digital resources and more time teaching.
…
Several months of planning and deep collaboration with AWS enabled Discovery Education to innovatively integrate Amazon Personalize technology into the “Just For You” area of its K-12 platform. The “Just For You” row connects educators to a unique, personalized set of resources based on the grade level taught, preferences, and assets used in the past.

“For some time, educators have desired more resources to help personalize teaching and learning. ML technology is already being used to curate our entertainment experiences, help with workforce productivity, and more, and it’s exciting to see this innovation is being integrated into classrooms,” said Alec Chalmers, Director, EdTech and GovTech Markets at AWS.

From DSC:
It looks like Amazon continues to make inroads into the education space. Team up this type of recommendation engine with an AI that’s pulling the latest skills that are needed for — and embedded within — job descriptions and you have a learning powerhouse.

Disruption ahead…?

Also see:

How Machine Learning Is Having an Impact on Education — from techlearning.com by Erik Ofgang
Discovery Education has partnered with Amazon Web Services to enhance its platform with machine learning. It’s one of many ways machine learning is being used in K-12 today.

Could Coursera become as prestigious as Harvard? This expert thinks so. [Young]

On 09/20/2021, in 21st century, change, changing business models, colleges, community colleges, disruption, future of higher education, higher education, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, lifelong learning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, online learning, by Daniel Christian

Could Coursera become as prestigious as Harvard? This expert thinks so. — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young

Excerpt:

Big changes are coming to higher education, and those changes will be bigger and more disruptive than many college leaders realize as online education grows in both size and prestige.

That’s the view of Arthur Levine, in a new book called “The Great Upheaval: Higher Education’s Past, Present, and Uncertain Future,” which he co-wrote with Scott Van Pelt, a lecturer and associate director of the Communication Program for the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

As more students turn to these degrees for their credentials, they may come to see these corporate platforms as the provider of learning rather than worry about which college is the one behind the scenes doing the teaching, Levine says.

Interesting…LearnWorlds: Create & sell online courses from your own website

On 07/12/2021, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adjunct faculty, career development, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, entrepreneurship, experimentation, faculty, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, ideas, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, new business models, online learning, online media, passions, platforms, society, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, tools, training / L&D, trends, United States, vendors, vision/possibilities, workplace, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
While checking out an edition of innovation & tech today, the following sites caught me eye.

LearnWorlds looks intriguing to me. It will be interesting to see how teachers, professors, trainers, instructional designers, artists, coaches, and more make their living in the future. I’m pulse-checking the area of learning platforms and posting items re: it so that we can stay informed on these trends.

Also from LearnWorlds:

27 Best Online Learning Platforms

Also see:

Thinkific’s powerful, all-in-one platform makes it easy to share your knowledge, grow your audience, and scale the business you already love.

Coursera: The ‘Amazon’ Of Online Education May Grow By Magnitudes — from seekingalpha.com

Summary

Increasing student dissatisfaction and declining enrollment suggest that many people are rethinking traditional methods of higher education.
The historical value of universities is becoming defunct as the internet allows a more efficient, less expensive, and more accessible vector of transmitting knowledge.
Innovative platforms like Coursera offer students a huge “marketplace” of high-quality courses far less expensive than those in traditional universities.
Given Coursera’s minimal barriers to growth and its massive total addressable market, I would not be surprised to see its annual revenue rise by 10X or more within years.
COUR may be one of the few recent IPOs which is actually trading below its fundamental fair value – subject to the assumption that online education will eventually supersede traditional models.

The Next Great Disruption Is Hybrid Work—Are We Ready? — from Microsoft

“Over the past year, no area has undergone more rapid transformation than the way we work. Employee expectations are changing, and we will need to define productivity much more broadly — inclusive of collaboration, learning, and wellbeing to drive career advancement for every worker, including frontline and knowledge workers, as well as for new graduates and those who are in the workforce today. All this needs to be done with flexibility in when, where, and how people work.”

Satya Nadella, CEO at Microsoft

Also see:

What executives are saying about the future of hybrid work — from mckinsey.com by Andrea Alexander, Rich Cracknell, Aaron De Smet, Meredith Langstaff, Mihir Mysore, and Dan Ravid.
What’s next for consumers, workers, and companies in the post-COVID-19 recovery — from mckinsey.com by Susan Lund, Anu Madgavkar, Jan Mischke, and Jaana Remes
For mothers in the workplace, a year (and counting) like no other — from mckinsey.com by Jess Huang, Alexis Krivkovich, Ishanaa Rambachan, and Lareina Yee

Evolving Instruction in a Rapidly Changing World [Sheninger]

On 05/31/2021, in disruption, education, education reform, education technology, ideas, instructional design, K-12 related, pedagogy, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, youth, by Daniel Christian

Evolving Instruction in a Rapidly Changing World — from esheninger.blogspot.com by Eric Sheninger

Excerpts:

In Chapter 3 of Disruptive Thinking in Our Classrooms, I lay out tried and true strategies to consider during any direct instruction component of a lesson while setting the stage for learning that empowers students to think disruptively by replacing conventional ideas with innovative solutions to authentic problems. Below is a summary of things to consider as you plan out your instructional design:

One wonders what this type of tech will do for online-based learning, &/or hybrid/blended learning, &/or hyflex-based learning in the future [Christian]

On 05/24/2021, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, attention, collaboration, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, disruption, distance education, education technology, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, Google, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), hybrid learning, ideas, innovation, K-12 related, law schools, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, liberal arts, more voice more choice more control, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, online learning, online media, platforms, remote teaching and learning, smart classrooms, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, society, student-related, telecommunications, telelegal, telemedicine / telehealth / virtual health, telepresence, television, tools, training / L&D, United States, universities, usability, user experience (UX), vendors, videoconferencing, Virtual courts and law firms, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, visualizing information, vocational / trades, web-based collaboration, webinars, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
It will be interesting to see — post Covid19 — how vendors and their platforms continue to develop to allow for even greater degrees of web-based collaboration. I recently saw this item re: what Google is doing with their Project Starline. Very interesting indeed. Google is trying to make it so that the other person feels like they are in the same space with you.

.
Time will tell what occurs in this space...but one does wonder what this type of technology will do for online-based learning, and/or hybrid/blended learning, and/or hyflex-based learning in the future…?

A second demographic cliff adds to urgency for change — from insidehighered.com by Ray Schroeder
The demographic cliff we have been anticipating since the drop in births with the 2008 recession now has a younger sibling — the COVID-19 cliff is coming with another deep drop in recent births.

Excerpts:

In sum, competition is rapidly growing; the pool of “traditional” students is evaporating; employers are dropping degree requirements; and, with student debt now surpassing $1.7 trillion, we all know that families are looking for more cost-effective paths to the knowledge and skills they seek. “The fundamental business model for delivering education is broken,” said Rick Beyer, a senior fellow and practice area lead for mergers and affiliations at the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges. “The consolidation era started a few years ago. It will continue. We will see more closures.”

What, then, are the bright spots for postsecondary learning?

Online learning tops the list despite some bad press for the hastily put-together remote learning of last year. Adult students, in particular, prefer the flexibility and mobility of online. Enrollment in online programs has continued to increase while overall higher ed enrollments have declined each of the past dozen years.

Why Tech Companies View the Job Search As Big Business — from edsurge.com by Ayesha Khan

Excerpt:

A pre-pandemic study shows that more than 4 in 10 college degree holders are underemployed and are likely to remain that way for decades to come. This coupled with the astronomical cost of college and mounting student loan debt raises a need for alternative pathways into America’s workforce. The current college system is not putting all Americans to work.
…

Jobtech has the potential to be more effective for job seekers by aligning their aspirations more directly with the needs of employers. Unlike higher education institutions, a jobtech company’s profit and survival depend on people getting placed in good jobs.
…
The success of these businesses hinges on securing opportunities for job seekers. This guarantees customer satisfaction, repeat business, positive margins and a healthy, sustainable business model.

Reflections on “5 Ways to Marry Higher Ed to Work” [Schaffhauser]

On 04/11/2021, in business, career development, change, changing business models, collaboration, colleges, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, curriculum, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, history, ideas, innovation, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, society, training / L&D, trends, United States, universities, vocational / trades, workplace, by Daniel Christian

5 Ways to Marry Higher Ed to Work — from campustechnology.com by Dian Schaffhauser

Excerpts:

Treat employers as customers.
Move beyond the idea of the bachelor degree as the end-all.
Link coursework with competences.
Develop a “shared vocabulary of skills” that can be used by employers and peer institutions.
Design for equity and inclusion.

From DSC:
It’s great to see more articles like this that promote further collaboration — and less siloing — between the worlds of higher education and the workplace.

My guess is that those traditional institutions of higher education who change/adapt quickly enough have a much greater chance at surviving (and even thriving). Those that don’t will have a very rough road ahead. They will be shadows of what they once were — if they are even able to keep their doors open.

Disruption is likely ahead — especially if more doors to credentialing continue to open up and employers hire based on those skills/credentials. One can feel the changing momentums at play. The tide has been turning for the last several years now (history may show the seeds of change were planted in times that occurred much longer ago).

More Employers Are Awarding Credentials. Is A Parallel Higher Education System Emerging? — from edsurge.com by Sean Gallagher and Holly Zanville

Excerpt:

As the acceptance of new types of credentials grows, a number of employers have become learning providers in their own right, in a way that could shake up the broader higher education landscape.

A growing number of companies have moved beyond training their own employees or providing tuition assistance programs to send staff members to higher education. Many of these employers are also developing their own curricula and rapidly expanding their publicly-facing credential offerings.

But the current boom in employer-issued credentials is different—and potentially transformational. Unlike the traditional IT certifications of decades past, these new credentials are less focused on proprietary technologies related to a given tech vendor, and are instead more focused on broadly applicable tech skill sets such as IT support, cloud computing and digital marketing.

It’s Time to Rethink Higher Education: What if our goal was creating social impact, not preserving the status quo? — from chronicle.com by Brian Rosenberg (president emeritus of Macalester College and president in residence of the Harvard Graduate School of Education)

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

Higher education should in its ideal form lead to more economic security for more people, a more equitable and innovative society, and a well-functioning democracy. Add whatever goals you would like, but these seem like a reasonable starting point and, given the present state of the country, more than a little aspirational.
…
But if we fail to explore — if we fail to go beyond superficial change and interrogate our most fundamental assumptions about how and what we teach, how and why we organize ourselves in the current way — we will have no one but ourselves to blame if the system as we know it shrivels to the point where it collapses from within or is painfully disrupted from without.

Also see:

The Pandemic May Have Permanently Altered Campuses. Here’s How. — from chronicle.com by Francie Diep
Trends accelerated by Covid-19 may make more sense than ever in the future, experts say.

Excerpt:

The Covid-19 crisis has transformed all aspects of higher education, and the physical campus is no exception. The Chronicle recently released a special report, Rethinking Campus Spaces, that offers strategies for doing more with less space, to save money and prepare for an uncertain future. Here is an adapted excerpt from the report.

The Chronicle asked more than 40 architects, campus planners, and leaders in student life and housing about how several categories of campus spaces might look different in the future. As colleges navigate difficult financial straits, many interviewees predicted more public-private partnerships, and renovations instead of new construction — which can be less costly and more environmentally friendly. Overall, their answers paint a picture of future campuses that are more adaptable, perhaps smaller, and focused on what’s most valuable about seeing one’s peers in person.

Reflections on “Today’s Teens Questioning the Status Quo When It Comes to College” [prnewswire.com]

On 03/05/2021, in 21st century, Alternatives, business side of he, career development, change, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, entrepreneurship, experimentation, faculty, future of higher education, game-changing environment, generational differences, higher education, innovation, leadership, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, organizational change, parents/guardians, reinvent, society, staying relevant, strategy, student-related, surviving, traditional / tradition, United States, universities, vendors, youth, by Daniel Christian

Today’s Teens Questioning the Status Quo When It Comes to College — from prnewswire.com by with thanks to Ryan Craig for this resource
National survey finds high schoolers want lower-cost, quicker paths to careers: 50 percent are open to something other than a four-year degree

Excerpt:

For those who have been following the discussion, it will not come as a shock that this demographic is extremely concerned about the cost of higher education. In fact, the number one thing teens would change about college is the price tag. Their second top concern is making sure the path they take directly connects them to a future career. Specifically, the top three things Gen Z teens are most concerned about:

50 percent—graduating with a high amount of debt
44 percent—not getting a job after they graduate
40 percent—not being prepared for a job after school ends

From DSC:
I sometimes use the tag “surviving” and it often has to do with individuals and families. But over the last few years, I have found myself using it for institutions of traditional higher education (as I did for this posting).

It’s time for reinvention if we want those institutions to survive. Those who can’t wait until the status quo returns are likely in for a disappointment, if not outright shock. Over the last several years, many people have already lost their jobs throughout higher ed, positions have gone unfilled, and early retirement offers were made (and often snatched up). The headcounts have been decreasing for years and the workloads have increased for the survivors of such cuts. The use of adjunct faculty members has been on the increase for many years now.

Those institutions that have cultures that support experimentation, innovation, and support strategic, nimble, entrepreneurial thinking have a better chance of surviving.

Learning Ecosystems

The Disruption Of Legal Services Is Here [Arsneault]

Could Coursera become as prestigious as Harvard? This expert thinks so. [Young]

Coursera: The ‘Amazon’ Of Online Education May Grow By Magnitudes [seekingalpha.com]

The Next Great Disruption Is Hybrid Work—Are We Ready? [Microsoft] + 3 items from McKinsey.com

A second demographic cliff adds to urgency for change [Schroeder]

Reflections on “5 Ways to Marry Higher Ed to Work” [Schaffhauser]

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