future of higher education

Reimagining the Higher Education Ecosystem

On 06/20/2018, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, algorithms, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning, business, career development, change, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, content development, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, curriculum, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, distance education, education, education reform, education technology, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, learning, learning ecosystem, learning from the living [class] room, learning hubs, Lifelong learning, passions, platforms, professional development, reinvent, society, staying relevant, strategy, streams of content, student-related, surviving, teaching & learning, tools, training / L&D, United States, universities, vision, Walmart of Education --> New Amazon.com of Higher Education, web-based collaboration, workplace, youth, by Daniel Christian

Reimagining the Higher Education Ecosystem — from edu2030.agorize.com
How might we empower people to design their own learning journeys so they can lead purposeful and economically stable lives?

Excerpts:

The problem
Technology is rapidly transforming the way we live, learn, and work. Entirely new jobs are emerging as others are lost to automation. People are living longer, yet switching jobs more often. These dramatic shifts call for a reimagining of the way we prepare for work and life—specifically, how we learn new skills and adapt to a changing economic landscape.

The changes ahead are likely to hurt most those who can least afford to manage them: low-income and first generation learners already ill-served by our existing postsecondary education system. Our current system stifles economic mobility and widens income and achievement gaps; we must act now to ensure that we have an educational ecosystem flexible and fair enough to help all people live purposeful and economically stable lives. And if we are to design solutions proportionate to this problem, new technologies must be called on to scale approaches that reach the millions of vulnerable people across the country.

The challenge
How might we empower people to design their own learning journeys so they can lead purposeful and economically stable lives?

The Challenge—Reimagining the Higher Education Ecosystem—seeks bold ideas for how our postsecondary education system could be reimagined to foster equity and encourage learner agency and resilience. We seek specific pilots to move us toward a future in which all learners can achieve economic stability and lead purposeful lives. This Challenge invites participants to articulate a vision and then design pilot projects for a future ecosystem that has the following characteristics:

Expands access: The educational system must ensure that all people—including low-income learners who are disproportionately underserved by the current higher education system—can leverage education to live meaningful and economically stable lives.

Draws on a broad postsecondary ecosystem: While college and universities play a vital role in educating students, there is a much larger ecosystem in which students learn. This ecosystem includes non-traditional “classes” or alternative learning providers, such as MOOCs, bootcamps, and online courses as well as on-the-job training and informal learning. Our future learning system must value the learning that happens in many different environments and enable seamless transitions between learning, work, and life.

From DSC:
This is where I could see a vision similar to Learning from the Living [Class] Room come into play. It would provide a highly affordable, accessible platform, that would offer more choice, and more control to learners of all ages. It would be available 24×7 and would be a platform that supports lifelong learning. It would combine a variety of AI-enabled functionalities with human expertise, teaching, training, motivation, and creativity.

It could be that what comes out of this challenge will lay the groundwork for a future, massive new learning platform.

Also see:

Office of Edtech Wants Help Making Sense of All Those Higher Ed Providers — from edsurge.com by Sydney Johnson

“The scary amount that college will cost in the future” DC: This line of thinking — and trend — needs to come to an end.

On 05/18/2018, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, business side of he, change, changing business models, colleges, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, future of higher education, higher education, ideas, learning, learning ecosystem, learning from the living [class] room, learning hubs, learning spaces, liberal arts, library / librarians, Lifelong learning, Microlearning, more choice more control, online learning, parents, personalized/customized learning, platforms, reinvent, smart classrooms, society, streams of content, student-related, Technologies for your home, technology (general), tools, trends, United States, universities, Walmart of Education --> New Amazon.com of Higher Education, youth, by Daniel Christian

The scary amount that college will cost in the future — from cnbc.com by Annie Nova

Excerpt:

Think college is expensive now? Then new parents will probably want to take a seat for this news.

In 2036, just 18 years from now, four years at a private university will be around $303,000, up from $167,000 today.

To get a degree at a public university you’ll need about $184,000, compared with $101,000 now.

These forecasts were provided by Wealthfront, an automated investment platform that offers college saving options. It uses Department of Education data on the current cost of schools along with expected annual inflation to come up with its projections.

Excerpted graphic:

From DSC:
We had better be at the end of the line of thinking that says these tuition hikes can continue. It’s not ok. More and more people will be shut out by this kind of societal gatekeeper. The ever-increasing cost of obtaining a degree has become a matter of social justice for me. Other solutions are needed. The 800 pound gorilla of debt that’s already being loaded onto more and more of our graduates will impact them for years…even for decades in many of our graduates’ cases.

It’s my hope that a variety of technologies will make learning more affordable, yet still provide a high quality of education. In fact, I’m hopeful that the personalization/customization of learning will take some major steps forward in the very near future. We will still need and want solid teachers, professors, and trainers, but I’m hopeful that those folks will be aided by the heavy lifting that will be done by some powerful tools/technologies that will be aimed at helping people learn and grow…providing lifelong learners with more choice, more control.

I love the physical campus as much as anyone, and I hope that all students can have that experience if they want it. But I’ve seen and worked with the high costs of building and maintaining physical spaces — maintaining our learning spaces, dorms, libraries, gyms, etc. is very expensive.

I see streams of content becoming more prevalent in the future — especially for lifelong learners who need to reinvent themselves in order to stay marketable. We will be able to subscribe and unsubscribe to curated streams of content that we want to learn more about. For example, today, that could involve RSS feeds and Feedly (to aggregate those feeds). I see us using micro-learning to help us encode information and then practice recalling it (i.e., spaced practice), to help us stop or lessen the forgetting curves we all experience, to help us sort information into things we know and things that we need more assistance on (while providing links to resources that will help us obtain better mastery of the subject(s)).

DC: Whoa! Consider the possibilities for global/blended/online-based learning w/ techs associated w/ Microsoft’s meeting room of the future

On 05/11/2018, in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning, blended learning, business, Christian education, collaboration, colleges, communications, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, Languages and translation, learning, learning ecosystem, learning spaces, Microsoft, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, Natural Language Processing (NLP), online learning, platforms, productivity / tips and tricks, smart classrooms, tools, training / L&D, universities, vendors, vision, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Microsoft’s meeting room of the future is wild — from theverge.com by Tom Warren
Transcription, translation, and identification

Excerpts:

Microsoft just demonstrated a meeting room of the future at the company’s Build developer conference.
…
It all starts with a 360-degree camera and microphone array that can detect anyone in a meeting room, greet them, and even transcribe exactly what they say in a meeting regardless of language.
…
Microsoft takes the meeting room scenario even further, though. The company is using its artificial intelligence tools to then act on what meeting participants say.

From DSC:
Whoa! Many things to think about here. Consider the possibilities for global/blended/online-based learning (including MOOCs) with technologies associated with translation, transcription, and identification.

Educause Releases 2018 Horizon Report Preview [Kelly]

On 05/08/2018, in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, algorithms, analytics, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning, business, career development, cognitive computing, collaboration, colleges, community colleges, corporate / business world, data mining, digital citizenship, digital learning, education technology, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, learning, learning ecosystem, learning spaces, maker movement, Mixed reality, new media literacies, online learning, open courseware and systems, personalized/customized learning, platforms, robotics, smart classrooms, society, student-related, teaching & learning, Technologies for your home, technology (general), tools, trends, universities, user experience (UX), vision, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Educause Releases 2018 Horizon Report Preview — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

Excerpt:

After acquiring the rights to the New Media Consortium’s Horizon project earlier this year, Educause has now published a preview of the 2018 Higher Education Edition of the Horizon Report — research that was in progress at the time of NMC’s sudden dissolution. The report covers the key technology trends, challenges and developments expected to impact higher ed in the short-, mid- and long-term future.

Also see:

DC: How soon before we can do this with learning-related spaces/scenes/ALCs & more?

On 05/02/2018, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, attention, business side of he, change, changing business models, Christian education, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, content development, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, digital storytelling, disruption, drama/theater, education technology, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, learning, learning ecosystem, learning from the living [class] room, learning hubs, learning spaces, Lifelong learning, love of learning, more choice more control, multimedia, music, personalized/customized learning, platforms, play, professional development, society, tools, training / L&D, trends, vendors, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, virtual reality / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision, Walmart of Education --> New Amazon.com of Higher Education, web-based collaboration, webinars, by Daniel Christian

From DSC regarding Virtual Reality-based apps:
If one can remotely select/change their seat at a game or change seats/views at a concert…how soon before we can do this with learning-related spaces/scenes/lectures/seminars/Active Learning Classrooms (ALCs)/stage productions (drama) and more?

Talk about getting someone’s attention and engaging them!

Excerpt:

(MAY 2, 2018) MelodyVR, the world’s first dedicated virtual reality music platform that enables fans to experience music performances in a revolutionary new way, is now available.

The revolutionary MelodyVR app offers music fans an incredible selection of immersive performances from today’s biggest artists. Fans are transported all over the world to sold-out stadium shows, far-flung festivals and exclusive VIP sessions, and experience the music they love.

What MelodyVR delivers is a unique and world-class set of original experiences, created with multiple vantage points, to give fans complete control over what they see and where they stand at a performance. By selecting different Jump Spots, MelodyVR users can choose to be in the front row, deep in the crowd, or up-close-and-personal with the band on stage.

See their How it Works page.

With standalone VR headsets like the Oculus Go now available at an extremely accessible price point ($199), the already vibrant VR market is set to grow exponentially over the coming years. Current market forecasts suggest over 350 million users by 2021 and last year saw $3 billion invested in virtual and alternative reality.

From DSC:
How do we best help folks impacted by these changes reinvent themselves? And to what? What adjustments to our educational systems do we need to make in order to help people stay marketable and employed?

Given the pace of change and the need for lifelong learning, we need to practice some serious design thinking on our new reality.

The amount of retail space closing in 2018 is on pace to break a record — from cnbc.com by Lauren Thomas

Bon-Ton’s more than 200 stores encompass roughly 24 million square feet.
CoStar Group has calculated already more than 90 million square feet of retail space (including Bon-Ton) is set to close in 2018.
That’s easily on track to surpass a record 105 million square feet of space shuttered in 2017.

Transforming the Postsecondary Professional Education Experience — from by Mary Grush & Thomas Finholt

Excerpt:

So, among other factors currently influencing change, those are the predominate ones. I’ll sum it up this way: The tried-and-true residential model has worked so far, but a number of factors are forcing transformation: emerging technologies, new expectations about when learning will occur in a student’s lifespan, and the introduction of a whole new population of students that had never been imagined before.
…
Grush: What are your latest efforts or experiments in new professional education offerings that you see as part of this transformation? When did you make a start and what impacts do you see so far?
Finholt: The biggest transformation for us to date has been our entry into the MOOC space. That movement began with a few small trials, but it’s now rapidly expanding and may include, ultimately, full degree offerings. I would describe our period of experimentation with MOOCs to have started in 2013, gaining especially significant momentum in the past two years. Over the next couple of years, our efforts will expand even more dramatically, if we elect to offer fully online degrees. As a measure of the magnitude of impact of MOOCs so far, one of our MOOC specializations in the Python programming language is among the most popular offerings on Coursera — I believe that it has reached more than a million learners at this point. A significant fraction of those learners have opted to sit for an exam to get a certificate in Python programming.

One is, as announced at the March 6th Coursera meeting, that we have joined in a partnership with Coursera and the University of Michigan’s Office of Academic Innovation to design and get approved, a brand-new online master’s degree in Applied Data Science.

From DSC:
Mary and Thomas’ solid article reminds me of a graphic I put together a while back:

“The process of obtaining postgraduate credentials is becoming something that one works on over the entire span of one’s career… Working professionals will have an array of punctuated intervals, if you will — periods of time when they work intensively to update their credentials.” (source)

DC: What can higher ed learn from this? “Big corporations — giant retailers & health insurance companies — are teaming up to become your doctor.”

On 04/07/2018, in colleges, corporate / business world, cost of getting a degree, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, financial aid, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, health, higher education, ideas, learning from the living [class] room, new business models, strategy, universities, Walmart of Education --> New Amazon.com of Higher Education, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
What can higher ed learn from this? Eventually, people will seek alternatives if what’s being offered isn’t acceptable to them anymore.

The Disappearing Doctor: How Mega-Mergers Are Changing the Business of Medical Care — from nytimes.com by Reed Ableson and Julie Creswell
Big corporations — giant retailers and health insurance companies — are teaming up to become your doctor.

Excerpt:

Is the doctor in?

In this new medical age of urgent care centers and retail clinics, that’s not a simple question. Nor does it have a simple answer, as primary care doctors become increasingly scarce.

“You call the doctor’s office to book an appointment,” said Matt Feit, a 45-year-old screenwriter in Los Angeles who visited an urgent care center eight times last year. “They’re only open Monday through Friday from these hours to those hours, and, generally, they’re not the hours I’m free or I have to take time off from my job.

“I can go just about anytime to urgent care,” he continued, “and my co-pay is exactly the same as if I went to my primary doctor.”

That’s one reason big players like CVS Health, the drugstore chain, and most recently Walmart, the giant retailer, are eyeing deals with Aetna and Humana, respectively, to use their stores to deliver medical care.

People are flocking to retail clinics and urgent care centers in strip malls or shopping centers, where simple health needs can usually be tended to by health professionals like nurse practitioners or physician assistants much more cheaply than in a doctor’s office. Some 12,000 are already scattered across the country, according to Merchant Medicine, a consulting firm.

“Blockchain: Is it Good for Education?” [virtuallyinspired.org] + other relevant resources

On 03/30/2018, in accreditation, adult learning, Blockchain, business side of he, career development, change, changing business models, colleges, community colleges, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, education technology, emerging technologies, experimentation, face-to-face, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, IBM, ideas, innovation, learning, learning ecosystem, learning from the living [class] room, Lifelong learning, MBA, Microlearning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, online learning, platforms, professional development, project-based learning, society, strategy, student-related, tools, universities, vendors, vision, Walmart of Education --> New Amazon.com of Higher Education, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Blockchain: Is it Good for Education? — from virtuallyinspired.org

Excerpt:

What is Blockchain?

Blockchain is a public ledger type database made up of records called blocks that are linked together like a chain. It is a shared unchallengeable ledger for recording the history of transactions. Here, the ledger records the history of academic accomplishments. An education ledger (blockchain) could store academic information such as degrees, diplomas, tests etc. It could be kind of digital transcript.

A Few Potential Applications of Blockchain

Learning Credentials Repository – A blockchain database of credentials and achievements can be a secure online repository. Digitized records/blocks replace paper copies for sharing proof of learning and can be easily accessible and tracked. Blockchain can make it easy to access all of your academic accomplishments in a digitized and ultra-secure way. Each record is a block. Your records would be chained together and new credentials will be added as you go throughout your lifetime of learning.
Lifelong Learning Building Blocks – Informal learning activities could be captured, validated and stored in addition to formal learning accomplishments. This can be as simple as noting a watched video or completed online lesson. We’re already seeing some universities using blockchain with badges, credits, and qualifications.
Authenticating Credentials – Institutions, recruiting firms or employers can easily access and verify credentials. No more gathering of papers or trying to digitize to share. Blocks are digital “learning” records and come in multilingual format eliminating the painstaking task of translation.

What’s more, with diploma mills and fake credentials causing havoc for institutions and employers, blockchain solves the issue by providing protection from fraud. It has two-step authentication and spreads blocks across numerous computer nodes. It would take hitting over 51% of computers to falsify a block.

Sony and IBM have partnered and filed patents to develop a blockchain educational platform that can house student data, their performance reports and other information related to their academic records. Some universities have created their own platforms.

Also see:

Blockchain in Education — from by Alexander Grech and Anthony F. Camilleri

Context
Blockchain technology is forecast to disrupt any field of activity that is founded on timestamped record-keeping of titles of ownership. Within education, activities likely to be disrupted by blockchain technology include the award of qualifications, licensing and accreditation, management of student records, intellectual property management and payments.

Key Advantages of Blockchain Technology
From a social perspective, blockchain technology offers significant possibilities beyond those currently available. In particular, moving records to the blockchain can allow for:

Self-sovereignty, i.e. for users to identify themselves while at the same time maintaining control over the storage and management of their personal data;
Trust, i.e. for a technical infrastructure that gives people enough confidence in its operations to carry through with transactions such as payments or the issue of certificates;
Transparency & Provenance, i.e. for users to conduct transactions in knowledge that each party has the capacity to enter into that transaction;
Immutability, i.e. for records to be written and stored permanently, without thepossibility of modification;
Disintermediation, i.e. the removal of the need for a central controlling authority to manage transactions or keep records;
Collaboration, i.e. the ability of parties to transact directly with each other without the need for mediating third parties.

Sony wants to digitize education records using the blockchain

On Change and Relevance for Higher Education — from campustechnology.com by Mary Grush and Phil Long
A Q&A with Phil Long

Excerpts:

Mary Grush: You’ve been connected to scores of technology leaders and have watched trends in higher education for more than 30 years. What is the central, or most important concern you are hearing from institutional leadership now?

Phil Long: Higher ed institutions are facing some serious challenges to stay relevant in a world that is diversifying and changing rapidly. They want to make sure that the experiences they have designed for students will carry the next generation forward to be productive citizens and workers. But institutions’ abilities to keep up in our changing environment have begun to lag to a sufficient degree, such that alternatives to the traditional university are being considered, both by the institutions themselves and by their constituents and colleagues throughout the education sector.

…

Grush: What are a few of the more specific areas in which institutions may find it difficult to navigate?

Long: Just from a very high level view, I’d include on that list: big data and the increasing sophistication of algorithms, with the associated benefits and risks; artificial intelligence with all its implications for good… and for peril; and perhaps most importantly, new applications and practices that support how we recognize learning.

“The pace of change never seems to slow down. And the issues and implications of the technologies we use are actually getting broader and more profound every day.” — Phil Long

Learning Ecosystems

DC: Whoa! Consider the possibilities for global/blended/online-based learning w/ techs associated w/ Microsoft’s meeting room of the future

DC: How soon before we can do this with learning-related spaces/scenes/ALCs & more?

DC: What can higher ed learn from this? “Big corporations — giant retailers & health insurance companies — are teaming up to become your doctor.”

On Change and Relevance for Higher Education [Grush & Long]

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