Science and Technology are advancing in the world today at a rapid pace that is difficult to appreciate. Humans have not traditionally been very good at using new technologies in new ways. In order to take advantage of new and emerging technologies in education, we must embrace theoretical underpinnings that position us to keep up with the pace of change and allow us to further the development of humanity. Moving beyond educational technology initiatives that are immediately in our grasp, there are numerous opportunities visible on the horizon that have potential to redefine the meaning of a learning space and transform the nature of teaching and learning in the twenty-first century. These initiatives may not be ready to implement today but instead require some further development in technology, policy, or business models. It may be that enabling technologies still need to be refined or even invented. It may be that certain institutional regulations and structures need to be revised, adopted, and put in place. It may be that significant investments of time and/or money need to be secured. In every case, these sorts of projects will require consensus building and institutional will.
As we consider the building blocks that form the foundation of our educational options for the future, it is important that we recognize and account for the systemic nature of higher education. Like many systems, higher education has a tendency toward equilibrium. As we make a change to one part of the system other parts react in order to keep the overall system in its original form. When we begin to design and implement projects positioning higher education for the future, we must keep this systems orientation in mind. Far too often technology has been introduced to educational systems as a one shot panacea. The thinking has long been that technology by itself can solve all of education's problems. We repeatedly see thinking along these lines, such as: "If we give every student an iPad (insert your favorite technology here) scholastic performance will improve, dropout rates will go down, and costs will plummet." Long experience and a body of research spanning many decades has shown this mentality generally leads to failure. Instead, we know that technology is only one component of a complex, dynamic interaction among many stakeholders, goals and processes.
This session will discuss the results of the Georgia Tech Commission on Creating the Next in Education (CNE), an effort to draw with broad strokes the nature of education that defines the technological university of the year 2040 and beyond. I will outline the forces likely to affect higher education, including a new and accelerating revolution characterized by technology-driven disruptive change throughout society, shifting public attitudes about the role of public universities, and demographic trends that challenge long-held assumptions about who will benefit from a college education. I will describe a future for college not conceived only as a physical place one enters at a particular age and exits when a degree is completed, but rather as a platform for an increasingly diverse population of learners.