My husband who teaches at the college level and I have been discussing for some time the implications of open source learning and how it is changing the nature and role of universities. How, if everyone is engaged in passion-based, self-directed learning, will we know that knowledge and skills gained are valid? What will be the place of credentials and degrees in this new society where barriers to knowledge are removed? What role will analytics play in assessing skill and knowledge development? Where will the human factor still be relevant and even necessary?
We've been playing with possibilities, and a picture is beginning to emerge. One outcome that we see is that universities rather than being the degree mills that they have now become, will return to their original intent. They will provide peer review. Ideas and knowledge, if they are obtained with the goal of working in a particular field, have to stand the test of assessment and feedback from those most knowledgeable in that field. This means that anyone will be able to begin the process of learning; at some point though, peer review will come into play. This will most likely be a combination of technology based analytic assessment and human assessment of abstract thinking and the candidates competency with hands-on technical work. No one, after all, wants the self-trained heart surgeon working on grandma. Part of the future role of universities will be to provide fee for service credential assessment.
Universities will continue their role of conducting research. They will have access, though, to a much larger talent pool. As they conduct peer review of candidates, they should be able to spot the truly talented and gifted thinkers, even those located in remote towns and villages. Those proven thinkers can then be invited to join research teams even though they will not necessarily have gone through a traditional schooling system. The heretical thinkers should be able to rise much more quickly as well. These unconventional thinkers will have the opportunity to gain footholds in institutions of higher learning, bringing with them innovations, because their learning progression won't have been filtered and shaped by traditional instruction, curriculum and assessment methods.
Universities are not going to disappear; how they conduct business, though, will change and this change will be for the better. Bring on the heretics!
We've been playing with possibilities, and a picture is beginning to emerge. One outcome that we see is that universities rather than being the degree mills that they have now become, will return to their original intent. They will provide peer review. Ideas and knowledge, if they are obtained with the goal of working in a particular field, have to stand the test of assessment and feedback from those most knowledgeable in that field. This means that anyone will be able to begin the process of learning; at some point though, peer review will come into play. This will most likely be a combination of technology based analytic assessment and human assessment of abstract thinking and the candidates competency with hands-on technical work. No one, after all, wants the self-trained heart surgeon working on grandma. Part of the future role of universities will be to provide fee for service credential assessment.
Universities will continue their role of conducting research. They will have access, though, to a much larger talent pool. As they conduct peer review of candidates, they should be able to spot the truly talented and gifted thinkers, even those located in remote towns and villages. Those proven thinkers can then be invited to join research teams even though they will not necessarily have gone through a traditional schooling system. The heretical thinkers should be able to rise much more quickly as well. These unconventional thinkers will have the opportunity to gain footholds in institutions of higher learning, bringing with them innovations, because their learning progression won't have been filtered and shaped by traditional instruction, curriculum and assessment methods.
Universities are not going to disappear; how they conduct business, though, will change and this change will be for the better. Bring on the heretics!
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