Ref: 051501
Many of the reasons for this rapid pace of change relate to information technology. The volume of new information is increasing at such a rapid pace that the class of 2000 will be exposed to more new data in a year than their grandparents encountered in a lifetime. The evidence of the information explosion is all around us.
· Ten thousand scientific articles are published every day (Forman,
1995).
· Ninety percent of all scientists who have ever lived are alive
today (Prusak, unpublished).
· Beginning in 1907, the Chemical Abstracts Society took
31 years to accumulate its first million abstracts; the next million took
18 years, and the most recent took 1.75. More articles have been published
on chemistry in the last two years than all of recorded history before
1900. (Noam, 1995)
· As of May 1996, there were more than 33 million articles and
web pages. It would take over five years to read just the new listings
added each month (Van Alstyne, 1996). Even so, only 1% of the world's recorded
knowledge is available on the Internet.
· Predictions are that by the year 2020, knowledge will
double every 73 days.
One of the defining trends of the future will be the rate of change. In fact, for the first time in the history of higher education, the ability to manage change is becoming a competitive differentiator.
"Many feel that traditional self-contained, time-delimited "degree" programs may have increasingly limited use in a world where information and skills become quickly obsolete. Education has already become a lifetime process and with the advent of a "virtual" university comes the possibility of providing the learning people need, when they need it, wherever they happen to be.
"We must move beyond the idea that any particular model of education is sacrosanct and concentrate on the content and results of that education. Success as a "lifetime" university will mean the creation of a much more flexible and adaptive education. `Just-in-time' courses will need to respond to the diverse and shifting needs of emerging careers, developing social problems, and opening areas of knowledge. Some classes may need to be available in modules so that students can choose the parts they need to know." (Duderstadt, 1996).
There are other indicators of the rate of change. Microprocessor performance has been increasing at a relatively constant rate, doubling approximately every 18 months. This trend is expected to continue. Its impact, however, is a perceived time compression which will cause changes in business, education, entertainment and daily life.
A steady rate of growth (2x per period of time, as in 2, 4, 8, 16, 32....) will yield progressively larger increments of growth as the rate continues. The result is that it takes less time to cover the same increment of technological improvement as time goes on. This is perceived as less time; it stresses our established models.
The result is that we sense a breathless pace of change. The impact is felt on organizations, as well. Asset volatility is high. Neither organizations or individuals can purchase the "right" machine. As soon as it is bought, it is out of date. No one can keep up with the current version of the software. Organizations are spending enormous energy, time and money churning hardware and software in an attempt to stay current. In spite of large investments, institutions find themselves with two or three levels of technology that are now obsolete, but which they cannot afford to discard.
Add to this scenario the fact that these changes are dwarfed by what we believe will happen in network bandwidth. Expect changes on the order of 800 to 1,000 times in bandwidth (Tuller, 1997). To put this into perspective, it is possible to transmit close to 1.2 GB (gigabits) of information over a network with current capabilities. This is roughly equivalent to 85 books or 39,000 pages of text per second. Such transmission speeds also support scientific visualization. Compare this to the capabilities available in 1989 when transmission speeds enabled a mere two pages per second to be sent across a network (Hulser, 1997).
Age 15. The term papers in this course are web-based. The students have grown up thinking and composing in hypertext. "Technology" is as natural to them as a household appliance. A student has an aunt who lives in Ireland. She just began a job processing insurance forms for a US company. The firm moved its operation from America to Ireland to take advantage of the high literacy rate and competitive wages.
Age 16. A student is preparing for college entry. He/she uses CollegeNet to browse information on colleges of interest and receives periodic "counseling" updates such as reminders to begin preparing for college entrance exams and to develop a savings plan for college. These same students routinely correspond with pen pals from around the world. Getting connected and staying connected is taken for granted. This is the first generation for which the world is their "neighborhood."
Age 17. Students participate in Project FeederWatch on the World Wide Web. Not only are they able to research questions using the online database, but they contribute to a research which spans North America. The project from Cornell University's Laboratory of Ornithology is founded on the concept that scientific literacy can be improved by involving the public and school children in scientific research. A student later learns that a Korean firm has bought out his father's company. Mergers and acquisitions are changing the face of business.
Age 18. Students are taking a college course--at a distance--to get an early start on college credits. One 12th grader has a pen pal in India. Her father is working on a global software project--the project moves across three continents (where each one is a work shift) every 24 hours.
Freshman year. A college freshman uses information technology for a history course, utilizing historic archives that are in digital format on the Internet. At the same time that the student hears FDR's radio broadcast declaring war on Japan, he/she is able to read along from his notes. Access to the original material is more motivating and memorable than just reading from a textbook.
Sophomore year. A sophomore is studying music appreciation. However, instead of all the content being provided by the professor, students learn the fundamentals then are provided with a music analysis tool. Their assignment is to select a piece of music, analyze it and present it to the class. The students must teach each other.
Junior year. A junior is working on a team, selecting problems in a kinematics class. Applying principles from engineering and physics, the team collects data, analyzes the problem and reports the results on the web. The students find it motivating to be able to select their own problems and for their work to be shared with others.
Senior year. A senior is solving a microbiology problem. There has been an outbreak of food poisoning. The assignment is to identify the pathogen, find its origin and recommend corrective action. Lab tests are performed and analyses are made. Feedback is instantaneous. Information from multiple courses must be integrated.
Adult learner. An adult is studying for a new career in auto mechanics. Prior learning is assessed using a pre-test. Content for the course is delivered using video, text and audio in an integrated environment where tools such as a glossary are easily accessed. The learner is able to study on a flexible schedule.
There is an increasing body of evidence that technology, when well utilized, will lead to improved student achievement. More important than improving current educational practices, technology provides an opportunity to achieve results that have not previously been possible; to find entirely new approaches to teaching and learning; to reach students who have been immune to current strategies; to teach new, higher order skills; and to reinvent education (Verville, 1997).
It is not just the medium that is changing. We are in the process of shifting what it means to be literate from the memory base of knowledge acquisition to knowing how to find and use channels of information. Knowing how to learn is more important than the facts accumulated (Adams, Carlson and Hamm, 1990).
The brief scenarios on the previous pages provide a glimpse of education as we approach the 21st century. The learning environment of the future will continue to incorporate information technology (IT). The functional characteristics of IT, coupled with a better understanding of cognition, will lead to the development of learning environments that are authentic, interactive, equitable, sensory, modular, global and network-based.
· Authentic: Information technology allows us to bring students as close to the real experience as possible. Students can travel back in time to FDR's "Day in Infamy" speech. They can experience the pain and struggle of Dax Cowart. This access to authentic information--the original source material of scholars--brings students closer to the level of scholarship that faculty experience. It is through working with authentic material, coupled with learning the "way of thinking" of a particular scholarly community, that students enhance their learning.
· Interactive: Passivity has given way to interactivity. It is well recognized that the greater the interaction--student-to-student, student-to-professor or student-to-information--the greater the learning. The value of technology to education is partially encapsulated in the phrase "getting connected." "Connections are not just to information, but to other students, instructors and experts. Networks offer learners and teachers access to new ideas, perspectives, cultures and information--enriching locally available resources" (Harasim et al, 1995).
Students can easily interact with their fellow classmates, regardless of the fact that they may be spread across the country or the world. Although the face-to-face method may be the most efficient form of communication, such meetings do not occur very often (or at all when classmates span the globe). Said another way, the communication bandwidth peaks during face-to-face sessions and falls to zero in between traditional class sessions. Networked communications allows students to communicate 24 hours a day, seven days a week (i.e., asynchronously). The result is that, averaged over several hours, the effective bandwidth for asynchronous communication can be much higher than face-to face communication (Mayadas, 1997).
Another element that is different for students in on-line classes is the opportunity to learn from each other--to see the work of others and to compare their ideas with those of their classmates. Students learn not only from their own work, but they can learn from everyone else. By its very nature, this kind of on-line environment encourages collaboration and group interaction (Kearlsey et al, 1995).
· Equitable. Delivery of education through a collaborative, computer-mediated environment alters the relationship of the instructor, the students, and the course content. The many-to-many, asynchronous nature of the medium "democratizes" access and encourages student input (Harasim, 1991). In fact, studies are showing that students feel they have more access to the professor than they did in traditional, lecture courses as well as more interaction with other students.
· Sensory: Digitization has allowed us to effectively create a common, worldwide "language" with which to communicate. Virtually everything can be translated into a common currency of bits and bytes. The significance of digitized information is that the conversion of text, graphics, images and video into bits provides information with a digital passport to travel across global networks. Powerful new communications technologies are giving networks the bandwidth needed to handle rich but space-consuming content like video, MRI scans or great works of art. Networks are developing the speed to support interaction, enabling two-way communication and collaboration. Together, digital content and high-speed networks allow us to create "microworlds" that create sensory experiences that are much most motivating and memorable than text alone.
· Modular: It will become increasingly common for institutions to share courses, modules and curricula. The expectation that every faculty member create his or her own unique course will be replaced by a model of mass customization. Courses will be built of modules that can be "snapped" together to create unique combinations, individualizing and personalizing instruction. Few faculty will develop their own digital course materials from scratch; most will use component material directly or tailor it. This will facilitate more rapid response to the needs of learners whether the goal is completing a standard degree program or acquiring a skill related to a specific job or career.
· Global: Knowledge knows no boundaries. Education without a cultural frame of reference limits its value. The ability to use language ,interact and work productively with people from other cultures are skills that will be embedded in courses. Global systems are represented in the 21st century curriculum. These systems affect the quality of life as exchange rates raise and lower the price of goods and as pollution and public health problems trascend national boundaries (ACE, 1995).
· Network-based: The network--the global information infrastructure--allows learners to access resources anywhere at any time. Both students and instructors can share ideas, concerns and solutions with peers--no matter where they are--as easily as if they were in the next room. It also allows for nearly instantaneous updating of information. Because knowledge is distributed, communities of learners come together and disperse based on needs and interests, not solely on geography.
Technology is helping higher education execute the social obligation with which it is invested. Education is seen as the key to social and economic progress. Network technology is allowing us to establish education as the centerpiece of community and global networks. This extension of the benefits of education to the community-- to women, minorities, the elderly as well as underprivileged children-- will enable us to facilitate the development of learning communities that transcend the traditional boundaries of education.
In the 21st century university, our options will be expanded. Communication, computing and networking technologies extend the reach and range of traditional residential colleges and universities, enabling students to synthesize on-campus with on-line experiences. Some learners seek a mixture of face-to-face experiences and network-based education. For example, the on-campus student who wishes a more individualized, self-paced, self-directed learning experience can achieve that desire through technology. With a goal of reducing the time to degree, students may choose to complete courses in residence while simultaneously fulfilling other graduation requirements on-line. The network expands options for interaction among faculty and students. External experts are more easily accessed; opportunities for faculty to individualize and personalize contact with students is increased (Oblinger, 1997).
We see an immense opportunity to establish forms of electronic-based collaboration--from the student level to the institutional level--that can bring about major improvements in both access and learning, while meeting the legitimate public and institutional concerns about cost and quality. This is not to suggest that technology-based learning should replace traditional pedagogy; this is not an either/or proposition. Computer-assisted, self-directed, electronically-mediated learning will work for some institutions but not for others, for students in some fields, but not for all students in all fields (Mingle, 1995). As institutions move toward the creation of their campus of the future and a learning continuum that spans birth to death, it will be important to understand the nuances of where networked learning is the most appropriate alternative or supplement to traditional residential education, and how it can best be implemented.
As a tool, technology enables the transmission of information. However, the critical process is people interacting with other people. Technology enables us to develop a much more participatory and collaborative society. The societal implications of participation and collaboration could be immensely powerful. Drawing on research in collaborative learning, we know that there are significant, positive cognitive and non-cognitive effects of collaboration.
Information technology also places pressure on the "middleman." Computer networks offer the possibility of learners accessing services and information directly rather than through an intermediary. We have seen service delivery change in business (e.g., automatic teller machines) as a result of this "middleman" phenomenon. One of the challenges to higher education will be to identify those "transactions" where humans are "in the middle," redesigning them so that they add value.
When confronted by skeptics who question whether technology will have an impact on higher education, the response is that it already has. Information technology has opened new, fundamentally different options for higher education, both in how to run "the business" of higher education as well as in teaching and learning. History demonstrates that fundamental technological change ultimately begets significant structural change, regardless of whether the affected participants choose to join or resist the movement. The changes that universities have weathered over the centuries did not upend their basic technology. Information technology does (Massy, 1997).
Global competition is one of the most significant forces of change in the last five years for business. This is the environment in which graduates will work. It is tempting to assume that much of this global pressure stems from "sweat shops" or exploitative labor practices. However, global competition no longer means a low wage unskilled labor pool. Increasingly, competition is coming from a high quality, highly productive work force.
The strategy of many countries is to skip over being an industrial power and move directly to being a powerbroker in the information age. It is a savvy approach. For those with massive populations, their raw power is in people. If they are educated, have a strong work ethic and are motivated to become middle class consumers, they will become fierce competitors with the US and Western Europe. "Industrialized" nations cannot afford to stand still.
Globalization is not just about competition, it is also about interdependence. As an example of international interdependence, consider the nations involved in manufacturing and selling my Honda Civic. The engine was assembled in Japan with some US parts. That engine was likely shipped on a Liberian-flagged freighter with a Greek crew, manufactured in Ohio, distributed by a trucking firm and sold to me in North Carolina. Where once we were in competition, we are now bound by mutual dependence.
Globalization represents a structural change. When a structural change occurs, things never go back to the way they were. We will never be able to recreate the time when the US or the UK was the dominant economic and cultural force. Globalization is inexorable. It will not be reversed; it cannot be legislated away. One of our educational challenges is to integrate globalization into the curriculum in a meaningful way so that we can capitalize, rather than be constrained, by globalization.
In the workplace, the people with whom we interact are more diverse in terms of culture, gender, ethnicity and age, making interpersonal communication more complicated. As layers of middle management are removed for the sake of efficiency, different tasks are being required of workers. All these add to the complexity of work.
The more complex a process or an event, the less likely it is that a single individual knows enough to master it. Complexity also compounds the likelihood that something will "go wrong" and specialized knowledge will be required to correct it. In both of these cases, the knowledge needed will most likely be found through others. As the nature of work itself changes, there is much greater emphasis on workplace knowledge--the knowledge that is embedded within the routines, processes, and norms of the organization. To be efficient, organizations must gain access to this non-articulated knowledge that resides within groups of professionals. (Prusak, 1997).
Another dominant demographic trend in our countries is aging. The "graying" of our population is likely to produce a variety of changes in society at large and in higher education, as well. This aging labor force will require new investments by the public and private sectors in education and training in order to facilitate American economic growth and productivity. For example, as older adults work longer and postpone retirement, many seek continuing education in order to stay abreast of new technologies and developments with professional disciplines. For those who do retire, many pursue learning for enrichment and enjoyment.
At the other end of the age continuum, consider "Generation Y," those children who will reach their teen years as the next century begins. They will be the first generation to take the Internet for granted. Generation Y's orientation in space and time will be different from its predecessors. Some are growing up with online pen pals on other continents. Far more than today, their world will be global, connected and around-the-clock. Their neighborhoods will not be the street where they live, but the people with whom they interact, electronically (Graham, 1997).
Generation Y will never know a world without computers. Global conversations over the Internet will bring distant cultures close. What's more, they won't even realize how remarkable that is. This generation views computers as basic equipment, like pencil and paper, not something to be feared. Technologically, this generation is going to make the Generation Xers look like fuddy -duddies (Beck, 1997).
It is no wonder that the demand for education has never been greater. For a large proportion of its clientele, education is an investment--a down payment--on a career, social status or more immediately, a job. Most students take the degrees they do to get the jobs they want, knowing or hoping that these jobs will repay the investment (Brown and Duguid, 1996). In 1992, a worker with a bachelor's degree earned 1.74 times as much as a worker with a high school diploma (Bureau of the Census, 1994).
No surprisingly, the single most important factor in determining level of income is level of education (CFAE, 1997). This poses a troublesome future in the US. I assume it is similar in the UK. If current trends are extrapolated for 20 years, by 2015, male workers with a high school education will have lost 38% of what comparable male workers earned in 1976. And those without a high school diploma will have lost 52% in real earnings over the same period. Only college graduates will be able to hold their own out to 2015. This economic polarization is even more alarming when linked to demographic statistics; African Americans and Hispanics have lower college-going rates than other ethnic groups.
It is in the interest of all to promote higher levels of education and training for those who are rapidly losing earning power in society. Low levels of education are powerful predictors of welfare dependency, unemployment and incarceration, all of which are very costly. Moreover, by 2015 the numbers of workers for every retiree on Social Security will be one-fifth what it was 50 years ago. This means a shrinking proportion of American workers will not only have to maintain US economic competitiveness in the global marketplace, but will also have to support the economic base of the rest of the nation at the same time (CFAE, 1997). Will the trends be noticeably different in the UK or Western Europe?
Figures involving education, income and social services help illustrate the importance of education. In Indiana, the break-even point for state services is $38,000. The average Indiana worker who earns less than $38,000 per year uses more services than he or she pays for through taxes. Someone who earns more than $38,000 contributes to the general tax revenue. The average high school graduate in Indiana earns $34,000 and the average college graduate earns $55,000 per year. Thus, the average college graduate is likely to be a net contributor to the public welfare; someone without a college degree is apt to be a net user of services. It is to the benefit of the state to increase the proportion of the population obtaining college degrees (Brand, 1997).
Education has broad economic returns that go beyond the individual. For example, for every dollar Illinois invests in undergraduates at the University of Illinois, returned to the state are $4.31 in taxes over time (Anonymous, 1996). Colleges and universities stimulate economic growth through the creation of new jobs, as well. A study found that the 4,000 companies founded by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) graduates or faculty as of 1994 employed 1.1 million people and generated $232 billion in world sales. In the US, MIT-related companies employed 733,000 people or one out of every 170 jobs in the country (Kindleberger, 1997).
Perhaps because of all of the positive effects of higher education,
the demand is great. Unfortunately, population growth is outpacing the
world's capacity to give people access to universities. A sizable new university
would now be needed every week merely to sustain current participation
rates in higher education. A crisis of access lies ahead (Daniel, 1996).
Half of the world's population is now under 20--three-quarters in countries
like South Africa and Palestine. Our traditional concept of the campus
university will deny higher education to all these young people. Without
vigorous action, many of them will grow up to be unemployed, unconnected,
and unstable. In a global world, that is a global problem. We require mass
training and employability and mass education to inspire the human spirit
(Daniel, 1997).
The inertia in our systems of higher education is immense. Many point to an exemplary record and ask why there is any need for change. How does the Future Compatible Campus begin? More often than not, its origins stem from fear--fear of moving ahead or fear of being left behind. Although all institutions are unique, there are some common philosophies that are emerging among campuses which are "future compatible."
Historically, undergraduate education has operated on the premise that the student spends four years living on a campus, insulated from home, work, and the social environments outside the campus. Consequently, it is a campus-centric system that is both place-constrained (the campus or the classroom) and time-constrained (delivered according to an academic calendar and a specific course schedule that is controlled by the provider). The campus-centric model assumes that students will choose from a campus-established set of courses and curricula. Control over the content is in the hands of the provider--the faculty or the institution. Administrative functions such as admissions, financial aid and registration are designed for the convenience of the institution, with minimal regard for the needs of the consumer.
The combination of new communications technologies, changing student demographics, the rising costs of a residential experience, and the need for continuing education throughout a lifetime is eroding this centuries-old system. The modus operandi of the campus should be changing. Relationships among learners, instructors, and information resources are shifting, as well. The rapid proliferation of information and communications technologies is making it possible for the control of delivery to move out of the hands of traditional providers--higher education institutions and faculty --and into the hands of consumers.
One indication of the rising power of learners is the trend for students to learn independent of time and place. The assumption that higher education takes place in the classroom or on the campus is being shifted to the workplace, the home, the library, or even the network. Communications technologies enable a shift toward asynchronous (at different times) rather than synchronous (at the same time) learning experiences, which makes learning available seven days a week, 24-hours a day. Increasingly learners use networks to interact with their peers, their instructors, external experts, as well as information resources; they do it when it is convenient, not just during scheduled class times.
The change from a campus-centric to a learner-centric learning model is accelerating. By expanding the number of potential providers--for content, courses and curricula--learner choice is expanded. The days of a campus-centric model are fading (Twigg and Oblinger, 1997).
This is not to imply that students are without responsibility. In a learner-centered environment, students will be accountable--for updating their mailing address or seeking out external experts for course projects. Institutions can make the processes simpler, but will not assume the in loco parentis burden. Learning is hard work. Although information technology can make learning more motivating, engaging and enjoyable, it will always require exertion. The new learning environments and skills that will be required of students are likely to require additional effort. For all involved, becoming learner-centered will require some adjustment.
To create a sophisticated and continually improving workforce, we need to create and nurture learning organizations. "How institutions of higher education engage their workforces in learning activities is one of our sadder ironies. Colleges and universities are, of course, learning organizations by definition. If we are to develop sophisticated problem solvers in our organizations, we will need to increase our commitments to the formal training agenda. In addition, we will need to discover, uncover, empower and replicate that complex informal system of successful mentorships, peer networks, informal collaborations and grapevines that exist already in the organization" (Ernst et al., 1996).
Becoming a learning organization mirrors the individual's commitment to learning. For singular workers, brains, know-how, broad skills and the willingness to learn throughout life have become the essential tools for building a career (ACE, 1997). Job skills are more important than a job, alone. In the university of the 21st century, employees will recognize that their job and security depends more on their own competence and work skills than on the hierarchy. Assessing skills, finding good teachers and making time for self-improvement will become part of the university culture. The goal will be to ensure that employees have skills that are valuable and transferable--from one department to another or from one institution to another.
Access to information technology can enhance learning in several ways. When compared to traditional classes, student satisfaction with online courses is higher; GPA and other measures of student achievement are the same of better; a higher level of critical thinking and problem solving is reported; and there is often more discussion among students and instructors in a course. Instructors are able to track the progress of their students in a detailed way and have a better understanding of what students are/are not learning. Computer networking provides a more authentic learning environment in the sense that students can easily communicate with other educational professionals outside of the class if they desire (Kearsley et al., 1995).
Concomitant with an emphasis on learning vs. teaching is the focus on learning productivity vs. teaching load. Learning productivity (Johnstone, 1992) describes a concept that will allow higher education to attain significant and sustainable productivity increases through greater attention to the learner. "Learning productivity relates the input of faculty and staff not to enrollment or to courses taught or to credit or classroom hours assigned, but to learning, i.e., to the demonstrated mastery of a defined body of knowledge or skills."
One way to make learning more productive is for students to master a body of knowledge in less time. Learning that takes less time can cut the traditional costs carried by the institution, but also the opportunity costs (lost earnings) of the student. Another way to make learning more productive is to make it possible for students to get the courses when they need them (Johnstone, 1992). The way we will achieve sustainable productivity gains in higher education is by facilitating more learning from students, not just increasing the workloads for faculty. If we are serious about learning, the learner should be our focus.
There are many ways in which information technology might be used to leverage learning if the bars of convention were dropped. Massy (1997) illustrates some important benefits from reengineering such as relaxing traditional constraints on the economics of the educational process. For example, faculty labor is applied at the times and in the circumstances needed rather than in fixed quanta defined inflexibly as courses per semester. Technology substitutes for some of what has traditionally been viewed as faculty work, but faculty labor is redeployed to tasks that professors can do best. Support staff and graduate student time may be used to a greater extent than in some kinds of institutions currently, but it is concentrated in areas where faculty do not have a comparative advantage--not in places, like small group discussion sections, where a professor's wisdom can confer important benefits.
Another critical component in redefining learning is to think in terms of learner needs rather than teaching franchises. Currently, most teaching, course credits and degrees are bundled together seamlessly in accredited institutions, with credentialed faculty, controlled by various combinations of accrediting associations and government agencies. A learning franchise, on the other hand, provides access to powerful learning systems, information and knowledge bases, scholarly exchange networks with customizable learning modules and systems open to anyone who needs them and can compensate the provider. Measurement and certification are important for many but not all learners. Students can pay for as little or as much mentoring as they choose (HEIRA, 1996).
Organizations evolve not just because they change but because we change our point of view in looking at the work of an organization. When this occurs, we need to redefine the work. In the future, work will be directed mainly by cross-functional and self-governing teams. The effectiveness of such teams will depend on their members' access to one another, to cross-functional information, and occasionally, to elements of the campus leadership. Such work practices will demand enhanced integration of data across functional systems, robust networking and technical interfaces that lower the cultural barriers between diverse work cultures (Ernst et al., 1996). Administration will be redefined.
Consider organization charts as an example. Although they are useful guides, they are outmoded. Institutions do not manage through structures anymore, they manage through processes. The emergent organizational paradigms succeed by empowering people and horizontal processes in ways that are supplemental to--or independent of--the "formal" vertical organization.
To enable organizational transformation, we need to shift our attention away from the organization chart and towards the creation of an information-rich infrastructure. We will need to (1) eliminate the technical, cultural, hierarchical, and procedural boundaries that divide or isolate intelligent and motivated people; (2) create a policy environment that stimulates and rewards collaboration; (3) promote easy access to the kinds of information people need for making sound decisions; and (4) specify, measure and reward the achievement of defined and customer-centric objectives (Ernst et al., 1996).
There are also many lessons that business and industry have learned that could provide guidance for higher education. Although the enterprises are not alike in terms of governance, structure, etc., all involve people, cultures and change. Business has wrestled with massive changes for the last decade. Many of these changes are beginning in higher education. Why not learn from the experience of others?
With those philosophies, the future compatible campus will be
different. It will be:
· Mission-driven, not rule driven
· Results-oriented: outputs and outcomes will matter more than
inputs
· Customer-driven rather than driven by the needs of the bureaucracy
· Decentralized: decisions will be made at lower levels in the
organization--employees will be empowered
· Competitive: the status quo will no longer be good enough.
There will be rewards for those individuals and institutions who are more
competitive.
The IT infrastructure is also important in supporting organizational learning. Information gains value as it moves around the institution and is used by many people in many contexts. This exchange of information is facilitated by networking technologies and groupware. However, the IT infrastructure is more that wires, hubs and routers. In addition to optimizing machine efficiency we must enhance human productivity.
Tate (1996) described a future where higher education would evolve toward production, delivery and certification organizations (PDCs). PDCs would operate on a national basis, using the most efficient and effective communications media available. Courses and programs would be designed and produced to commercial standards. These organizations would purchase subject-matter expertise from many sources, depending upon the degree of expertise and the quality of the content. In addition, PDCs would provide competence-based testing and certification services. Students could participate in interactive testing at any time or at a place of their choosing--and pay a fee to receive certification upon successful completion.
Another model focuses on electronic commerce and education brokerages. Proposed by Hamalainen, Whinston and Vishik (1996), education brokerages would provide product marketing and advertising. They would also process customer applications. Able to match customer needs with existing and prospective courses available from any number of educational suppliers, they could also accommodate requests outside the mainstream by bringing in educators with special expertise or through customized combinations of course elements.
Within courses, cognition, collaboration and communication will modify both what is taught as well as how. Problem solving skills will receive significant emphasis. The focus will be on process more than on memorization. Components of "successful intelligence," (Sternberg, 1996) will be woven into the curriculum: analytical, creative and practical intelligence. Traditionally, only analytical intelligence has been valued on tests and in the classroom. Yet all three are needed. Analytical thinking is required to solve problems and to judge the quality of ideas. Creative intelligence is necessary to formulate good problems and ideas in the first place. Practical intelligence is essential in order to use the ideas and their analysis in an effective way.
Many subjects and skills can be approached through apprentice-like learning. Going beyond the traditional libraries, laboratories and studios, newer technologies can enrich and expand options. Technology can be used to support apprentice-like activities in fields that themselves require the use of technology as a tools, such as statistical research and computer-based music, or the use of the Internet to gather information not available in the local library. Some simulations require computers. Other tools help students gain insight. For example, students can be asked to design a radio antenna. Simulation software displays not only their design but the oridinarily invisible electromagnetic waves the antenna would emit. Students change their design and instantly see resulting changes in the waves. The aim is not to design antennae but to build deeper understanding of electromagnetism (Chickering and Ehrmann, 1996).
A second financial problem is due to a funding strategy based on inputs rather than results achieved. "The higher education system as currently financed is not adequately serving the public interest. As long as payments are made to colleges and universities on the basis of intent and not results (for example, graduation rates or the demonstrated competence of graduates), inefficiency is built into the financial structure. As long as the higher education financial structure also includes a faculty reward system that encourages them to pay less attention to public need and more to professional demands, research will continue to be valued over teaching and teaching less over teaching more." (Eaton, 1993).
"One of the absurdities of current funding formulas is that an institution could utterly fail its educational mission and yet its revenue would remain unaffected. Nothing could facilitate a shift to the learning paradigm more swiftly than funding learning and learning-related institutional outcomes rather than hours of instruction." (Barr & Tagg, 1995).
Over the past decade, demands for accountability have begun forcing institutions to measure their performance and communicate it effectively to stakeholders. Even though many have begun, more needs to be done to measure outcomes and the "value-added" by the educational process. Demands for increased productivity arise from the common perception that faculty do not teach enough, students do not learn the right things, and that administrators are reactive "fire-fighters" instead of effective managers. And, the high fixed costs of doing business (e.g., aging, decaying infrastructures and massive deferred maintenance) give institutions a hefty bill to pay regardless of the number of students they attract and retain (Hafner and Oblinger, 1997).
One of the most effective tools to address measurement and accountability is the balanced scorecard (Kaplan and Norton, 1996) which integrates vision, goals, measures and controls to provide a more holistic view of the institution. Performance indicators take into account the customer perspective (e.g., how students or legislators regard the institution), an internal business process perspective (e.g., cycle time, use of resources), a financial perspective (e.g., revenue, expenditures) and innovation and learning perspective (e.g., asking how well the institution is improving and creating value).
As "customers" of higher education institutions, students are interested in a smooth, integrated process which will produce the results they need. They hope to go seamlessly from admissions to registration, file their financial aid application and receive their awards, pay their fees, attend classes, receive advising and grades, and graduate, with the least possible disruption to their learning experience. They expect to initiate these tasks themselves via technology from their homes and dorm rooms. Like customers of any successful service delivery operation, they count on the institution to make their interactions with it easy, fast and painless.
To transform an institution, the focus must be on what its customers want and need. Many tasks that employees perform have nothing to do with meeting customer needs; they are done simply to satisfy the internal demands of the organization, hence the world of multiple reviews, four part forms and complex certification stamps and approval signatures. Often things are done simply because they have always been done that way. Guardianship, gatekeeping, controlling and regulating must give way to collaboration and sharing in the future compatible campus.
Students are not the only customers of higher education, of course. Others include business, government, and society. As higher education expands its focus on customers, we anticipate that network-based, university-organized virtual communities will become more prevalent, playing a very positive role in society.
In some cases, strategic alliances will be created so that key personnel may remain focused on the core competencies of the institution. Although operating a mailroom, the bookstore or a legacy system are part of running the university, none represents the university's core business. Instruction and research are the core businesses. Choosing from a sliding scale, ranging from "insourcing" to "outsourcing," universities will select which activities to "own" and which to contract out to another provider.
A more important step for the 21st century university, however, is the refinement of the notion of partnership. All too often, "partnership" is synonymous with philanthropy. The premise of a partnership suggests that performance can be significantly improved through joint, mutually dependent action. The requirements include risk sharing, the need to view the relationship as a series of exchanges without a definite endpoint, as well as the need to establish a range of mechanisms to monitor and execute the operations of the partnership. Because of the high degree of mutual dependency that evolves, these partnerships become strategic alliances.
As higher education and business become more adept at partnerships and strategic alliances, both parties must develop trust that they share similar goals. Trust and confidence are built up through a working relationship. As trust and confidence are built, mutual dependencies will evolve. This is reinforced by each partner understanding how the other works. Although it takes time to educate each other, the key is sharing knowledge. Of course, effective partners bring distinctive resources to the relationship to build something greater than either could have done alone. Skills are brought by each party. Interdependence may replace autonomy as a characteristic of the 21st century university.
Why do we do what we do?
Why do we do it the way we do?
What must we do? (What is critical to our success and our students?)
What should we do? (without regard to what is currently done)
(Hammer and Champy, 1993)
Why do we do what we do? Why do we do it the way we do? Among the answers are because that is how we were taught and because the culture of higher education emphasizes autonomy. The tradition, the existing infrastructure, the lecture-based experience of faculty and the fact that it is more comfortable to preserve the status quo than to change it all contribute to higher education's lecture-based approach to learning. The tough questions are: What must we do? What should we do?
"Resistance to change is a hallmark of higher education. It has been said that changing a college is a lot like moving a cemetery--you don't get a lot of help from the residents. In this case the residents include the education bureaucrats, the faculty, the administrators, the students and the parents--all stakeholders in the status quo." (O'Banion, 1997).
The challenge for higher education will be to create a culture where change is accepted--even welcomed. Seen in a positive light, higher education is entering one of the most challenging and potentially creative periods in its history. Although to change will require enormous acts of potentially career limiting leadership (Rush, 1995), changes will be required if higher education is to thrive in the 21st century. If higher education is not the architect of change, it may be its victim.
The dilemma is that the future is always becoming the present and the present becomes the past. Our real challenge is to inculcate a culture of change in our institutions. The rate of change in our disciplines, our lives and our society will probably never diminish. Only by making change a part of the academic culture will we be able to continually create our future.
Copyright EUNIS and IBM 1997 Y.E.