UNISA: South Africa

At the Threshold: Higher education, complexity, and change
George Siemens
September 1, 2011
Pretoria, South Africa

With thanks to fellowship via
For thinking time

First, a few thoughts on complexity and change

Complex systems:
“a set of diverse actors who dynamically interact with one another awash in a sea of feedbacks.”
Miller and Page, 2007

Complexity:
“disturbing traits of mess, of the inextricable, or disorder, of ambiguity, or uncertainty”
Morin, 2008

Complicated systems:
Reducible, every piece fits, cause-effect relationship

Learning is a
complex process(mainly because people are complex)
Our institutions today (attempt to) manage it like it is
complicated system.

If it changes how information is created
If it changes how information is shared
If it changes how information is evaluated…
If it changes how people connect
If it changes how people communicate
If it changes what people can do for themselves…

Then it will change
education,
teaching,
and learning

Yeah, but then why has the education system been slow to change?

JamilSalmi, 2009

Mixed messages

“Thirty years from now the big university campuses will be relics. Universities won't survive. It's as large a change as when we first got the printed book.”
Drucker, Forbes, 1997

Students, however, can no longer assume that a four year degree will be the golden ticket to a good job in a global economy that cares little for their social networking skills and more about what their labor is worth on the global marketplace.
Bill Gross, 2011

20 people under the age of 20.
$100,000.
Drop out of school.
Change the world.

Higher education: the latest bubble?

…and in the other corner

150.6 million higher education students globally. 53% increase from 2000.
Altbach, Reisberg, Rumbley, 2009

India.
Challenge:
add 800 new universities by 2020
June 9, 2011

$20 Billion. Opened September 2009

University as economic engines:
In the economy of the future, the businesses that will have staying power, and growth potential, will be those most dependent on knowledge — on research, new ideas, new technologies, new processes, upgraded skills for their workers.
Rockefeller Institute, 2010

Universities won’t go away.But they won’t be like we know them today.

Distance education represents an area of enormous potential for higher education systems around the world struggling to meet the needs of growing and changing student populations.
The distance learning landscape has been transformed by ICTs, allowing for real growth in numbers and types of providers, curriculum developers, modes of delivery and pedagogical innovations.
Altbach, Reisberg, Rumbley, 2009

http://www.scribd.com/doc/48586092/KPCB-Top-10-Mobile-Trends

The university has secured the option to borrow $7-million to help pay for the project and may spend $4-million to $7-million of that money over the next several years, he said.
In order to repay what it borrows, Mr. Greenstein outlined a new plan to offer the online courses to people not enrolled at the University of California, as well as to undergraduates. Tuition from those students will pay the loan back, he said.”

Everyone, every company, every cause, can/will have their own university

Creating integrated ecosystems:Content,Delivery,Assessment
(he who integrates, rules.
Really, I mean that)

Change coming from the outside.Edtech entrepreneurs & startups.

Other change drivers:
Cloud
Big Data
Mobiles
Globalization
Internationalization

Challenge for universities in advanced economies:
sustainability
Challenge for emerging economies:
meeting existing demand

What would education look like if we designed it today?

It would look like the internet
Open
Accessible
Distributed
Scalable
Social
Networked
Self-organizing
Creativity-driven
Derivative and iterative improvements
Connected to amplify effects
Adaptive
Global
Multimedia-based

Or, a bit like this:

2008, 2009, 2011

But we’re not the only ones.

What is the technical ecosystem of open online learning?

and the pedagogical model?

change.mooc.ca
Twitter: gsiemens
www.elearnspace.org/blog
Learning Analytics & Knowledge 2012:
Vancouver
http://lak12.sites.olt.ubc.ca/

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UNISA: South Africa

by gsiemens on Sep 01, 2011

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