The Digital Future of Higher Education

The evidence is clear: when it comes to the use of digital technologies in higher education, generation is not the issue. Portraying technology use in generational terms is simplistic and potentially costly. This is the conclusion of our research and of many other studies. But that doesn't mean our work is done. We still need to gain a fuller and deeper understanding of what impact the pervasive use of digital technologies is having on students and their learning. This is what we are now focusing on in the second phase of our Digital Learners in Higher Education research project. And it also one of the themes of an interesting one day conference that is being organized by Norm Friesen at Thompson Rivers University. Debating the Digital Future of Higher Education will feature keynote presentations by Anya Kamenetz, author of DIY University, and Professor Michael A. Peters, author of Knowledge Economy, Development and the Future of Higher Education and a debate on the net gen issue with yours truly.

The conference takes place Feb 22. Check out the website for details. Early bird registration starts from only $99.

Goodbye Net Gens, Hello First Globals

When a product is no longer selling, businesses will often "re-brand". Take the same thing and call it something different. Does the same thing happen with ideas? Say goodbye to Net Gens and hello to.....First Globals.

In a newly-released book (The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream) John Zogby highlights the emerging influence of the First Globals, whom his book calls "the most outward-looking and accepting generation in American history." First Globals, he says, are more socially tolerant and internationally aware.

According to Zogby the First Globals are causing a "fundamental reorientation of the American character away from wanton consumption and toward a new global citizenry in an age of limited resources."

And of course, there are implications for higher education. According to an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, "these days...students are much more likely to have experienced other cultures firsthand, either as tourists or because they have immigrated from someplace else. Whether college for them is a traditional complex of buildings or an interactive online message board, said Mr. Zogby, there is a different student on campus."

Now, I haven't read this book but I'm always skeptical when I hear sweeping claims being made about paradigm shifts at "lightning speed", "transcendent change" and when educational innovation is compared to microbrewed beer, automobile sharing, and DVD rentals by mail.

Zogby's claims are based on data from polls conducted in 2007 of several thousand Americans.

Read the Chronicle of Higher Education review of the book.

The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream

Net Gen Hype Gets in the Way

In chapter 14 of Educating the Net Generation, Carole Barone makes a a powerful case for significant institutional change in higher education to address the changing social and economic realities. She argues that technology and pedagogy are converging and in the process challenging "the structure, governance, power relationships, and cultural values of the traditional campus. Efforts to transform higher education face deeply entrenched cultural, behavioral, and philosophical resistance" (p. 14-1).

She calls for the creation of a "new academy" that is founded on five characteristics:

• The interplay of culture and technology (the socio-technological context)
• A multidimensional framework for action
• New cultural values
• A new style of leadership
• The relationship of learning to space

But one of her main arguments for this change is based on the net generation hype:

"The arrival of the Net Generation on campus is causing unrest in the classroom.¹ A wave of young people empowered to create knowledge, not merely absorb it, now flows in and out of the classroom, calling into question the convictions and processes that have served as the foundation of traditional higher education. It remains to be seen whether traditional higher education will adjust sufficiently to truly engage the Net Generation."

And on what does she base this claim of the net generation revolution ? Two articles. One by Jason Frand, The Information-Age Mindset: Changes in Students and Implications for Higher Education that is based entirely on the author's personal observations of students at his institution, but no solid empirical research. The other, a thoughtful and interesting article by Gary Brown, that discusses what he sees as the growing disengagement of students from learning in higher education and the sense that higher education and what happens in the real world are two different things. Neither of these provide the evidence of the the Net Generation revolution that Barone speaks of.

A strong case can be made for institutional change in higher education without resorting to unsubstantiated claims about the Net Generation.