Moving at the Speed of Creativity by Wesley Fryer

Evolution of the Role of Faculty in Higher Education

Next preso here: “Evolution of the Role of Faculty in Higher Education”
– question: how will technology impact the faculty role?

part of “If we know then what we know now” eLearning2005 preso

faculty role is impacted by
– email, discussion boards, bulletin boards, chat rooms
– web based research (Google it)
– applications for word processing, presentations, etc
– course management systems (www.classbot.com)
– instructional delivery systems

CEO of Xerox has talked about PowerPoint being evil, suggested not using PPT (people are shocked by this)

We developed our own home grown CMS system using open source technology: www.classbot.com
– this is managed by a faculty member in our department

Terra Cognita working out of Austin is doing amazing work on instructional design

traditional instruction is defined by a classroom
– integrated in conventional learning modes
– resistance, mistrust of technology, hesitation in adoption, insecurity
– problems are not with educators: problems are with the system

I DISAGREE: I THINK A LOT OF THE PROBLEM IS WITH PEOPLE WHO DON’T WANT TO CHANGE. THIS IS COMMON TO THE HUMAN CONDITION, NOT JUST SPECIFIC TO EDUCATORS THO.

From teaching and managing to facilitating and orchestrating (not a control freak)
– no “classroom” as we traditionally think of it (just to manage the learners)
– organic, dynamic classes: classes don’t have the definition of the 4 walls, they can change over time and place
– individualized learning, optimum cohorts
– automation of administrative tasks
– global learning space

CISCO is a lot like a college campus, very creative
– lots of teaching and learning always happening
– lots of flexibility built into the environment
– CISCO has resources and flexibility, everyone sometimes goes and creates their own tool
– every process at CISCO HAS to be online, nothing is done in hard copy!

What would be the faculty role, how would technology be used in the future
– learners will be multitasking, somewhat scatterbrained about finding the content: that is the reality
– Boundaries of the classroom are melting away
– at CISCO all our learning is virtual, the so-called “learning community of the future” is going to be different

Faculty are going to have to come up with ways to accomodate individual learning needs of students
– different strata / levels of the learners can be accomodated

MY THOUGHT: I NEED TO DESIGN MY WINTER ONLINE CLASS WITH THESE MODALITIES AND PEDAGOGIES IN MIND

Hope that LMS systems will be portals
– are connected to other portals
– portals will be homogeneous in a scary way? maybe?

Idea of a global learning space: boundaries of the classroom are no longer defined
– the learning space can be negotiated between students and faculty
– should be defined beyond brick and mortar, across national boundaries even
– not just a local audience

Other areas that will evolve
– instructional support: perception of organizational support by the faculty member is really key
– learning management support
– vast knowledge base
– focus on development of the learner
– varying evaluation models (including greater reliance on peer, automated, experts, self)

Support in the future for instruction needs to be more transparent and pervasive

At CISCO we spend about 9 months (that is very long in business context) trying to bring all learning organizations together, to develop a competency library / index of all the different roles we need in CISCO moving forward
– something like this could be replicated in higher education
– a growing and dynamic knowledge base

CISCO is a universe unto itself with 25,000 employees worldwide
– bringing the experts to your students is much less of a challenge today than it has been before
– the process of doing this needs to be much easier for educational settings

Challenges: what is going to make those changes happen
– we have to get beyond on perceptions that shackle us, when we focus on our current problems and limitations
– our attitude is key
– our willingness to adapt and learn
– our ability to conduct considered experiments (AND FAIL)
– economic, logistical and infrastructural support

MY THOUGHT: THE FAILURE BOW IS KEY HERE! 🙂

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