Ravensbourne 2020 - Education - Sue Thomas

The academics view of 2020:
Not about technology alone but how it is used. Boundaries between communities of practice will be impermeable. Brokerage and synergies between communities of practice will become more important.

Things are moving so fast we cant possibly imagine but teaching will certainly change and need to change. Students have to be equipped to work in a rapidly changing world with rapidly changing technologies.

Education in a faster and shallower world is a challenge. How do you have educational authority in such a world?

Robins dying out and sparrows increasing due to communication.

Educational challenges massive in 2020 due to Asia competition and demographic change. Spirit, culture and experience will be our own advantage in the west.

From mass production to mass configuration in 2020. Personalisation and localised supply of goods and artifacts.

Conserving the balance between technology and humanism is critical.

What happens to the long game in education in 2020. What's the impact on the student experience. How do people gain experience to become freelancers when they are not afforded the longer learning experience.

If students are less qualified now than they were ten years ago what will it be like in 2020? Where will the one to one, face to face experience come from?

We have an opportunity to start with a clean sheet and provide a distinctive digital experience.

Prof. Sue Thomas: www.suethomas.net
Bruce Sterling 'Shaping Things' Read this. Also the 'Internet of Things'.

MAKE and CRAFT websites run by O'Reilly - Tim O'Reilly. About traditions brought up to date.

Not about the book or the internet. It is about the coming together of both - 'Transliteracy'. Visual alternative could be 'Transvisuality'. Not one or the other but an 'ecology of literacy'.

Some are beginning to jump over the reading and writing process thanks to the improvements in technology and the internet. We don't all need to read and write. Some people need to fish...

A picture can be worth a thousand words. Writing is not an absolute truth, just a semblance of truth.

Howard Rheingold teaching in second life example.

Obama's Social Media Advantage. Best example of social media for business impact. At least 'personal business'

'It's not about wires. It's about people'

Deep attention is a real luxury and good for complex problem solving. It inhibits other abilities and hyper attention can be equally important to living.

Ronald Burt - 'Transliteracy in the network'. Some types don't go out the corporate network, others frequently go out and back in to share and often a will find b a disruption, others find him creative and desirable. Structural holes are vital to the health of the networks. Always loook for opportunities for new structural holes.

Where are our current transliteracy spaces and where will we create new ones in the future? Some people work well in such spaces others don't.

Many still find it easier and less time consuming to teach and prepare traditional learning experiences rather than digital learning experiences. This highlights the need to train the teaching staff else the student digital expectation and ability will quickly overtake.

There is a reluctance to embrace what is not known by the teaching generation.

Ravensbourne should become a focus for an anthropological study about new learners, new teachers and teaching techniques.

How do we remain ahead of the game and privde the space to develop new ideas and techniques? New merged teaching techniques combining the best of industry and Ravensbourne could become one of the focuses of a future lab model.

Continually shifting lab based research combining academics, community and businesses. Our thought leadership needs to responsive and fast paced. This is what Ravensbourne could do well. To make this work we need to cherry pick the right individuals to be involved. Librarians are key in this transliteracy process.

Creating the space and environment and head space to foster brokerage between people, communities and disciplines. We can do this through the lab space and EIC.

This is to be a key part of the remit of the future lab. 'Developing community, business and education futures through creativity and technology'.

The lab steering group to include learning enhancement, eic, ma, design and comms. One member from each.