Building Virtual Universities

Anonymous Coward writes "Psychologist and AI guru Roger Schank has an essay at the Edge about The Need for the Virtual University. Surprisingly, he sees nothing special about virtual universities except for the narrow window of opportunity to make schools that don't suck." Spend the time to read the whole article (it's in interview format and quite long) and you might come away with more than that. Schank raises some good questions - and proposes some good answers to them.

Comments

Asking for the impossible ...

[LL]

Universities have always evolved over the centures, from the birthing grounds of monastaries (still reflected in graduation regalia) teaching reading/writing, to librarians of classical times, to liberal colleges after renaisance, to modern technology powerhouses. What form it will take in the next century, whether virtual or otherwise, remains to be seen. One thing I have noticed is that as economies switch from agarian->industrial->manufacturing->service->knowl edge, the average age at which a person becomes "employable" rises. Thus while a kid can watch over herds, nowadays you need a minimum of honors or double degrees to have half a chance of getting into a professional career.

I think people underestimate the difficulties facing tertiary education. The problem is that there is no single "university". Instead that term can cover the gamult of technical education (adult learning), teaching colleges, research universities, plus corporate labs/training campuses, each trying gain the prestigue of being called a university and thus diluting the value of the term. Also given the rising costs and reduced public resources, it will be more expensive for individuals to select the education they desire.

The unspoken question in the interview was how to sort out the "right" choice for each potential student. Given humankind's inability to predict the future, many young people have no real clue as to what they want to do in life, much less the best method to cultivate their talents. In the grand scheme of things (ignoring any taught material), universities act as a filter and sorting mechanism, allowing companies to select the top 5-20% on the basis that if you've got half-a-clue and are willing enough to slog it out for 3-4 years in a competitive environment with your peers, then at least you are marginally employable and can thus be trained :-).

On the role of teaching, there are certain basic foundations which are essential for certain disciplines such as mathematics for many of the physical sciences. How many would willingly take up maths if it wasn't forced down their throats at an early age? While Richard Feynman was correct in saying "If you can't explain it, you don't understand it", there is a serious shortage of people who are both brilliant at research and excellent at teaching especially if the institutional incentive structures are not aligned this way. In short, you are asking for superstars, and in turn these superstars want superstudents (otherwise it would be a waste of their time) and the universities set harder entry barriers which raises the average cost (fewers students per staff). A rather tough cycle to break out of, not to mention the general upmanship and educational arms race (my supercomputer is bigger than your supercomputer etc).

So how can universities change to become more effective? The major problem is that education is not really market driven, more like a semi-regulated oliopoly (state charters, national certifications, etc) with all the expected distortions. The prestige factor alone can influence students in selecting a potential course though they may well not be totally suited or happy. Demonstrating competence is a difficult feat as there are many different skills and requirements for different disciplines. It is not like open source where one can point to as the CV and others can determine the quality (or lack thereof). Given the arrival of the web, I would toss out some possible directions education can head:

1. students publish their work on the web and employees can eyeball their ability
   
2. fractionalised departments from different universities can join up and offer more complete courses
   
3. more independent evaluation of courses and student grapevine
   
4. you don't like your notes, copy another uni
   
5. more clueless use of wasteful technology
   
6. students end up learning more about the real world by participating in group talkfests like /. !
   

So to sum things up

• universities have changed over the centuries
  
• there are diverse elements in the tertiary sector
  
• as a filtering mechanism, universities do provide a rough ranking
  
• research and teaching superstars are rare
  
• more transparency will (hopefully) lead to better choices
  
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    LL