Well, let's look at HE 20 years ago and see how far we have come and then extrapolate those trends with a few tweaks, say for the exponential advances in technology, for the next 20 years. Yes, that should work....
1996
20 years ago I would arrive at work as a junior lecturer in my Volvo. My office was rather Spartan but had its own PC which would take a time to fire up but on which I could draft emails, letters and reports and search a growing amount of data some fearless folk had mounted on something they called the World Wide Web. Research would typically be word processed by secretarial staff. Some colleagues even dictated letters to them! My bookshelves housed a number of key textbooks and books published by conferences and research books and my filing cabinets overflowed with printed acetates, ready to be removed and used as the bi-weekly lecture was to be delivered. At lunchtime I would repair to the staff room to share gossip and observations with colleagues. Teaching would be easy. I spoke, students listened and took notes, I set an exam and the students either passed or failed.
2016
Today, I arrive at work as a senior lecturer at the top of my pay scale on my bike. My office has hardly changed in all these years but the Laptop in my rucksack plugs into the desktop docking station and access to databases, online books and publications, powerful software and the now ubiquitous email and VLE are at my fingertips. There are books on my shelves but these largely act as "serious" wallpaper for podcast and webinar appearances. All research papers is self-typed with fairly mixed ressults. I no longer have filing cabinets or much paper in my office and teaching materials are online, ready for me to drag them from the network in any of the lecture spaces I use. Lunch is at the desk and gossip is confined to corridor conversations and toilet breaks. Teaching is challenging as students need to be engaged by the delivery and the material. Being lecture captured they can catch up later and concentrate on their Facebook conversations and so the classroom experience becomes a synthesis of entertainment and information. Assessment is more varied. Coursework and a shorter exams mean that frequent feedback and swift marking is vital.
2036
In 20 years my successor will not leave home. He or she will sit, in their leisure wear purchased in the 1 Euro shop in their own apartment and use their personal tablet with virtual 5D voice recognition and movement control to be in constant seamless conversations with students worldwide via synchronous chat room, vidmail, and working under a zero hours contract that determines pay on the basis of online time and recorded interaction. The materials taught have been prepared by "experts" and vidcast to students on demand as they follow courses at their own pace and according to their own timetables.
Research is confined to big data analysis of student databases as most academic research is now undertaken by a small number of spin out consultancies based in so called "top" universities. Assessment of students is continuous as algorithms analyse the quality of their interactions after, first, verifying identity by bio data and online quizzes and peer assessed short text inputs complete the picture of achievement.
Happily I will not be taking much notice in 20 years time but my grandchildren will. What sort of future do we really want them to experience?
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