For a couple of years, my keynotes and plenary talks incorporated a bit about Nick Nolte as a framework. It was a description of the evolution of education technology over time, based on Mr. Nolte’s high and low points as markers.
The bit began by showing a picture of ‘sexiest man’ Nolte hot off of a dramatic role instead of the action pieces he was typically known for. My ed tech corollary was that there was a ton of promise back then (1992), seeing visionaries casting a hyper-connected, AI filled, education-technology-panacea that would democratize education and really tackle the mobility gap.
Learning from home without taking a correspondence course was just becoming a realistic idea and the idea of computers in classrooms was well established (although the vast majority were Macs alone).
The bit continued by showing an alcohol soaked mugshot of Nick (around 2002) who was not having one of his better days. My talk went on to suggest that we had squandered much of our ed tech resources (and goodwill). We were asking the wrong questions, like, “how do I do online what I do face to face?” Not only does this fallacy assume that our face to face experiences are optimal (which research soundly suggests they are not), it also sits squarely at the bottom rung of Puentadura’s SAMR model for how to best use education technology: Substitution —> Augmentation —> Modification —> Redefinition.
We were “aiming low” by trying to simply substitute technology for non-technology experiences.
So, when I would finally show a fresh faced, back-on-top Nolte in 2012, it not only received some laughs, but made it easy to explain how educators were finally asking the right questions in ed tech. Teachers had finally moved on from “professing” paradigms to “learning” paradigms. The MOOC craze was well underway and even though I said at the time it was a waste of energy, the ideas were finally about how to break out of the boxes and not simply fill them differently. Everything just felt like we were on the cusp of greatness (in terms of eLearning, anyway).
But now that we’re almost another decade into that cycle, and as I head to Educuase (which really is like the Detroit Automotive show of Ed Tech), perhaps it’s worth taking a pulse check again. How well are we leveraging education technology as we approach 2020? Are we asking the right questions? Are we using ed tech effectively?
As with any trend or transformation, there are good and bad examples all around. On the negative side, technology “systems” (in higher ed) are rare, seeing far, far more disparate experiences at most colleges and universities. The ever-present factors of budget, vision, implementation, and bureaucracy have weighed heavily on the landscape of ed tech over time. Let me give you an example:
Brandon Hall Group Study
At most schools, the LMS is the kingpin of technology. Ironically, almost every user of the LMS wants another one (or the very least, they want their existing LMS to do a LOT more…) But you can see the power of this system through funding, time, and more. This means that the LMS garners resources in the form of money, people, add-ons, integrations, and more.
But as a person who worked at an LMS company (arguably with more full-time users than any system for a decade), I can assure you that the LMS was not designed to be the center of the student experience, nor is the Frankensteining of functionalities to try and become such a centerpiece a good idea. Add to that the power and influence it finally gives academic affairs in the ed tech portfolio of their school, typically seeing a hands-off approach by I.T., and the LMS is expected to do even greater things than are reasonable. Yet due to considerations of money, a lack of system architecture vision, or political ownership, this is how the LMS works on many, many campuses. It actually deepens the silos around the university, rather than acting as a unifying platform.
“We need to get student organizations talking to one another.”
”Let’s use the LMS!”
“We want AI chat-bots to help students find tutors.”
”Why not put that in the LMS?”
“The basketball team needs its own page on a website but our web master has locked everything down.”
”I know – the LMS!”
So, in 2019, I do not think is unfair to say that Ed Tech = LMS (and any LTI configured tools that can glom on) at many institutions.
On the other end of the spectrum is a small, but wealthy group of research schools who do not over-value the LMS at all. In fact, they may not even pay much attention to the LMS and/or they may be trying to create an LMS out of a conglomeration of other tools which were never designed to function that way. But disparate still rings quite true on these campuses.
I recently had a conversation with the Academic Technology Director at such a university. They had more than 400 unique tools in the portfolio. Of those 400, only a handful actually integrated and “talked” to one another. Students got lost regularly as the paradox of choice was alive and well. But every tool, no matter how minor, was actually being used by someone, somewhere. Between cries of academic freedom allowing instructors to use whatever technology they wished, despite its lack of available data for the institution to help students and how hard it made things for students, and the cries of researchers needing just the right platform for their experiments, the student experience was lousy.
But, in 2019, there are positives. While they may be realized more rarely than most would like to see, there are a lot of tremendously positive things in the ed tech space these days.
I think it only right to start with integration. There are more and more options, far beyond simple LTI integration, which allow for genuine, meaningful sharing of records, data, and beyond. Even if a tool doesn’t natively have this capability, an entire genre of connectors exist, turning disparate silos into connected platforms, and making unique tools feel like one experience.
This naturally progresses to tremendous increases in learning analytics. While many student success platforms are still stuck in the academic-only (cognitive) mindset, some are finally branching out to seek affective (engagement) and conative (effort / striving) behaviors too. So, rather than focusing all of a school’s budget against helping 1/3 of the students who struggle academically, they can finally help 100% of students with whatever sticking point they might be facing. Tools and platforms can do all of this today, assuming they are assembled correctly.
So, as we look at a context of pros and cons, and even as we see a landscape that might not look that different in 2019 than it did in 2009, I believe we can take heart. Incremental changes will start to speed up. Colleges and universities will start to steal ideas from other industries that finally make ed tech a powerful asset. Similarly, education technology providers will speed up solutions, also taking best of breed ideas from other contexts and innovating in the space. The LMS will start to move into a much more appropriate, helpful position as a piece of the chessboard instead of the board itself. And maybe, just maybe, education will finally be able to say that their students actually learn, and that upward mobility is now a reality. Yes, scads of research suggest neither of those things are accurate today, but soon…maybe we’ll see Mr. Nolte get a lifetime achievement award and ed tech will help make the ultimate goal of education a reality.
Good luck and good learning.
(Want to get help creating your own learning ecosystem which genuinely leverages ed tech as it should be? Contact the institute and let’s start a conversation!)