This blog may prove to be a bit different. I’ve done different blogs before – interviews, comedy sketches, a few videos, a list of resources, etc. But this one may be the most unusual. I want to put a placeholder in the world and this is likely a good place to do it.
Do you know those times when you know something that is likely going to happen, but you never get a chance to tell anyone, then that thing happens, but it also means that after the fact you look like you are making up any knowledge that it was coming? It’s like watching your friend try to jump over a stairway handrail. You know he’s going to do some serious damage to his manhood, or other parts of his anatomy. But you don’t say anything until after he’s writhing on the ground. Do you know that time? Anyone? Bueller?
Ok, maybe that was too specific. How about this. Have you ever watched a classroom where the professor has no idea what active learning is? They still perform the same lectures they have used for years. You know in the first 60 seconds what’s coming. Students will fall asleep, some will try to furiously write down every word while missing a healthy amount of it (and not absorbing any), and still others will simply stare off into the world, trying to remember why they are attending college, etc. You KNOW it’s coming. Well, this blog is like that.
I know, in my gut, that something bad is coming. Not bad for a person and not “doom and gloom” bad for our country or anything. But I know something bad is coming for a specific institute of higher ed. I have spent the week pouring over research and information about this place and writing down conclusions. It’s happening.
Obviously, I could be wrong. In fact, I hope I’m wrong. But I don’t think I am. So, let this blog serve as a placeholder. If I am indeed correct, I’ll post the writing that I’ve done and point back here to remind you it was coming. If it doesn’t happen within a time frame I have allotted to it (I’ve set a long term alarm), I’ll post that I was wrong too. But again…I don’t think I am.
But it does set me in mind of several articles I’ve read recently. Harvard‘s HBS, The Guardian, and Inside Higher Ed report this kind of news regularly. So consider this my placeholder for insights into what I’m (unfortunately) pretty good at…trend spotting and problems with scale in higher ed systems.
Good luck and good learning.