Wikipedia on Higher Education in the US
King, Gary and Maya Sen. 2013. "The Troubled Future of Colleges and Universities." PS January 2013 83-89
Three Challenges: Political, Economic, Educational > business model, government support, mission
What do universities do: create, preserve, distribute knowledge
How do universities run? Tuition
Economic Attacks. Internet. Distance Learning. For Profits. Startups.
Politics.
Todd Hixon Higher Education is Now Ground Zero for Disruption Forbes JAN 6, 2014
Clayton Christensen. Improving Higher Education Through Disruption
pace of technological progress in almost every market outstrips the ability of customers to use that progress"
=
Litmus tests
- do we target customers who have not been able to do something
- is it aimed at folks who will love the simple version?
- will it help them do more easily and effectively what they are already trying to do?
Rob Abel What is Disruptive Innovation in Education?
Issue: how institutions should invest resources
"Impact Awards" : access, affordability, or quality
What are some over-hyped things? What does he mean by overhyped?
"crossing the chasm"
MOOC
"All disruptions share a pattern, Disruptions [from new technology] first compete against nonconsumption [of old technology] …The technology improves and the underlying cost declines"
Abel's 3 Points
- Service models and educational quality. Issue: in ed is it about entering at the "low quality" end? Abel says no, rather shortened masters and such.
- Not massification but "relevant" and personalized.Overlooked point "highly usable toolkit for faculty…."
- LONG TAIL. Ed as needing to aim at niches and so tools that allow for flexible diversity and easy coordination/integration. (Tenets not tenants)
- MMOCs as "tutorial"
The more you commoditize education, the less valuable. DJR: which kind of valuable?
Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn. "Student Centric Educational Technology"
What do they actually mean by "student-centric"?
IMPORTANT: typical approach is "cram the innovation into its existing operating model to sustain what it already does."
I think they misuse "disruptively" under "Student as Consumer" - it implies that disruption is a strategy or way of doing things. That's a common misreading. Some work needs to be done to make the leap from disruption as description of what happens to description of a move one can make.
Take-away: if you want to try a new way to do things, look for unserved portions of customer space.