Humans have shown an incredible capacity to adopt technology in ways that improve, enhance and revolutionize our collective existence. Clearly, the Internet is the frontier of social impact technologies. But the Internet is not just the means to view books in electronic form or pay bills online. It is a platform for using computational tools to enhance and bring new meaning to fundamental human pursuits.
Pew Research estimates that 87 percent of American adults now use the Internet, a figure that jumps to 97 percent for adults under 30. These numbers will soon increase to virtually 100 percent and “use” will entail seamless integration into nearly every aspect of life.
Online delivery has already transformed many centuries-old social enterprises. Banking, communication, commerce, government, news and art are all now more accessible, less expensive and faster to use and evolve. (They also require fewer people to do more work, which is another issue that requires serious rethinking of the design of the economy and the workforce, but that is an issue for another discussion.) The Internet is now integrated into much of higher education, and the future is promising.
However, the way we think about online learning is inadequate. Attitudes generally fall into one of two prevailing camps: online learning optimism and pessimism. Both sides are entrenched in meaningless, largely unproductive opposition, perhaps because both perspectives talk past one another in advancing valid points.
Optimists see online learning as inevitable, driven by demand for greater efficiency. Pessimists see institutions abusing government programs and uninformed consumers to maximize profits while undermining or even mocking quality of learning outcomes as a concept.
Within this polarized mix of ideas rests an underappreciated but important third perspective: online learning realism.
At Arizona State University, we see ourselves as online learning realists. We view the Internet as a platform for augmenting traditional learning while advancing an enterprise of highly responsive, personalized education.
It is true that many colleges are expensive, inaccessible and lacking in capacity necessary to restore America’s lead in producing college graduates, a position lost in this present generation. Prevailing models rely on schedules designed for ancient agrarian life. Teaching is inflexible, built around faculty-centric cultures, overly standardized and unresponsive to changing knowledge demands.
The American economy has thrived over the past two centuries as slow, limited and expensive craft production shifted to the mass production of high quality yet affordable goods. Higher education mirrored this transition, as the predominant college form shifted from small, mainly theological schools to the large public and private universities of today. These schools followed a factory model of production with standardized, inflexible modes of learning.
Recently, a new production paradigm has emerged in response to consumer demands for goods that are not only affordable and high quality, but also personalized. Companies like Dell and Nike thrive by offering built-to-order products at the scale and cost of mass produced products. Mired in slavish admiration for tradition, large universities have not yet embraced the new productive paradigm pioneered by industrial peers, despite the advantages it holds for students and the overall economy.
We at ASU see online learning — both at an immersive, face-to-face university and in a fully online mode — as a key technology in the transformation of education towards a personalized, accessible and high-quality future. The tools and instruments of online learning have emerged as instruments that help us better understand how individual students learn. In the online environment we can track and assess learning outcomes more effectively than in the traditional environment. In turn, instructors and partners can design interventions that complement students’ natural, highly sophisticated learning processes.
For example, Zaption transforms online videos from passive instruction to active learning tools by embedding elements like quizzes, questions, and discussions. Smart Sparrow and ASU have built a deep learning environment for new ways to teach science and we have partnered with the Mayo Clinic to advance a hybrid online learning environment where top-tier medical students build a knowledge base online, then spend class time focusing on high-intensity clinical knowledge and skills.
As online learning realists, we understand that the emergence of viable technological models takes time. It is true that early forms of online learning posed great threats to quality and were often abused by short-sighted, selfish institutions to maximize their revenue (or profit) margins. It is unfortunate when a college commits to advancing an online learning enterprise for the sake of financial expediency. It is just as bad when a college fails to commit because the road has been rocky. We should commit to online learning because of its promise to reinvent and enhance the age-old models that prevail in higher education. With deliberate effort, there is no foreseeable end to our ability to adapt to anything the future may bring.
Michael M. Crow is president of Arizona State University and former executive vice provost of Columbia University. Derrick M. Anderson is the adviser to the president for innovation at ASU and a professor in the School of Public Affairs.