Disintermediated Education
Last Friday Manu Sharma came in and gave us a review of Richard Florida’s talk in Ottawa. Manu came with high praise for Richard Florida as a speaker and a starter of thoughtful and controversial conversation, which is high praise coming from Manu as he is not easily impressed.
One of the points that hit home from Florida’s talk was that research universities as we know them today will become disintermediated.
dis·in·ter·me·di·a·tion (d s- n t r-m d – sh n). n. “Disintermediation is giving the user or the consumer direct access to information that otherwise would require a mediator, such as a salesperson, a librarian, or a lawyer. Observers of the Internet and the World Wide Web note that these new technologies give users the power to look up medical, legal information, travel, or comparative product data directly, in some cases removing the need for the mediator (doctor, lawyer, salesperson) or at the very least changing the relationship between the user and the product or service provider.”
While Florida was speaking mainly of research institutions, a similar point for post graduate education was made by Michael Wesch, an award winning professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas state university. There is a disconnect between the evolution of our educational institutions and the evolution of our technology, culture, and opportunities for learning. Learning is now easy – thanks to the open availability of information. North American education remains expensive and fragmented. It is also painfully clear as a student that a North American professor’s primary duty is not to teach - it is to perform research.
The question is, if the current state continues, what value will the educational institution provide in the future? Prestige – maybe. Learning – this will become debatable. Once this value lowers, so will prestige in time.
I am currently completing a masters degree in Engineering Management. While the theoretical knowledge I am obtaining from the university has been irreplaceable, the thought provoking conversations occurring in TalentBridge have surpassed those occurring in my master’s program. That is what needs to change in order to create value for our institutions. Especially at a post graduate level – it should be the norm, and not the exception, to have professors that lead thought provoking, perhaps even controversial, discussions. Otherwise, every student will need a TalentBridge, a mentor, a learning community to augment their education. Anyone can read textbooks on their own. But wait – isn’t that what I’m paying thousands of dollars to the universities to provide me with in the first place?
I think that many students are complaining from this same problem. Universities are becoming kind of institutes which offer degrees, the more you pay, the more prestigious is your degree. And we keep complaining for not having “practical” teaching from universities.
In my opinion, we dont have to blame universities, but instead the professors and their new business-oriented approaches. Not all professors are equal for sure. Some (and they re becoming few with time) are still honest to their beliefs. I give you an example to both types:
the first, the very attractive, good looking professors, who are becoming managers of 30 or more graduate students, and who know nothing about the details of their papers, and concerned more on the “quantity” of papers they publish. Most of these professors are publishing for the sake of publishing. They are not dealing with “fundamental scientific questions” (as they are not “practical”), and not giving any real care to the contents of their courses ! (which are nothing but surveys any one can have). However, these professors are making fun of students, get good amount of research funds, well known and famous and attractive to those who dont know them !
The second type are those that consume a huge amount of their energies preparing their courses, asking challenging questions to their students to force them to think. They deeply analyze the researches of others to show the students “guidelines” of how they (i.e. the professors) are thinking. [if such guidelines were followed, then any problem whether in academia or industry can be solved in an "easier" manner - for me, this is the purpose of academia]. These professors, although of their energetic characters, can not supervise more than 6 graduate students a year (because supervising for them is not as easy as you may think). The main problem, however, is that these professors are not “attractive” anymore. They hardly get any sort of research grant. As a consequence, they loose the motivation – and the quality of their courses get worse, and follow other paths! (in any case, they re getting their salaries)!
It is getting much worse in today universities ! — Academia teaches how to think. It is a place where people think about challenging questions that tell us who we are, what we have around us, and what we will be !