The Changing Landscape of the Classroom.

So, one of the courses I loooove teaching is Literature of Science Fiction. We meet in a 18th century style classroom with 20th century technology and talk about the big "what if" questions of the future that authors like Jules Verne, Isaac Asimov, and Ursula K. LeGuin pose.

One of the themes of the course is the mythology of the future, or rather, cautionary tales of a society coming to grips with new technologies. Many of these stories prey on the reader's fear of the unknown (be it alien or cybernetic). These authors speculate as to what the future might bring in order to get an emotional reaction from the audience.

The Wall Street Journal article "What College Will Be Like in 2023" is seemingly such a Science Fiction piece, speculative in nature and written to get an emotional reaction and to get clicks. Yes, I can see colleges becoming more digital, using grade management systems and early alert systems to communicate with students like never before.

Yes, textbooks like likely change. Yes, giant lecture halls with a sage on the stage will be less and less popular. Yes, the online landscape will get much, much larger.

But the article doesn't address the community college model of small classrooms and individualized instruction. Many students need the "touch," person to person interaction. There is a reason why we see more and more "incubators" in the business world. We've got strong social networks both in the personal and business world, yet incubators sprung up and became popular despite those online social platforms.

Students will turn away from the lecture hall in the university, but I think those students won't just flock to MOOCs (I don't think I've heard the term in several months), but they will flock to what learning will fit them, an online platform or a small classroom setting, or a bit of both.

Thus, I think Sierra College will look much the same in 10 years. Our online program will have grown, certainly, and we will see textbooks become more customized as they become more digital (my students already find the stories we read for class on line), but I think we will still offer a lot of on ground classes, too, as many of our students are still and will still want an IRL social education.