Will's Blog 2020 Vision

Will Richardson was blogging about the vision of education in 2020. He had read the following quote from Collins and Halverson’s book Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology, “we are not going to fix education by fixing the schools”. This quote really disturbed and concerned Will who has two children in the school system. He felt that much could change in the next ten years, but how much really will change. He believes “that the current structure of the education system in this country is fundamentally flawed in preparing students for a life of learning”.
I agree with Will that our structure of education is flawed. I know more about the college system than the K-12 educational system. I know at the college level, students are far superior than most of their instructors when it comes to using technology to find and share information. Because of that, students are learning in a variety of ways that are not traditional. Basic teaching has not changed in 100 years. The teacher standing at the front of the classroom lecturing and students sitting in rows of desks were common place. Today, students learn by reading, writing, and watching the web. I know just as my college students want to use technology to learn, the younger students in school are even more adapt at technology and social media. They are the ones who are really growing up in this techo-environmental age and will know no other way. How will teachers be able to relate in ten years?
Our students need to learn how to continue learning throughout their lives. If teachers cannot guide them, then who? Some students believe everything on the internet is real. Who’s duty is it to tell them the truth and help them find their way through all the murky statements on the web? I hope teachers will still be a facilitating force in 2020.
As for the first quote, I agree that fixing the schools is not the way to fix education. We are moving beyond the walls of the physical school. Ten years ago, on-line courses were just beginning to form. Now on-line courses are the fastest growing courses. At my college one classroom course may have four versions of the same course on-line. Sometimes it is a space issue, other times we just have so many students wanting to take the same course. I understand the issues, but I still hope the classroom does not disappear by 2020.