Lately, as another 6 years of education comes to an end, I've been discussing traditional higher education with some friends. One raised the interesting point that despite the enormous increase in the number of students entering higher education and the increased accessibility of information thanks to the internet the process of education has barely changed since the post-war boom. It seems like a reasonable suggestion that there must be a more effective way to educate and in particular prepare students for employment while at university.
My university claim to offer career-oriented education. They encourage 12-month internships and throughout my course I've been exposed to many projects. I, along with most people I know, found the internship the most valuable component of the course. However, what about the coursework in general and in particular the projects? Are they truly representative of professional life? Ultimately no, I don't believe so. Projects are used just like traditional tests, to reinforce the facts and information presented in lectures. They are group, open-book exams. In my experience professional projects never reinforce prior learning, they always require new research, the development of new skills, applying new technology (or at least new concepts), and then implementing something that hasn't been tried before. Compare this to uni: I can't remember a project where I was forced to decide from a range of possible implementations. There is always a clear sequence of steps, always an obvious source of information (lecture notes or textbook) and thus, their value is diminished.
I don't believe the answer is simply a change in the way a subject is taught. A better approach would be a supplementary course, run by respected professionals where students were simply given problems to solve? They wouldn't need to relate to the student's course, they only need to encourage a way of thinking and tackling problems. The small projects could last for a week, a month, a semester, however long was needed. The result of the class would be a folio, with information on the objective of each piece of work and then the results. The experience for the students would be invaluable and any employer who isn't impressed by a varied (ideally, high quality) folio isn't worth working for.
I don't like the idea of integrating the course into a university, which means that the course would require financial support from the companies providing the professionals. However, if the tutors are doing their job the students should be very valuable upon graduation. The concept is one of increased quality, not increased efficiency but if communication was predominantly online the course should be less costly to deliver. Email and teleconferences are also representative of how the majority of real project communication occurs these days. How much would students pay for such a course? I'm not sure, but with the right professionals and innovative and challenging projects I know I would have found the money.
There are a range of other ways education could change to take advantage of the changes in society and technology and I think anything that challenges students to be more responsible for their education and have a well rounded knowledge base should be welcomed.
I'm becoming more and more convinced that this is a good idea. I really like the concept of graduating with a folio of projects that isn't going to have the exact same solutions as everyone else in the course.
ReplyDeleteThe concept of closed book exams as the major assessment for most subjects has become ridiculous. Remembering information used to be important due to the sheer difficulty in obtaining it, however now the students that are valuable to employers are the ones that easily understand concepts, and can solve problems without being babied through each step. This is where Uni is failing at the moment especially in Engineering courses.