Education: those next 20 years…

I’m getting closer to my colleague Mark Guzdial’s intellectual turf here, but I saw two things recently that made me pause and take a moment.

The first was an update on a fluid situation, the question of how much of a budget cut the University System of Georgia will take next year. It’s still a work in progress, note that the article says that there’s another meeting on Wednesday which concluded with a still fluid situation. The list of cuts, from each University appears towards the end of the article and it makes for sobering reading. I say that as a State employee myself, one who works for Georgia Tech.

The second was the announcement that Hawaii’s schools will be moving to a four day school week. I’m not a parent, but I can imagine that this is going to be something else for the dual-income parents of Hawaii. There’s always been an alignment between the school week and the work week, not perhaps a complete one, but this is certainly going to expose more of the assumptions that come with that alignment. And that’s not even a thought about education. As the article comments, people are concerned about the educational impact on Hawaii’s children with less instruction time.

Together they paint a picture of an educational system that is in transformation. No-one is predicting that this recession will end soon. Many suggest that there will be recovery, but it will be slow. The effects of this could be as long lasting as the generation experiencing it (those in education at this time). Intriguingly (and somewhat politically I’ll observe) it is the people who are largely not in education who are deciding the fate of those who are.

Recently, Dick Lipton posted an article about education, asking could Universities become extinct in the next 25 years, one that Mark and I built on. I have to wonder whether these are just two data points, in a sea of others that set up the conditions for just such an event. If we’re optimistic, we can hope that at the end of this time we’ll look back and be able to see innovations that set up better conditions for the next generation. I’m trying to keep focused on that. And, one bright spot, the University of Michigan.

Media in the Modern University

Does talking to media outlets have a place in the modern University?

The answer to this question is one that I have heard debated among my colleagues. It’s a complicated proposition, but I have long thought that the media does have a role to play in the life of a faculty member.

I understand the concerns.

It’s not usually the case that media outlets care much about a particular finding or result. There are exceptions of course, but I think what the media usually want is an expert to comment on a topic of their interest. This gulf takes some time to cross. I was once interviewed about the World Wide Web. It was when the 100 millionth web site was reached. I did not realise it was for television at the time I agreed to comment. I was asked a variety of questions, and luckily I know my web history since one of them was about the origins and intent of the original WWW site.

Why did they ask me? I’ve not done much research on the web. I mean I use the web, and certainly some of the things I have written about imply the presence of the web, but I would not describe the web itself as a central interest. They asked me because I think they wanted someone who could answer their questions. I could tie the pick up of the Web to both a driver and a reason for the Internet explosion, I could offer some reasons why people would use it (to form online communities) and so forth. I’m certainly not alone in being able to answer these questions, but I didn’t mind spending the time preparing for the interview so that I would provide the answers that they wanted and that would be useful.

Another concern that people have about engaging the media is that they may mis-characterise or miss the significance of the topic being discussed. I’ve certainly felt that sometimes the best things I have said during an interview were not picked up, and some of the more obscure things were. I think this is another type of translation work that I, as much as the reporter, own the responsibility for doing. What matters to me, or to my research community is not always what a reporter thinks will sell papers/adverts/etc… so I have to either decide that what they think is important is OK or work harder to explain the relevance clearly.

I wondered myself whether having my research appear in some places was potentially damaging to my reputation. I decided some time ago that it was likely not the thing I feared. So, when my research featured as the number 1 Threat Down on the Colbert Report I was actually quite proud. Some of it, especially the robot work, has been picked up in a variety of ways, all featuring the rather entertaining side of the work. What I think is most important now is to a) protect and explain the subjects of the research (we dont want to make fools of the people who have given us the data that we’re discussing) and b) to ensure that students involved in this work also don’t feel that their research has been subject to derision. Again in the case of the robot work, it is the case that people dress up their vacuums, indeed there’s a substantial revenue-generation industry in this area, and people do it for reasons that are similar to blinging phones and so forth. It’s very human, and it is, when you think about it, something that makes you smile. No-one was harmed, it’s actually a discussion about good feelings… heartwarming in a world that is full of bad news.

And good news is one reason to talk to the media. I was asked to comment on Atlanta’s increased wi-fi density. Without hesitation I said that I thought Atlantans should be proud of this because it reflects an orientation towards being experimental with technology (this was back when it was fairly new and San Francisco was the type of place people put in this wi-fi dense community network genre). That story generated a lot of positive feedback. A few people talked to me about it directly, but the Institute also collects metrics about the role of media and positive attributions of Georgia Tech. That story, which was not much longer than this paragraph, with that one quote was ranked one of the highest stories in that year. Surprised. I was too. But, I was entirely sincere (not just trying to boost GT’s reputation, that never occurred to me, usually I just think what do I say that reflects and doesn’t embarrass 🙂 and it seems like there was lots of good to just a little good phrase.

Something I don’t like is when I can not get the reporter to include all the names of the people who worked on the work. I have had stories that attributed pieces of research to me that were actually products of groups. In fact that’s often the case. That always makes me sad when that happens. The only way I’ve ever found to deal with it is to attempt to share some of the work of talking to reporters around. Assume that the person who does the talking will be the one who appears in print. But you can’t predict which stories will take off, which will be the ones picked up by many outlets. So, it’s an imperfect solution. The difficulty of this situation is only mitigated by the fact, at least in my experience, that the majority of what has appeared in the papers is not actually about my research, but about things that I have the expertise to comment on.

Of course, the arguments for engaging with the media turn on the value of translating the work that we do at Georgia Tech into things that potentially help inform the public, help people make decisions, or understand the significance of things that they are (in the case of technology) already or will use in their daily lives. In so doing it’s a way to communicate what the worth of an Institution of higher education is, what they get for the time that faculty are not in the classrooms teaching, which is the result of our research. Breaking down the walls of the ivory tower…

And then there is the question of continuing to promote and position Georgia Tech in what will be an increasingly competitive market. As my colleague Dick Lipton recently discussed there is stiff competition for education from a new type of University, characterised by the University of Phoenix. Media, and the visibility that Georgia Tech gets through the stories, is one way to explain our value, through making the products of what we do as well as the processes by which we do them clearer to groups of people who support us. So that’s why despite concerns, and sometimes the difficulty of attribution, I think it’s worthwhile.

An Academic Blog

I’ve just created a new section in my Georgia Tech Vita. The Georgia Tech vita is the official format for an academic resume. It’s long and detailed, but it is a very accurate reflection of the values of the Institute (what Georgia Tech thinks matters for academics). But it has some curious admissions. There’s nowhere to put the media hits that your research gets (and mine, for example, has been on the Colbert report, it was the number 1 threat down, so pretty serious stuff) and there’s nowhere to put blog posts. And yet, both have a place in the modern University, although here I will focus solely on blogs.

So, what then is the role of an academic blog? Why do I think that they matter? I’ve been doing some thinking about what you can accomplish with an academic blog. This is based on my own experiences as well as observing those of my colleagues with blogs. Thank you Mark, Rich, Dick, Andrea, Henrik and Amy.

Like other blogs it’s a way to get the word out. Quickly, especially by academic standards!

One of my most popular posts, about facebook and social networking, was a timely (and thoughtful I hope) response to a meme that had circulated around facebook earlier in the day. You can’t get that article submitted and reviewed in a single day but you can offer an analysis via the blog. I’d like to think that even though the response is not peer reviewed, and would certainly require more if it was peer reviewed, the process of sharing any thoughts on a blog is reviewed in a different way. People don’t have to read the blog after all. And, it’s also your reputation that’s wrapped up in the blog, so what you say is a reflection of your expertise as a researcher.

And I think this matters because as a researcher, especially one employed by the State of Georgia, I feel a responsibility to communicate not just with my academic colleagues but with anyone who happens to read my blog. I’m not always sure whether I do manage to communicate broadly, but I view the blog as part of that opportunity. And I see it in my colleagues posts too, a sense of explaining why some event or discussion has more significance than it might appear to at first blush. It probably is largely colleagues, but I’d be happy if it was broader than that too. I’ve always thought that it’s a responsibility, particularly of a tenured professor, to use their knowledge derived from the research process, to help explain and inform broadly.

Blogging also helps me think, not just about my research, but about my professional experiences. I frequently think things out in my writing. So, the blog is another forum for this type of thinking. I can see my thinking reflected not just in the lots of dead text that I carry through each posting (I delete it right before I publish). It’s also visible in the number of draft postings I have. Each accretes notes as I do more thinking about what the topic of the post is going to be about. Unless I write the post very quickly. Most posts, the majority, are written over several sessions. This one, for example, has been in the works for a few months now. Each time I think about blogs, or see something going on one of my colleagues blogs I add it to the list.

And then there’s the thinking that happens as I write the post up in full text. I have found myself coming to conclusions that were different from what I initially thought. This makes for considerable time spent writing, with less to show for it. But, hey, I’m an academic, this is not an entirely unknown phenomenon. But this process, even when it ends up being contradictory, is a great way of clearing my head and getting my ideas together and clearly. I think it’s helped me with my research. I use my blog in part to write about cross-cutting themes I see in the research that my students do, to synthesize the products of other research and workshops, think out assumptions, and to examine disciplinary business.

A colleague of mine suggested that a blog might be a way to kick start the process of writing a book. I’m still not sure what book my blog is (I’ll take suggestions). But, I view that as emblematic of the thinking work that a blog can provide. And it spills out into other places. I recently gave a talk where I was asked to reflect on futures for the field of Human-Centered Computing. My blog had helped me to think through a number of the ideas that I talked about. Perhaps you should never talk about things you have not published about, but for some types of topic (such as, say, the disciplinary business of Computing, it’s not precisely clear to me what I would have published or where if I was constrained to the more traditional writing mediums).

Some of my colleagues post fairly frequently to their blogs. I find this both inspirational and vaguely terrifying (Where do they find the time? Where they always have, through discipline). But what fairly frequent postings, particularly when they are all focused on the same topical area, do is show the importance and prevalence of a topic. I’ll borrow from Mark’s blog here, to which he posts multiple times a week. Even before his blog I knew that Computing Education mattered. Can you be a professor in Computing and not know this? Anyway, what I get from Mark’s blog is not just updates on critical issues in Computing Education but a sense of how important it is, how Computing Education is connected to other worlds of education, practice, and learning, and so forth. It’s not just the content it’s the frequency of that content that communicates this to me in a profound way.

It’s also a place to have an opinion, to take a position. In the reporting of research results, it is often best to not have an opinion, beyond those supported by the facts. The blog encourages the development of ideas beyond the scope of research. This of course likely can be abused, taken to extremes. But, I think it’s useful in measure. I do have opinions, quite a lot of them. Some in no particular order are that Computing4Good problematises human-centered computing research; that I am a Computer Scientist and that discussions about who/what counts are premature in a discipline that draws on methods/theories that are philosophically contradictory; that the University is an unusual organizational entity and should not be managed with tools imported wholesale from the business world as a result; and that recognising and understanding the human-built nature of computing systems is as important as understanding the patterns of human-used systems. You can find all of these opinions in my posts, perhaps not quite so succinctly stated, and while I would like to tell you that these are all opinions I have arrived at carefully and thoughtfully (and frequently through research), the blog is a place where I find it easier to express them.

Georgia Tech is doing through the strategic planning process (I have opinions about strategy too). And clearly this is way down on the list, but if Georgia Tech claims to value things (like media) then they should make sure that it’s reflected in the GT Vita format. What better way to incent desirable behaviour than providing an appropriate reporting method, the ability to demonstrate achievement in that area. And while they’re reconsidering how the GT Vita reflects the values of the Institute, I call on them to put in a section for blogs. Highly read posts, posts that whiz around the blogosphere, demonstrate a type of reason for existence. And I can’t help thinking that the personal-professional rewards of blogging are well worth the effort.

The Future of the University

My colleague, Dick Lipton, has just written a piece about the future of the University.

Inspired by Georgia Tech’s strategic planning, which was started by Bud Peterson, our 11th and newest President, but also by Rich DeMillo and others (as he mentions), Dick asks the hardest question, and one that’s currently not in the GT strategic planning process.

Will Georgia Tech be around in 2035?

He posits two reasons why this is not being asked. One is that of course it’s obvious we’ll be around and two that its a really scary question to ask. He then goes on to contrast traditional brick and mortar institutions (like Georgia Tech which he calls UN’s) with those that are on-line (like the University of Phoenix which he calls ON’s) over the basic functions that a University provides.

Educate students. I see no reason that On could not do as good a job as Un’s with this basic goal. The usual response is that there would be a loss of interaction with the professors and with fellow students. In 25 years perhaps there could be much more interaction with the On model. Imagine that they have a virtual world where you can talk to my avatar—when ever you like and for as long as you like?

Socialize students. This is perhaps one of the places where Un have an advantage. But, On may already, or could in the next few years create mechanisms that help in this important area. Again 25 years is a very long time, in which huge changes could occur in how humans interact with each other.

Network students. This is one where Un think they have a lead, but I think that is unclear. The rise of net based communities of all kinds may make this a tie at best. One could imagine On putting enough resources into on-line communities of all kinds that give them a lead here.

Research and innovation. This is the place that I think Un have and will continue to have a unique advantage. I will come back to this in a moment.

Perhaps it’s because I am a human-centered computing researcher, so I want to riff on the role of technology in these settings.

I think technology will continue to improve, but distance learning, virtual worlds, etc… are the subject of considerable study. A common finding is that those worlds are not the same as “the real world” and that social dynamics take new forms. Beki’s prediction. While distance learning will improve, the On’s are going to have to figure out how to adapt their methods of learning to leverage the best of online opportunities. Now clearly they are off to a great start, and that’s one reason we have to seriously consider what the future of UNs in an ONs world is. But to create an experience online that matches the offline, or that is as capable of providing perhaps especially socialization and networking is really going to require innovation. Oddly, it might be the research and innovation done in an UN setting that helps them to do that. That would be ironic.

And, while technologies may provide new opportunities, I don’t think humans change as much as we sometimes think they do. I’ve had a good career to date in studying how people use technologies in novel ways. Like, for example, the very rapid uptake of Short Messaging Service among teens. There was no doubt that the technology enabled teenagers to message and communicate across temporal and spatial divides, but what they did with it was to do what they enjoy doing, communicating, socialising, and get help with their homework. These types of communications pre-date SMS, but they are greatly facilitated by it. So, the ON’s don’t have to rely on human change here, they have to hope for innovations in understanding how to make virtual worlds etc… as rich and enjoyable as the experiences that people can have in the physical world, or something better.

Perhaps the ONs can also look to the most traditional of the ONs, places like the Open University in the UK that has done distance learning since 1971. ONs are older than they appear.

But, while I have a slightly different take on Dick’s post, I agree that it’s a question worth asking. Scary as it is.

Professionalization of Academia

Louis Menand has a new book out about academia. A short excerpt was published in Harvard Magazine, which I found fascinating.

For the relatively new reader, let me begin by saying that I have a “one-woman” interest in disciplinary business and academic organization. I can’t yet say that my thoughts are coherent, but I know that the more I experience academia, the more I find it very intriguing in many different ways.

First, I still find the calls for transparency in decision-making, at times, curious. I think that the ways organizations make decisions can not always be made transparent, the processes are too distributed, so it’s hard to trace results back to root causes. There’s also temporal lag in processes. These and a myriad of other things make organizational sense locally, but make transparency difficult to achieve. I have referred to this in the past as the fallacy of transparency. I also wonder about how the tools we use to organize academia work, since they were designed to work in corporate and commercial contexts… and academia is different, (do I have bosses, why do you increase the reporting lines rather than replace them when you take on administrative assignments).

I also find the changes in the discipline of Computer Science fascinating. Not just the rise of the iSchools, but also how CS is separating organizationally and what that might mean for the discipline as well as what new fields, like ICT4D, can teach us about Computing’s disciplinary business.

So that brings me back to Menand, who clearly has thought a lot more about academia than I have…

“Since it is the system that ratifies the product—ipso facto, no one outside the community of experts is qualified to rate the value of the work produced within it—the most important function of the system is not the production of knowledge. It is the reproduction of the system. To put it another way, the most important function of the system, both for purposes of its continued survival and for purposes of controlling the market for its products, is the production of the producers.”

In this quote he argues that the mechanism of peer review basically leads from a community that values products, to a community that values the reproduction of the community itself. I am still thinking about whether I agree with that statement. I don’t want to agree in all honesty, and I believe that the work that I see done is done by people who are passionate about the products, the results. It’s hard to work up the energy needed to do research if you’re not worried about the products. It does also seem like an argument for interdisciplinarity, reaching across communities to have a broader judgement. I think that’s a good thing.

What I do wonder is whether Computing is headed towards a time when at least at the Ph.D. level the market might be shrinking, or at least stabilizing. One reason this is certainly happening in the short-term is the economy. And last year, in CS we saw an NSF funded post-doc program. While there have always been post-docs in Computing, I am pretty sure there are more. The program had the goal of helping to alleviate the consequences of the economic recession after all.

So if there is a shift, and particularly if the shift is long-term, and if Menand is right, then there must be some effect on the system somewhere. If Menand is right then the production of producers must change if labor patterns are changing. Only his subsequent focus on the humanities suggest changes that at least I don’t find satisfying… he suggests that the economic downturn led to increased times to graduation and increased difficulty in finding employment. And so Menand has caused me to reflect… whether or not I agree with his arguments, I think that they are very worthy of thought, and also on what happens in a time of economic recession and what my responsibility is as a member of a professional academic community.

Whatever I conclude, he concludes with an argument that I hear more often from a variety of people who I know have given the future of the academic enterprise considerable thought. And what I hear over and over again is that change is coming. And I hear it from very different types of people. When different people with very different perspectives say the same thing, it makes the point stand out in my mind because I find myself thinking how did they all get to the same conclusion. Of course, I also believe, see above, that that change will be slowed down by the institution itself but I find myself disposed to the argument about change. Indeed, one glimmer is already a reality, that there are Universities out there that can and do graduate people but do not look like traditional Universities.

I’ll leave you with his parting thought…

“My aim has been to throw some light from history on a few problems in contemporary higher education. If there is a conclusion to be drawn from this exercise, it might be that the academic system is a deeply internalized one. The key to reform of almost any kind in higher education lies not in the way that knowledge is produced. It lies in the way that the producers of knowledge are produced. Despite transformational changes in the scale, missions, and constituencies of American higher education, professional reproduction remains almost exactly as it was a hundred years ago.”

What I do look forward to is a conversation about production and reproduction of the academic profession. What does that mean for Computing, what does it mean for HCI (which is my speciality). And how might this change, in what ways….

Update: Slate reviews the book.