Automation is changing the nature of education and the ways people learn. More schools are using online learning to supplement in-class activities. In fact, some schools are completely online. Distributed computing on the internet and the automation that drives it makes this possible.
Everything changes when the formal education process becomes embedded in the internet. Courseware delivery becomes asynchronous; people learn what they want, when they want to. Test administration becomes more about the efficient acquisition of data and evaluation thereof. Human-to-human interaction as a basis for a meaningful educational experience becomes optional. Today, it’s entirely possible to learn all you need to know to make a good living in the modern world without ever needing to sit in a classroom or interact with a human directly. Let’s face it: You can do a lot of learning from YouTube.
Learning in the 21st century does not require more presidents, chancellors, deans, directors, supervisors or teachers. Now we need learning ecology designers, cognitive coaches, influencers and makers. What our society needs is Augmented Learning: knowing how to develop superior cognitive abilities to work with machines, robots and automated systems.