Graves Lecture sparks discussion about future changes in higher education

Beu, Chadron State College’s senior director in Student Affairs, and his wife, Gail, who is also an educator, have raised four children, all who have attended college. One attends CSC full-time, one is a college graduate, and two others are working on their degrees.

“This talk has a lot to do with our efforts in raising four kids for college,” Beu said.

He reflected on a time when teachers and parents wondered if an elementary school student using a calculator in a math class was cheating and an instance in the 1980s when a professor on his master’s committee forbid Beu to let his wife type his papers with a word processor because it had spell check.

With technology-driven changes occurring rapidly, Beu said research shows college freshmen are often preparing for jobs that don’t yet exist.

Beu shared a YouTube video, “The Future of Education: Epic 2020,” highlighting alternative modes of education such as Khan Academy, Udacity, MITX and TED-Ed for free.

Following the video, audience members discussed whether or not online learning is an adequate delivery system for disciplines requiring hands-on or laboratory work.

The costs and benefits of face-to-face learning, the role of adjunct faculty, a well-rounded education compared to career prep and the value of liberal arts courses that challenge status quo belief systems were also discussed.

Following a second YouTube video, “Future Learning,” Beu said an observation by Sugata Mirta, professor of educational technology at Newcastle University in the UK, was worth considering.

Mirta said although riding a horse and shooting a gun were basic life skills 200 or 300 years ago, they are now sports. He mused that maybe math, currently viewed as a life skill, will be a sport in 2061.

—Tena L. Cook, Marketing Coordinator