EDUCATION: DISRUPTIVE TECHNOLOGY TRIGGERS RADICAL CHANGE
A group of automotive students is standing in a circle, ready to learn how to dismantle a car engine. But bizarrely, there is no actual car engine in all its greasy glory.
That’s because the car motor is a virtual one, a three-dimensional image transmitted into eachof the student’s Virtual Reality headsets. Through the lenses and under an instructor’s guidance, they will see how the engine is disassembled and then put back together again before they are asked to do it themselves.
It’s a scene that BCIT president Kathy Kinloch enthusiastically uses to explain just how disruptive technology has profoundly changed howwe teach people.
It was just one of a number of issues she raised during her speech and a BCIT-led panel discussion on disruptive technology at the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade earlier this week. A sampling of her points includes the following:
Disruptive technologies such as virtual reality, automation and connectivity are transforming our world.
Those changes have prompted predictions that 50 per cent of to- day’s Fortune 500 companies will no longer exist in a decade.
Business consultancy McKinsey estimates half of the activities people are paid to do today could be automated, representing $15 trillion lost in global wages.
Millennials can expect to change careers six to seven times during their working life—often in areas that don’t even exist today.
While some have predicted mass unemployment, Kinloch sees a brighter future, particularly if educational institutions like BCIT rise to the challenge. “People will find new, higher-skilled employment if we provide accessible and practical retraining that is aligned with current and emerging industry needs,” she told the business audience.
Disruptive technology is triggering massive changes in the way BCIT is educating more than 48,000 full- and part-time students annually, including abandoning the old “chalk and talk” teaching ways, she said in a later interview.
“The traditional teaching model for many of us was a teacher at the front of the room. We received the information (from this authority) and somehow fed it back so that there was some kind of attempt to assess our learning.”
That model is almost entirely gone now, replaced by methods — including the use of virtual reality — that are proving far more effective for today’s learners, she said.
“Students will always remember [learning experiences like those using virtual reality],” she said. “It is much more effective, much more engaging, and I think it leads to greater success because critical thinking and analysis is immediately integrated into subject matter learning.”
Kinloch stressed that the impetus for change has often come through BCIT’s long history of close connections with industry, connections that are also essential for BCIT to keep up with industry’s changing needs.
“One of our differentiating factors is our hands-on delivery, and coupling that with the industry exposure and working with industry, it’s a hallmark for applied institutions like BCIT.”
Close contacts with industry is one reasonwhy BCIT has a record of 96 per cent of its degree graduates finding jobs, she said. But it also compels the institution to constantly work with its industry partners to make sure BCIT is meeting their needs in the workplace in a rapidly evolving technological world.
“I think post-secondary education is challenged to keep up with what industry sees because industry sees the trends coming earlier,” she said. “So we’re connected closely with each key industry sector, through our faculty and industry partnerships. We are listening to them to determine the trend line so we can adapt our programs to meet industry needs. That is why I see partnerships as such a key component for usmoving forward.’’
Kinloch also pointed out that BCIT’s impact on the provincial economy is considerable: it con- tributes $750 million a year and generates 10,000 direct and indirect jobs. Also, it is reaching out globally with active partnerships with post-secondary institutions in China, India, and many European Union companies in a bid to explore international opportunities.
DISRUPTING THESTATUS QUO
Jeff Booth, one of the BCIT panelists, said what impressed him most about the session was a story by fellow panelist Nadia Dobrianskia about change. She went into her BCIT class (on computer technology) and they told her, “We are not offering that course anymore because it is not relevant anymore,” he said.
“For an organization to be that fast in saying (the existing course) won’t be relevant anymore, we have something better: that’s impressive. People are holding on to the existing infrastructures too long, holding out against radical change.”
Booth has made a business of disrupting the status quo. Drawing on his background as a builder, Jeff co-founded BuildDirect in 1999, which took on the inefficiencies and high costs inherent with the home improvement and building supplies industry.
The danger for many companies — and most institutions in our society — is that they ignore the signs that their business is becoming obsolete, he said, sharing the example of a now-defunct video store chain.
“If you look back at the curve for Blockbuster, there were a few less people in the store but they were still building stores until the moment the chain collapsed. This is our government, these are our political institutions, this is our education and our health care, everything is facing radical change.”