More Clicks, Different Bricks – 2012

Posted on by

UT.UMNIt is hard to find anyone who thinks his or her own undergraduate campus will cease to be.  It is as if these places will go on forever.

At a recent SCUP conference I asked attendees to tell me why their campus would or would not exist in 2040.  One said their campus would morph into a “multi-purpose innovation/ business/research park”.  All the rest said their campus would survive – at least until 2040.  The reasons fell into four categories:  too big to fail, enough demand, adaptable enough and unique mission.  Can this be right?

Terry Brown of the University of Wisconsin System, knows that higher education is “…faced with an existential choice:  adapt or die.”  Dr. Brown recommends slow, deliberate, incremental transformation and without compromising core values.

I began writing about the physical dimensions of this choice 22 posts ago.  Year-end is a good time to reflect on the major themes that have emerged. Continue reading →

Campus: More than a Dreamscape

Posted on by

Dreamscape.UTThe popular conversation about the digital transformation of higher education takes two common forms.  Some decry the dehumanizing effects of digital formats, and others embrace the changes seeing no risks, only rewards.

Almost every week there is word of a new digital partnership, educational startup or innovative mash-up in higher education.  These initiatives range from invalidating the previously sacrosanct concept of the college degree to global expansion of access, all the while accelerating the shift of ever more educational activity to a virtual world. Continue reading →

Campus Sustainability: Compromised by Space and Metrics

Posted on by

Every college and university claims to be striving to be sustainable.  Two significant obstacles stand in the way:  too much space and ineffective management practices.

The most sustainable building is the one that is never built.  Unfortunately, most institutions continue to build space they don’t need and can’t afford.  Even if these buildings are at the cutting edge of sustainable design, institutions are increasing their carbon footprint problem.  Having more bricks than necessary is expensive, regardless of how good those bricks are.

Everyone wants more space, but only occasionally is that appropriate and sustainable.  Two articles in the SCUP journal Planning for Higher Education provide insight into these dynamics.  Space and Power in the Ivory Tower, by Sandra Blanchette, identifies the challenges in achieving effective space management in the political milieu of the university.  New Metrics for the New Normal, by Gregory Janks, Mel Lockhart and Alan Travis, identifies the limitations of current space allocation guidelines.  Together they describe an environment with inadequate tools and ineffective decision-making. Continue reading →

Students in the Diagram

Posted on by

The long-term survival of the physical campus will lie in keeping students at the center of the diagram.  The adaptations required will result from a different way of thinking about facilities, in which small moves made with students in mind can be of strategic significance.

A recent project at Cal State Northridge is one example.  Documented in the SCUP Journal Planning for Higher Education by Katherine Stevenson, Sean Clerkin, and Diane Stephens, the project provides a student-centered environment for introductory mathematics. Continue reading →

Authenticity and Value

Posted on by

Questions of authenticity and value are not new.  Socrates objected to the introduction of writing – it compromised the value and authenticity of memory and as a result, knowledge.  His own students saw the value of written material and thus accepted a different notion of authentic knowledge.

The digital transformation of higher education concerns both authenticity and value.  Continue reading →

Trajectory – 2

Posted on by

Most higher education capital plans for facilities are little more than politically correct prioritizations of departmental wish lists.  Funding opportunism has long trumped budgetary discipline.  Four cycles of facilities expansion have left most institutions in an unsustainable position – more space than they need and more than they can afford to operate and maintain.  Just now digital transformation is bringing this into focus.  How did it come to this? Continue reading →

Preserving what?

Posted on by

While they continue at full speed, higher education institutions face the challenge of remaking themselves.  In the coming years this will shift from cosmetic tweaking to preserving the best and losing the rest.

It is difficult to identify those ‘best’ characteristics without sounding nostalgic and all rah-rah.  Perhaps everyone can identify a few special conversations with a mentor who has influenced our lives, moments of insight that have dotted our academic careers, and enriching experiences that we have shared with classmates or colleagues.  Until quite recently these events always happened in a specific place and ‘real time.’  It may not always be so. Continue reading →

Forever?

Posted on by

Fifteen years ago, Peter Drucker and others began to predict the demise of the physical campus.  It was to become yet another relic of an era bypassed by technology.

Yet today it is hard to find anyone who thinks his or her own undergraduate campus will cease to be.  It is as if these places will go on forever.  Can this be right? Continue reading →

Student Community: Verbs not Nouns

Posted on by

As the academic experience becomes more fragmented and asynchronous with fewer on-campus hours per student per degree, the formation of campus community is becoming more and more tenuous.  This is a world of verbs, not nouns. Continue reading →

Study Space: On the floor

Posted on by

In a digital world, poor study space is a strategic liability.

In a previous post, I made the case that the ‘idea work’ of reading and writing requires at least 4 square feet of horizontal surface.  Whether by hand, keyboard or touch screen, a horizontal surface is an essential part of the technology.

The most densely packed study spaces are in libraries.  Depending on the hour and day even the side-by-side seats at large library tables are used.  It’s just like classroom or airplane seating.  The middle seat is least desired, but it gets used at peak times.  Such is the demand for functional study space on campus. Continue reading →