OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS

Transcription

1 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS VISIR VISION REPORT 2014 OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS 1

2 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS The VISIR Consortium MENON Network EEIG MENON BE European Association for Distance Learning EADL NL European Distance and E- Learning Network EDEN UK European Foundation for Management Development EFMD BE European Foundation for Quality in e- Learning EFQUEL BE European Interest Group on Creativity and Innovation EICI DE European Learning Industry Group ELIG FR KULeuven KUL BE SCIENTER SCI IT This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial- Share Alike 2.0 Belgium License. To view a copy of this license, visit nc- sa/2.0/be/ 2

3 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS CONTENTS 1 Policy and ICT trends in learning in Complex changes and accelerated transformations About the Open Education movement The VISIR approach to analyse change and build visions A few words on methodology A dynamic tool and a living document The VISIR domains of change Aims of Learning Systems: Shift in balance of aims of Education Learning content, curricula and competences Orchestration of the teaching process and the learning environment Valuing Learning: Motivation, Awareness and Value of Learning Assessment and certification Funding market dynamics and governance of Lifelong Learning Lifelong learning (Integration of formal- non formal- informal learning) Inclusiveness and Socio- economic impact of education Teachers competencies and communities of practice Quality development and assurance Learning Spaces and Learning Communities References

4 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS 1 POLICY AND ICT TRENDS IN LEARNING IN COMPLEX CHANGES AND ACCELERATED TRANSFORMATIONS The state of art of ICTs in education and training in Europe in 2014 is difficult and complicated to describe and summarise in a compact way. Due to the coincidence of several transitional factors, so is identifying trends regarding policies at national, regional European or global level. The period covered by the history of VISIR was coinciding with rapid and intensive changes in the fields of ICT enhanced learning, learning innovation and in particular, open educational resources. The runtime period the VISIR project is covering in The design of the project started obviously earlier, the concept will be by the end of the project almost five years old. It is worth paying attention to look into the changes of the European context, with the intention of eventually fine- tuning the main questions the VISIR initiative is investigating. An important factor has been the busy and hectic period of the medium and long term planning in the European Union linked to the next programme development and budgeting period of The field of education, training and youth was not an exception as far as complicated, often contradictory scenarios, concepts, plans have been raised and elaborated in the ateliers of the Commission services and policy making bodies of the political parties. These drafts have gone through the different fora of assessment, processing, confrontations in debates, conciliation amongst the Members States, discussions in the Committees of the European Parliament, the European Economic an Social Committee, the Committee of the Regions and finally the Parliament plenary forum itself. The above eventful period has also been accompanied and supplemented by the finalisation, presentation and publication of several significant comprehensive studies, reports and papers elaborated for the Commission by their agencies and services, followed by organised academic, professional and policy discussions in the field of education. As linked streams, several analysis, observatory and foresight activities, the presentation of results of broad strategic projects implemented with EU funding became available, disseminated and debated in conferences and seminars. In parallel, international organisations (OECD, UNESCO, EUA, the World Bank and more) in the same period also published reviews and position papers in the themes of ICTs, learning innovation and open education. Most national European governments have also commissioned such strategic papers, studies and latest issues of periodic reports. With different perspectives, the corporate sector organisations also have been present in the debates with position papers and studies. The increasing public interest in particular towards the open education related issues also generated countless articles in printed and online journals and newspapers, representing inspiring diversity of approaches and opinions. The above developments have resulted a multiplicity and continuum of papers, studies, statements, foresights, observatory reports, project deliverables presented and published in the last good one and half year. The developments and movements highlighted certain regional- continental characters as well. The differences between the EU and US (Canada Australia UK) approaches on distance education, ICT enhanced and e- learning have been amplified by the open educational, in particular MOOC related attitudes. Asia has also been representing a different universe in this respect, due to cultural, economic and demographic discrepancies. These factors initiated paradigm- changing transformations in the past 1-2 years, with accelerating changes in the period of the last year of VISIR. Changes in technology by integrating different sets of tools in high performance and extraordinary capacity devices were supplemented by the enhanced affordability of the new powerful instruments. This was leading to the rapid spreading of the recent technologies, resulting a never earlier experienced increase of demand and use for them. The 1 This is the second issue of the VISIR Vision report. The first issue was published in 2012 (and is downloadable from the network.eu website) and presented a vision on the future of learning based on 11 dimensions of change. In this new issue of the Vision report, we have 4

5 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS changing notion of access, accompanied by increasing volume and improving quality of the digital content, the profoundly transforming user habits and expectations resulted the re- interpretation on several related concepts and have re- positioned the social impact of ICTs in learning. The period of has been therefore a critical and rapidly changing, busy and turbulent period for ICT supported and e- learning, including distance education and in particular Open Education. We are at a meta- stable point of the development/change curve in SOCIO- ECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT: THE EDUCATION - EMPLOYMENT CONTEXT In the world where complexity becomes the new reality (Conole) the proper understanding about what skills drive economy is essential. Technology development does not necessarily translate into economic growth and in particular, jobs. Success is increasingly linked to the way of thinking and has to do more and more with values: technological knowledge and global thinking should act in synergy in the changing, faster, interconnected, multi- language world. Social demand for education is growing, which is true in particular in developing societies. The development of ICTs, new learning technologies/devices and their increased high performance, power and affordability, the permanently upgrading networking capacities have been transforming rapidly the information society, often along unexpected tracks and with a high diversity of scenarios. Decreasing prices of the tools and services have raised new, earlier unimaginable social and economic scenarios on global scale. The emergence of low cost models in education is a big challenge for all sectors but in particular, universities. Presently, under the impact of uninterrupted economic turmoils, the linked dangerous policy scenarios and their disruptive effects on society, a strengthening tendency can be observed, with emphasis on recovering growth and competitiveness in Europe, predominantly in the sector of employment, which is raising serious challenges. The considerations of human aspects, the desires of the society and requests of the civil sphere are weakening in the policies and loosing positions in favour of economic decisions. This is also reflected in the approach and perspective of the new EU programme to 2020, including education. Uncertainty superposed by the complicated progress of the EU budgeting and programme development procedure, the economic crisis and its financial- structural- policy implications in the European Union have also been influencing the scenarios emerging. Employers interests are stronger pronounced. An often- raised complaint from corporations has been that jobseekers, academia and employers live in parallel universes, institutions teach what they know, not what students want to know or what employers need. Such opinions, however contestable, indicate the need for more and deeper communication between the stakeholder groups. Enhancing job placement awareness of education providers, supported by more and efficient efforts for exit strategies from universities is clearly becoming a reasonable request. Questions for the education sector like how well training is translated to employment opportunity? How to translate curricula to career guidance? should receive priority. The loosely formulated requirements for the educational institutions in the meantime are often not quite consistent and difficult to follow. Large companies mostly recruit for capabilities and character, whilst they add the skills during their in- house trainings. SMEs meanwhile require more concrete skills from the jobseekers. The notion on inferiority of vocational education is being reduced but this is happening slower than desirable. Partnership, apprenticeship programs are amongst the tools to be used much more often to overcome the discrepancies. POLICY According to the optimistic forecasts, from 2014 in the EU a new period should start to escape the crisis, with several long awaited - changes in the resource distribution systems. A sober- rational scenario is that overcoming financial and economic problems will remain a priority. That may result sustained difficult scenarios for education - with mismatches in employability, jobs, skills, VET fields - for a couple of years more at least. In the coming EU policy period, the role of ICT for accessibility and flexibility - to go further, simpler, closer to the citizens will be in general emphasized. In the education and training field, a slowly changing setting for e- learning and open education can however only be foreseen. Whilst there has been and will remain large demand for 5

6 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS knowledge and education, the issue of the skills deficit with reference to the OECD PISA and PIAC survey for adult skills and warning results are contributing to the critical socio- economic approach to the education and training field. Improving education and skills policies needs stronger evidence. Funding of education and training systems is raising as core policy theme, with investigating strongly the efficiency of mechanisms, the impacts of reforms. In reality, several policy aspects recently regarded as standard operating procedure in advanced countries are no longer standard across the EU. Numerous EU countries have no policy for ICT in education, neither for schools, nor in vocational or higher education. Ministries are hard- pressed and have limited resources to devote to ICT policy issues. Their daughter agencies may due to the austerity be closed (e.g. Becta, UK) or being/suffering under severe budget cuts. Due to the complexity and sectoral interdisciplinarity of the ICT/e- learning policies, long term uninterrupted political commitment is needed in order to be successful. The government should be clear about its priorities and not changing them for a longer time, ensuring the political leadership together with a transparent vision. Writing about the Canadian higher education policy scenario Siemens (2013) summarises several relevant statements which are valid in most other national environments as well. Often, university online education is constrained by lack of national data and strategic planning, by lack of cross- jurisdictional collaboration, convincing business models, economies of scale and resources. This limits the universities ability to capitalise on the potential of digital technologies to improve uptake, quality, accessibility, return on investment, tactical innovation and knowledge transfer. The ongoing strategic vacuum creates an environment that fosters weakness and duplication. EU member states agree about the central role of increasing digital literacy, together with the assessment of learning experience and validation issues. Core problems in ICT enhanced education remain the teacher training issue, further the improvement of educational content and the not sufficient infrastructure investments hardware and broadband issues. For teachers continuing education, a strong need is formulated for regular contacts and sustainable, content wise relevant and up- to- date partnerships with practitioners both in the public and business sphere, which should be supported by robust apprenticeship/traineeships systems, leading to new skill sets for the labour market, including enhanced understanding about and application of entrepreneurship skills. Policy makers meanwhile seem to get increasingly impatient with universities: requesting always more flexibility and efficiency. In the Erasmus+ programme, the industry- academia partnerships received new emphasis. Among the medium- term strategic EU plans, the development of the European area of skills and qualifications emerges, including the introduction of new tools and systems DIGITAL PEDAGOGY In the past decade, the environment of education has changed very fast, with major developments in the macro- factors of technology, globalisation, demography. Behind different waves of reforms there has always been a change of paradigm. So far, education has mostly been following the content delivery and assessment model, with the main goal the transmission of knowledge. However, the knowledge society requires education to raise autonomous (lifelong) learners and critical citizens rather than recipients of content. Learning is an active process in which learners not only receive new knowledge but construct new ideas or concepts. Effective integration of ICT into teaching and learning can contribute to the design of real student- centred learning environments. Because of new trends in education like open education and increasing access to and affordability of ICT tools, education is becoming a service, where the learner is in focus, with lots more freedom than earlier. Eventually, the technology in Technology Enhanced Learning will become invisible, and will become known only as learning (e.g. integrating with mobile devices, augmented reality as a daily learning extension, context driven learning, sensor- driven information etc.). Research results show on digital learners that although university students have a basic set of technological abilities, these do not necessarily translate into sophisticated skills in the use of other technologies or information literacy in general. Important contradictions exist between the perception of technological proficiency and its use, which is much more restricted. Although access to and use of ICT is widespread, the influence of teaching methodology is very decisive. For academic purposes, students seem to respond to the 6

7 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS requirements of their courses, programmes, and institutions/universities. There is a clear relationship between the students perception of usefulness regarding ICT resources and the teachers suggested uses of technologies. Students in virtual environments use technologies mainly for informative and educational purposes, while students in face- to- face environments use ICT for leisure and communication. Despite dramatic increases in students use of various technologies, their expectations of how they might learn at university remained relatively static. The expectations of learning at university appear to be influenced more by students prior experience of learning in formal situations rather than by their use of technology outside educational settings. Sometimes even the issue of balance between fun and hard work in learning is raised, suspecting to which extent the new ICT tools are about fun and to which extent they effectively help the improvement of effectiveness of learning. A recurrent tension, emerging to different extent and in different ways has been the discrepancy between boutique projects and the more comprehensive, system level issues. It is often proposed that education needs to learn from other industries where the integration in the information society has been accomplished with more operational and structural success. From about the second half of 2012, the approach started to change to some extent around the movement of OERs and MOOCs, raising more and more down- to- earth questions on operational and management issues, interrogating the feasibility of the business models and the interests of the institutions. One certain general advantage of the OER/MOOC movements (cf. infra) for the modernisation of education has been the increased awareness about and acceptance of the ICT enhanced, open and flexible e- learning solutions which have not been quite acknowledged as integral parts of the learning process in many institutions. In the meantime, in the professional and academic ateliers particularly in Europe, their systematic work, collection and analysis of data, mapping, intelligent observations combined with justifiable analysis and validation, slowly but massively contribute to reaching the critical mass of reliable knowledge which helps to rely on relevant information about the ICT use in education and training. Step by step, the technology side, the pedagogy and instruction dimension, the social- economic elements, the institutional and structural issues, the teachers and students behaviour, interests and characteristics related experience are summing up, outlining the realistic scope of potential actions. This is highlighting more clearly the space for manoeuvring on one hand - and on the other, the still existing gaps in the system that represent bottlenecks in reaching higher impact with structured, efficient use of ICTs in learning. What seems to happen nowadays is a kind of slow and flexible formation of different clusters of scenarios and solutions that are being built up from the research, from the worthwhile case studies, practices. They are analysed by the emerging, more and more powerful and reliable learning analytics tools and the coherent pool of experience. Learning at a massive scale gives new potential for the use of learning analytics, for better understanding the design and delivery of content and assessment and for engaging new communities internationally. About the pedagogic challenges of the social web, we should note that the issue of advanced online course development, understood as spontaneous knowledge management is emerging. The process of course development nowadays may often be too long and complex, whilst tutorial systems are also expensive with the time of instructor being major cost. Often, students use the social web most creatively and build up wikis replacing LMS within short time. There would be demand for course design models that better control time and cost. This is linked to the desired paradigm change of using campuses in the right way with much stronger integration of online learning, applying different new sets of conditions. Another important interdisciplinary field connects the world of learning to the brain sciences and their awaited contributions to the cognitive processes. Better and deeper knowledge and responses to the How do we learn...? question could much enhance the efficiency of the ICT supported education which is now rather a long term endeavour. 7

8 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS DIVERSITY ACROSS COUNTRIES It has been acknowledged that considerable differences exist between countries within the EU in several essential aspects. These may be related to the socio- economic background, to the differences in the infrastructure development, the policies of the governments, the attitude and preparedness of education and training sphere, the traditions regarding the openness of the sectors themselves, the use of the technology, the employment situation, the approach of stakeholders and many others. General approaches, patterns at the basics, similar pathways in elaboration and implementation may lead elsewhere, to different places (both in policy and in ICT use). Regarding the role of policies, one has to acknowledge the parallels and similarities in the system developments. On the other hand, we should recognise the more and more evident huge diversity of the scenarios emerging and the multiplicity of the solutions discovered. The overall state of affairs can be therefore characterised as being in a fluid state, the countless manifestations of the ICT tools and their usage in the manifold life situations and scenarios results huge diversity and multiplicity of solutions. 1.2 ABOUT THE OPEN EDUCATION MOVEMENT In many universities has been the MOOC year. The number of announcements, of publications and conferences devoted to this subject has steadily grown. In the United States MOOCs are seen as an alternative to mass teaching for the first years of study and Europe is following the movement, although the social and economic reasons of the US are deeply different. However the critical reviews emerging in the United States are beginning to denounce the myth of cheap quality education. The hopes raised by MOOCs follow the famous Gartner s hype curve, as any modern technology, and may already have overpassed the peak and drop towards a more realistic vision. We can speak about paradigm- change- like transitions in approaches (openness) with its implications for the use of ICT as well but also for socio- economic- cultural process and in particular, business models. A new element with the MOOC new generation of platforms is their social component with peer- to- peer interaction. This new dimension arises for two different reasons: (i) the explosion of the social dimension of the Web through social media like Facebook and others facilities, which transforms the ways of acquiring and exchanging knowledge, and (ii) the necessity to replace teacher- student interaction by peer- to- peer interaction for mass teaching with tens of thousands of students following the same course. To fulfil their goal MOOCs require a transformation of the pedagogy: the students must learn by themselves and, at the same time, must become more active, exchanging with their peers and helping each other instead of passively listening to teachers (flipped learning). That kind of approach can be used both for mass teaching outside the university (MOOC), and as SORC (Small Online Restricted Courses) for in- house teaching. EPFL, in Lausanne, for instance, is progressively replacing its first year theatre courses by MOOCs. This is the approach of European universities: MOOC can be conceptually considered as an extension of SORC. Conventional e- learning modules in the meantime will seldom fit into MOOCs and if their use is necessary, they must be entirely rebuilt. Two significant challenges around the role of MOOCs in higher education are prevalent. First, the discussion on MOOCs to- date has occurred mainly in mainstream media and trade publications. Although some peer- reviewed articles on MOOCs currently exist, the amount of available research is generally limited. Second, the vast research available in online and distance education has been largely ignored by mainstream media and MOOC providers. Paying greater attention to what is already known about learning in online and virtual spaces, how the role of educators and learners is transformed in these contexts, and how social networks extend a learning network will enable mainstream MOOC providers and their partners to make evidence- based decisions in favor of educational reform. (Siemens 2013) 8

9 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS An observable slowing down of the movement can be observed from the second half of 2013 by the still missing coherent and convincing processes and institutionalisation of OERs, while at the same time number of MOOCs and policy initiatives in Europe supporting them increased. Reliable national efforts for their support and recognition are rare. Enthusiastic foresights, extrapolation of certain beyond question valuable changes to global scale and the expected transformative impact dominate the information available. A sort of similarity with the hype concerning ICT enhanced and e- learning can e found. A disbelieving view says even that MOOCs represent little more than an elaborate and expensive marketing campaign in the today s globally competitive student acquisition market The COL- UNESCO report prepared for the World OER Congress in June 2012 admits that whilst there appears to be great interest in OER across all regions of the world, different regions face different obstacles to OER adoption. Few explicit OER policies exist only and there appears to be some confusion regarding an understanding of the concept and potential of OER, thus there is an ongoing need for further advocacy and information- sharing to motivate countries and institutions to harness OER. On the realistic- positive side, MOOCs can provide boost to meaningful research on human learning as very large samples are involved and as the data collected from MOOCs and MOOC platforms are harvested and analyzed. MOOCs and OER can be significant contributors to higher education in a more consistent, efficient, and less costly way in their ability to distribute knowledge throughout the world. Language barriers represent however serious problem. Translation and localization should be achieved on a broad scale. Learning depends significantly on the learning context, and one context cannot easily be transported to another context. 9

10 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS 2. THE VISIR APPROACH TO ANALYSE CHANGE AND BUILD VISIONS 2.1 A FEW WORDS ON METHODOLOGY VISIR is working to fill three gaps that prevent the full contribution of ICT to lifelong learning and innovation in Europe: an understanding gap, a networking gap and a mainstreaming gap. Understanding gap The theories of change and the intervention logics utilised in the different LLL sectors must be analysed and coherently integrated in some common scenarios and recommendations for change targeted both to policy and practice Networking gap Flows of information among ICT- for- learning experts and practitioners from different fields and across European Members states must be made smoother and must be based on recognized good practices which work Mainstreaming gap The micro- innovation practices that exist around Europe must be made visible as ways to mainstream a meaningful bottom- up use of ICT for learning and must be the basis on which future scenarios and visions of European ICT for learning are built and discussed Figure 1: the gaps addressed by VISIR A key activity of the VISIR project is trends analysis and vision building aimed at identifying, analysing and relating major trends development and change drivers related to the use of ICT for learning in Europe to overcome the understanding gap and build a long term vision on how to exploit the full potential of ICT as a leverage for innovation and change and as a way to increase digital and key transversal skills of European citizens. VISIR s approach to trends analysis and vision building strongly relies on the legacy of a set of studies and projects in the field of ICT for learning carried out in the last 12 years. In these set of studies, learning is analysed along domains of change which constitute transversal areas of transformation, which are critical to the evolution of education and training system. In the vision building exercise, they act as the lenses through which change in education is understood - as the result of interplaying trends which are both exogenous (such as globalization, demography, ICT revolutions, values- sets) and endogenous to education - as well as the map to define a transformation agenda. 10

11 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS The one to change is a four- steps way, which include trends analysis, scenario planning, vision building and planning of influence. ANALYSING TRENDS PLANNING SCENARIOS BUILDING VISIONS PLANNING INFLUENCE Figure 2: Four vision building steps The VISIR consortium has used extensive desk research and brainstorming activity to identify key trends in learning driven by ICT covering the macro level (E&T systems,), the meso level (organization which provide teaching and learning opportunities) and the micro level (teaching and learning opportunities themselves). We have then analysed how these trends play an influence on each domain of change and are likely to produce new challenges or rather solve existing problems and policy trade- off. During this phase, we went in depth into scrutinizing those trends against different learning sectors, countries and dominating rhetoric. To this aim we have used internal consultation relying on the several networks in the consortium which represent many European countries and lifelong learning sectors as well as on key literature and reports on trends in education in Europe, such as those from IPTS, OECD, EUA, EFMD, CRELL etc. Finally we have integrated the results of the first VISIR stakeh olders seminar held in May 2012 in Bologna which gathered experts from all over Europe and turned into a relevant re- definition of the original domains of change. As detailed in the first issue of the VISIR Vision Report, the framework adopted to analyse change and build visions in the field of ICT for learning is based on 11 domains of change in learning systems meant as critical areas of transformation through which education systems can be mapped and the contribution of ICT defined. AIMS OF LEARNING SYSTEMS CONTENT & COMPETENCES ORCHESTRATION VALUING LEARNING ASSESSMENT FUNDING & GOVERNANCE INTEGRATION INCLUSIVENESS TEACHING QUALITY LEARNING SPACES Figure 3: The VISIR domains of change 11

12 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS The domains of change represent a structure to analyze and reflect together on the future of learning starting from two key questions: What needs to be changed to respond to emerging challenges and achieve desired goals? and What contribution can be brought by ICT? Each domain of change which is part if this report is to be intended as a self- standing paper and can be accessed independently. It identifies relevant key trends and challenges and the role that ICT can play to solve existing contradictions and contribute to desired goals. With the intention to produce a user- friendly paper for each domain of change, we have kept the language simple and opted for a non- academic format. With this priority in mind, some of our statements might be formulated in such a way to apparently loose complexity in favour of immediacy. In fact, VISIR is not aimed to develop a scientific and evidence- based analysis of lifelong learning in Europe, rather to provide stakeholders with honest food- for- thought on key critical issues and start building their own visions for the future. 2.2 A DYNAMIC TOOL AND A LIVING DOCUMENT We do believe that vision building comes from consensus. We do not claim to offer ready- to- use and one- size- fits- all recipes for policy makers and practitioners. A dynamic tool - the VISIR domains of change are provided as a dynamic tool to be used à la carte by stakeholders, who are free to build their own map to transformation. What is learnt, how it is taught, what is assessed, how motivation is kept high are all are interconnected issues. Any segmentation in learning is obviously artificial though useful to accompany reflection starting from one or more entry points. Most of the issues are transversal as well as the examples provided on how ICT can help. What we offer is per each domain a perspective point which policy makers, practitioners and other stakeholders can adopt according to their role, interest and preferences. A wiki approach The 11 domains of change formed a living document open to be nurtured through consultation and research by stakeholders during the lifetime of the VISIR project and beyond. They offer an approach and a structure to analyse trends and evolutions in learning. Though the content can evolve together with the domains themselves thanks to the contribution of the broadest stakeholders community in Europe. 12

13 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS 3. THE VISIR DOMAINS OF CHANGE 3.1 AIMS OF LEARNING SYSTEMS: SHIFT IN BALANCE OF AIMS OF EDUCATION The role that society attaches to Education affects how Education and Training (E&T) systems are designed, organized and run by communities and individuals. This includes what needs to be learned and why. Three main aims are traditionally associated with education: individualization, with the aim to raise autonomous individuals, professionalization to train workers, socialization to grow up citizens. All three aims co- exist within education systems but their balance is not fixed. It somehow responds to the requests that society makes on education in different periods of time. Ultimately, it reflects the visions of the world, which predominate during a certain historical period in a certain society and the formulation of responses to certain big challenges. The classical liberal- humanist learning paradigm needs now to be critically reviewed with regard to new 21st Century requirements in terms of learning outcomes: knowledge, skills, competences, metacognition. Key trends and challenges Increased weight of professionalization amongst educational aims. The stable period of growth enjoyed in the aftermath of the Second World War supported the rise of mass education in Europe. In favorable economic conditions, education was primarily meant as an equalizing leverage and the means to community building and citizenship. The predominance of the aim of socialization reflected the process towards the constructions of solid democracy supported by large welfare provisions and gave shape to European education systems for the era which followed. While socialization dominated, individualization and professionalization were also important under a steadily growing economy. In time of economic crisis like the one we are experiencing now - education policy might be requested in the short- run to turn to professionalization and employability as its primary short- term goal. Increased importance on individual competencies in learning communities within pre- Primary, Primary and Secondary Education. School education in the 20 th century was mainly oriented towards socialization as it is the universal gate to citizenship and social inclusion. Nowadays, in the second decade of the 21 st century, schools and education policy- making are trying to enhance their means to meet this challenge, by focusing somehow more on the autonomy of the learner and ownership of the learning process, preparing pupils to become autonomous, creative and critical learners (and thus citizens) rather than good re- producers of knowledge. Self- expression of the learners, in view of encouraging autonomy and creativity, is to be stimulated in classrooms; with multi- cultural integration representing the big challenge on the socialization side. Self- directed professionalization: the Knowledge Economy opens up niches of opportunity for those who want to make a job out of their passion and merge individual and professional development. For these professionals, it is usually difficult to find exhaustive learning opportunities within current offer of traditional education and training systems. Profiting from the opportunities offered by technology, they are creating innovative learning paths which combine the nurturing of individual talents and the development of spendable skills. Countries and Sectors All aims of education are represented in the different education sectors with varying versions of the balance ; however the focus on the individual s competences is much more associated with Higher Education, the enhancement of professional skills with the Vocational Education and training systems and the building of the social competencies (the socialization agenda) with pre- Primary and Secondary Education (including compulsory schooling). Although the different sectors maintain their own learning priorities and mandates as well as their specificities in terms of 13

14 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS organization, education grades are now increasingly aligning towards a more even distribution of their aims. This reflects the obsolescence of the fragmentation of education into grades and education sectors which worked well in a more stable, less fluid and not yet globalized world. Both school and vocational education are now converging towards a modus operandi where all three aims co- exist in varying versions of balance. On one side, both Schools and Higher Education Institutions are being pushed to acknowledge the need to move from subject matter (knowledge domain) and content- based learning experiences towards more process- based learning, to enhance competences, in order to prepare the pupils for their lifelong learning paths and enhance their employability. On the other side, Vocational Education becomes more attentive to the individual s talent and transversal competences, beyond professional skills, to equip young people with the means to cope with continuously change processes, tasks and often job locations. Debate and practice There are concrete examples of incorporation of elements of general education within Vocational Education and Training (VET) particularly initial VET - in European countries which were traditionally oriented towards pure professionalization, like Italy for instance. There is interest within several European education systems for the dual model where education and work are more closely integrated; examples come recently from both France and Spain. Likewise professionally- oriented education at university level is being embraced. However, it is hard to say to what extent the new balances of aims will be translated into daily practice at the level of individuals and organizations. The increasing policy focus on transversal skills development and creativity enhancement as educational aims will for sure generate strong debates. Indeed, while it is clear that EU parents strive to ensure a future to their kids, they can still hardly believe that skills like self- expression, capacity to live in a multi- cultural environment etc. will help future generations earning their livelihoods. The European education system faces not only the challenge to shape future citizens and workers but also the challenge to remain competitive in comparison to the education systems of other areas of the world (such as BRIC countries), featured by different balances of the classical aims of education. 14

15 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS What can ICT do? ICT can support better coexistence among educational aims by providing innovative solutions individual and collaborative - to pursue individual development, social participation, and the development of skills valuable for work all at the same time. This deals with the growing use of ICT in the classroom and elsewhere within the formal education environment, but also with their role in favoring learning continuity, specifically with respect to the non- formal and informal learning of individuals. In school, examples already exist of the smart introduction of ICT to support more personalized learning processes, able on the one hand to foster creativity and individual talents of pupils while supporting socialization and education for active citizenship. The rise of self- directed professionalization although still an emergent trend - can teach us also something on the opportunities offered by ICT to smooth the fragmentation of individual learning goals. In general, ICT favors the autonomy of the individual in integrating the learning input received from the education system, enabling the learner to autonomously correct existing rigidity in the aims and boundaries of each learning cycle to adapt them to individual needs and long- term goals. Those who want to make a job out of their passion and merge individual and professional development. For these professionals, it is usually difficult to find exhaustive learning opportunities within current offer of traditional education and training systems. Profiting from the opportunities offered by technology, they are creating innovative learning paths which combine the nurturing of individual talents and the development of spendable skills. What s new The rising MOOCs phenomenon is strengthening the self- professionalisation trend highlighted in the last Vision report and paving the way for new forms of digital socialization. In this very critical economic period for Europe and for the world as a whole, governments are increasingly attentive to citizens social needs, in light of the disastrous effect of the economic rigor dictated by the Union. In Italy, for instance, for the first time the education and training reform is not provided as a top down change. A wide consultation open to all citizens has just been launched to get people s view on how education and training could change to support growth and fight the crisis. 15

16 VISIR VISION REPORT YEAR 2 - OPEN LEARNING IN TIMES OF CRISIS 3.2 LEARNING CONTENT, CURRICULA AND COMPETENCES The information society - characterized by complexity and fast change sees knowledge production as distributed and any knowledge set at risk quickly become outdated. The capacity to manage information in the face of complexity and to deal with changing conditions is thus becoming a requirement to face individual and social challenges; the focus of education is shifting from transmitting crystallized knowledge to equipping people with transversal competences as well as the capacity to make links between different elements of information and to apply knowledge in context, with flexibility. Key trends and challenges From given sets of knowledge to processes and competences Within the information society, the focus of education is shifting towards transversal competences as a basis to ensure individual development, employability and active participation in society. These include lifelong learning competences namely reflective attitude, critical skills and metacognition but also collaborative and social skills as well as proactivity, innovation and creativity. Decreasing importance of sets of knowledge. The relativism and loss of fixed beliefs of the post- modern society favors a new attitude towards knowledge which is constructed rather than a given datum. ICT has made available a giant set of resources, information and data and multiplied accesses to them. Individuals show a more proactive attitude in building their own set of resources to become knowledgeable about something rather than recipients of truth. This trend is likely to increase attention to quality of information and literacy as a focus of education, while diminishing the sacrality of knowledge in the classroom (e.g. students allowed using books and laptop to do a coursework). More local definition of content of education The focus on competences rather than set of knowledge in national curricula may favor increasing autonomy at the local level with respect to the definition of content, programs and activities. This in turn leads to more contextualized knowledge as the focus of education processes; the aforementioned competences are then developed within the learning context of pupils and the local specificities. However, such shift to competence acquisition might also bring convergence on standard competences and alignment with regards to standard assessment procedures. More interdisciplinary education: The traditional separation between disciplines and subjects is in crisis. Curricula and programs need to be more interdisciplinary to ensure responsiveness to the changed social and economic context within which there is increasing demand for integrated profiles. The shift to competences as a goal of education pushes towards the design of more interdisciplinary learning experience such as project- based learning and case studies able to stimulate the development of integrated set of competences. Development and generalization of innovative learning materials. The shift in key learning outcomes in education has also an impact on the development and spread of innovative learning material which are more adequate to achieve those learning outcomes, by allowing much more complex situation, better emulation of reality and Increased application of theory through projects anchored in the real world (i.e. simulation and game- based learning). Countries and sectors European countries are converging around the European Lifelong Learning Programme with its focus on transversal competences as a primary goal of education. There is also increased attention across Europe to the acquisition of integrated competences in learning processes rather than sets of theoretical knowledge. Although mediated by their specificities, such shift is common to learning sectors. In school - according to a recent OECD report on curriculum 16

17 VISIR VISION REPORT 2 LEARNING IN THE CRISIS innovation - so- called key- competences approaches and student- centred approaches to teaching have been promoted in several curriculum frameworks, while cross- curricular or integrated studies are increasingly common in many countries (OECD:2012)2. The competence discourse with its focus on transversal skills, innovation and creativity is also penetrating Higher Education. Debate and practice The debate around key learning outcomes is a lively one. The traditional opposition persists between on the one hand the need for more generalist content and on the other hand more specialist education - especially in the professional sector (including vocational education and workplace learning). On the other hand, the shift to competences is perceived in some sectors especially Higher Education - as a threatening to push towards education into over- professionalization. Due to this, the transformation in the learning outcomes is still more expected than real in the formal education sector. In particular, in both in School and Higher Education it is difficult to move away from traditional approaches centered on the transmission of sets of knowledge. At the workplace as well, it seems that reality still clashes with theories and claims. When it comes to concrete daily access to the new available knowledge resources, learning content on the web, many employee are still forbidden to access social media and channels such as You Tube, Twitter, Facebook etc., being thus prevented to access large sets of shared knowledge and enter exchange with wider professional communities. What can ICT do? ICT can be adopted in education to support the development of transversal competences and metacognition processes. New ICT devices and services - such as apps, tablets, smart phones - are already used in an experimental way in education to support active learning process based on contextualization. If used in a meaningful way, they can favor metacognition processes and stimulate competence development by requiring an active engagement of the learner with knowledge elaboration tasks and problem solving - also through collaborative processes. Likewise, ICT can help increase the reflective practices of learners. New data tracking systems permits to record and map individual learning (i.e. e- portfolio and personal learning environment). Increasingly interoperable systems support the creation of meaningful individual paths and profiles across learning contexts, favoring meta- cognition and ownership of the learning processes. The disruptive power of ICT is that they offer access to a variety of contents, opening up a learning process which was once confined to the classroom and structured by the teacher. At the workplace this include access to a variety of content and info such as blogs, professional communities and open resources, provided that web 2.0 tools are favored rather than feared by employers. As mentioned problems do however arise with respect to the quality of resources and the information literacy of learners. An effort of education systems is required to support the development of necessary competences to be spent from school up to learning at work. What s new Political focus at the EU level is increasing on the building of Open Learning systems, where the adjective open is applied both to the word learning and to the word system. Relying on the increasing availability of free learning material online (through MOOCs), focus is now shifting on the building of clearing houses or brokerage systems able to provide individualized competence building services and able to map citizens skills and help them 1) building a roadmap to enrich their competences and consequently their professional profile and 2) supporting them in finding the relevant platforms (mostly MOOCs) where such competences can be developed. 2 OECD, Bringing about curriculum innovations: implicit approaches in the OECD area, OECD Education Working Paper No