Making college affordable

As Karl Kapp recently explored in The Higher Education Bubble Continues to Grow, most colleges are mimicking Wall Street's flawed strategy of self-serving financial schemes. Colleges cannot slow the runaway inflation which results in soaring costs, declining value and under-served students. These colleges are conforming to a single contaminated business model, much like the health care providers that Clayton Christensen has analyzed. The "significant" differences between colleges amount to mere superficial variations in course offerings, campus activities and financial aid resources. The financial crisis is shared by nearly all institutions of higher education. As I recently explored on my other blog, the reasons the costs are soaring out of sight are not even on their radars.

I expect four different business models will emerge from the widespread collapse of over-priced academic institutions. Each constitutes an exit strategy from the stampede headed for the precipice. Two exits develop sustaining innovations which maintain the use of college campuses and classroom contacts with students. The other two introduce disruptive innovations which change the game of "getting a college education". All four innovations make college more affordable while redefining and differentiating their value propositions. Each new business model will need to "circle its wagons" to defend itself against contamination by the other three innovations.

Academic credentials providers
Only one of the four new business models will continue to offer degrees and transcripts from accredited institutions. This exit strategy is the least affordable alternative, though cost reductions can be achieved. This sustaining innovation only serves the sciences, engineering programs and technical disciplines. This model views undergraduate education as a certification process for grad school. The credentials earned remain within academia. Every student is required to progress through the same obstacle courses, get over the same hurdles and exhibit the same competencies. The factory model for the production of uniform outputs can be better utilized to make the educational and matriculation processes more efficient and cost effective. Presentations by pricey faculty members can be archived for download as the open courseware movement has already initiated. Personal contact with undergrad students can be handled by low cost grad students who are "learning by teaching". The faculty will continue to be devoted to academic research, publishing and grant seeking. Much of the students' testing and lab work will migrate into game environments where learners proceed at their own pace, self-remediating flaws in their perception, understanding or execution.  Cost savings will also be realized by the elimination of the "cruise ship" amenities and their accompanying layers of bureaucracy.

College experience providers
One other business model will sustain the use of college classrooms and campuses. It does not credential the advancement to grad school or support academic research. It values the quality of teaching and relating to students over subject matter expertise. It provides the enrollment with high quality college experiences and utilizes liberal arts and humanities curricula toward that end. It serves those college students looking to mature, separate from their family systems,  find themselves, and/or get experience with mating -- while living on campus. It expects there will be no connection between what students study in college and their subsequent employment. There is no need for grades or other academic credentials. The subject matter gets used to cultivate their ability to critique, problem solve, change frames of reference, perceive subtleties and express themselves. The instructors function as mentors, coaches, guides and sounding boards for the students' personal development. There remains a parallel staff of RA's, counselors, activity sponsors etc. for the rich variety of "student life" offerings. Cost savings are realized by the elimination of academic tenure, committees, research, libraries and administration. This labor model can be delivered entirely by part time "adjuncts" who exude a passion for teaching and cultivating individual students. These faculty members will write recommendation letters for the students they know very well upon graduation and job seeking. These students will have also assembled portfolios, verified by faculty members -- that reveal abilities that could contribute to an employer's objectives.

Service learning providers
The first of the two disruptive innovations utilizes a service learning paradigm. This business model serves those going into service careers. The process of apprenticeship, on-the-job training and action learning cultivates the needed skills and awareness. This "game-changer" will evacuate most community college and 4-year classrooms that pretend to prepare students to serve others by listening to lectures and taking tests on textbooks.  It delivers hands-on practice for subsequent work that will involves hands-on practices. While academia discredits this innovation as inferior  "vocational training" or "trade school", it redefines quality in "unacademic ways". Much like business recruiting and promotion efforts, this model relies on role play, in-basket and other "immersion in simulated situations" to qualify individuals. It's not what they say they know, but rather how effectively they "walk the talk" that counts. This model will deliver students who can get the job done, handle the responsibility effectively and respond to unfamiliar situations impressively. This innovation will frame academia as merely preparing students to be hypocrites who only "talk the talk" and look good on paper. Cost savings will be realized by the elimination of classrooms, campuses, textbooks and the academic administration.

Peer learning providers
The other of the two disruptive innovations utilizes a peer learning paradigm. This business model serves those going into professions that initiate projects, work with clients, collaborate with colleagues and create new solutions together. Learning from interactions with peers cultivates the core skill sets for collaborating. Getting an education from peers provides of sense of getting along with others more easily, gaining trust in others, getting others to feel understood and getting common ground established at the beginning. Learners get accustomed to making a difference by listening, appreciating differences and relying on others. They will become clear about the value they offer others and many other dimensions of "entrepreneurial literacy". They will get a sense of "how and why it pays to know this" which will set them up to prosper in the world of free lancing on call and working with virtual teams. These educations can emerge from mutual investments in sweat equity. Very little, if any, money will change hands -- much like the transition from the Wall Street to Main Street playbook of the next generation global economy. The cost savings, compared to other three business models is staggering, like the growing abundance of free online content and freemium offerings that are disrupting newspapers, radio/ television broadcasters and conventional advertisers.

At the center of these four exit strategies will be a new space. Instead of admissions advisors and college recruiters, we will find the likes of optometrists or travel agents for each seeker of a higher education. Students will come to get the equivalent of a new eyeglass prescription or a travel itinerary. They'll get help sorting out all these options to arrive that the best personal fit. Those that show signs of continuing dependency on authority figures, expert content and formal instruction -- will favor the sustaining innovations. Those revealing confidence, independence and self-direction will favor the disruptive alternatives. Those with no idea what they want to study will find the "college experience" emphasis will serve them best. Those with their sights set on grad school will favor the academic model that continues to issue diplomas and grade transcripts. Those who are inclined to make the same difference in different people's lives everyday will be advised to explore the service learning model. Those who expect to co-create new solutions with varieties of projects, collaborators and clientele will favor the peer learning model.

Entering possibility space

Most people on the planet are outside of possibility space. They have yet to awaken from dreaming up what they are convinced is realistic. They are missing out on all the freedom that is to be found in possibility space. I'll call where they are at "captivity space" to contrast their experiences with possibility space.

In captivity space, we act as if it's been said "Behold, I make all things old". We already know how familiar most things are and what they mean to us. The majority of our experiences are the "same old same old". We live inside our habits, routines and predictable occurrences with no way out. We pretend to value this much repetition while feeling trapped, bored and starved for stimulation. In possibility space, "all things are new". We know to not already know, to wonder instead and to be fascinated with the mystery we're beholding. Nothing has happened before in exactly this way, sequence or detail. There is so much to be in awe of like a newborn with sparkling eyes of wonder. By liberating ourselves from too much familiarity, we are free to explore and enjoy the freshness of this day.

In captivity space, we also act as if it's been said "All things are not even slightly possible". We argue for our limitations and favor chronic problems. We get stuck, stagnant or stalemated because the needed changes are not possible according to what we already know too well. We assume there's nothing new that could come along. In possibility space, "All things are possible". If it's conceivable, it's doable or possibly emergent from self organizing complexity. It's not a question of "can I?" but rather numerous questions of "how can I?". Because it's assumed to be possible, it becomes fascinating to explore how it can be done.

In captivity space, we want to do something that's never been done before. We expect to be completely original to escape the oppressive repetition. We're disappointed when we discover our thing appears to be derivative, it's actually been done before, or it looks like an unintentional copy. Mortality and time seem very real. We have one life to live and thus want to make spectacular progress with these elusive,  breakthrough productions. In possibility space, everything has been done before. We can get messages from the so-called future to stay on the path of recreating our latest copycat production. Neither time or mortality is real, but experiencing them is very real. We're free to live as if we're really experiencing convincing illusions.

In captivity space, we take things literally. The familiar is familiar and the unfamiliar is unfamiliar. There's no two ways about what is simply the facts. It's comforting to be objective, analytical and precise. In possibility space, we take things paradoxically. Everything offers a both/and combination of perceptions. What seems objectively real is also illusory, purely subjective and dreamlike. The familiar is delightfully unfamiliar as well as predictably familiar. The unfamiliar exhibits patterns that can make it seem familiar while remaining mysterious. The amount of fascination, appreciation and creativity soars in possibility space.

To enter possibility space, it helps to say to ourselves "I don't know what this is or what this means". It's helpful to play around with "what-if questions" instead of thinking about what is, what has to be and what always happens. It helps to ask ourselves "where's the freedom in this? and allow for experiencing a dramatic change of perspective. It may even help to be still and innocently observe the immediate surroundings as if there is no time like the present to bask in the wonder of now.

Why it's so difficult to awaken

As you're reading this, it probably seems like it is really happening that you're reading this. Now that you're to the next sentence, there is some continuity with reading the first sentence that gives you some historical perspective. With that ongoing stream of experiences and more of the same by the time you're reading this third sentence, your mind will predict that there will be more reading here much like what has already occurred. All this seems very realistic. You are really doing this reading of these words that are really here to be read. There's no indication that you are dreaming and thus, there's nothing to awaken from. With such powerful experiences of what is happening, what has already happened and what's going to happen, there's little room for doubt or suspicions regarding the reality of this.

As if that was not enough to keep things seeming real, there's the meaning this has for you. At some level this proves that you were right. It confirms what you've been expecting and intending previously. You feel justified in regarding this as real. It vindicates your convictions that it has to be this way, to take this time and to occur where you are. It substantiates your familiarity with how difficult/easy this is, what does not/does happen after doing this, and what remains the same/changes as a result.

With this preponderance of evidence of real occurrences and experiences, we assume it's not a dream to awaken from. We're convinced:

• We are not muggles dismissing the possibility of magical transformations this instant.
• We are not hobbits hanging out in the Shire where the usual things continue to happen
• We are not inside the Matrix taking those artificial constructs to be real.
• We are not Alice staying on the familiar side of the looking glass.
• We are not trapped in a London nursery only pretending Never Never Land is real.
• We are not confused about what is real and what is an illusion

If the truth be known, you are dreaming. This is not really happening. The time that has passed along with the seeming continuity between prior incidents is all an illusion. The particular place you're at only appears real. The meaning this has for you provides a wonderful story, with you as the main character, without sticking to the facts about how it got dreamed up by you and us together.

Rethinking nodes in networks

When we're making a study of a network or formulating an explanation for outcomes produced by a network, we need things to examine. We are prone to make a "thingy" of nothing or of an ongoing processing. Alfred North Whitehead coined the term "misplaced concreteness" to separate his "process philosoph" from all the scientific studies that had made things of processes in order to study them objectively.

In the Prince of Networks, Graham Harman characterized Whitehead as the grandfather of Bruno Latour's Actor Network Theory. Latour takes exception to scientific explanations that add a false dimension to their descriptions of networks. He expects explanations to emerge from sufficient complexity of descriptions, rather than conforming the data to established explanations. He treasures Whitehead's investigative principle of "beginning and ending with wonder".

As I've pondered how all this might support our rethinking the concreteness of nodes in a network, I've made a lot of associations to the possibility of nodeless networks. If there's nothing there where connections come together, we have to wonder what the intersection is about. The connections would meet with wonder and explore what it's about. There could be no "misplaced concreteness" in a absence of nodes.

What could occur at "connections over nothing" is significant learning. The unknowns could come to the forefront of the experience. The exploration of combined questions, possibilities, hypotheses, and contrasting descriptions could replace the so-called "learning" of information through network connections. The takeaways from the encounters could enrich each exploration and better articulate the intersection.

This is a reversal of preexisting nodes forming new connections. This proposes preexisting connections resulting in emergent nodes. The coming together is the constant process. The resulting nodes come and go. The process begins and ends with wonder.

Missing interfaces users and edges

Our eyeballs can see nodes, but not connections unless they're hard wired. Most connections are subtle, hidden or implied without taking form. As result, there is excessive attention on nodes, as Ailsa recently explored on her blog: Exploring the dark wood. In the comments I added there over the last few days, I explored some connections to Bruno Latour's Actor Network Theory. Since then I've been reflecting on what else is missing in all this exploration of connections. Interfaces, users and edges came to mind.

When systems are closed they lack interfaces. They seem to be for internal use only. They don't share information, make access easy or attempt to connect outside it's own boundaries. yet these closed systems are very well connected internally. Their lack of external connections is usually an indication of internal availability to every kind of resource, support and information they need.

When networks are self serving, there are no users to be served. It's all self-service and DIY functionality. There's no need to understand users or uses made of the functionality. Everybody is free to do what they want as if that will be useful to them. Providing structure to guide uses or advance the users abilities seems excessively imposing, authoritarian and industrialized.

When networks are ubiquitous, they lack edges. They seem to be everywhere in a way where there's no way to cross a line, reach a limit or hit a wall. Thus there is no supporting those who may have come to an edge, gotten stuck or maxed out. Everyone is getting connected as if that's an end in itself.

If a network had interfaces, user support and edges, many would say it's no longer a network. They make a purist argument about connections between nodes that handle anything that comes up. They might also argue that a system with interfaces, user support and edges needs to be more networked, interconnected and complex. Interfaces, user support and edges are missing from the focus on connections because connections and edges are mutually exclusive in the minds of these advocates.

What if connections and edges are two sides of one coin when we give less emphasis to nodes? What if there is a both/and alternative to replace the either/or conceptualization? What if nodeless networks are comprised of connections that require interfaces to compensate for the absence of nodes? What if a network that embodies wonder, questions, unknowns and ongoing explorations would easily imagine it serving users encountering edges in spite of all the connectivity? What if I explore this further tomorrow?

28 inches and counting

The forecast for 18 inches of snow had me running every errand for the week on Tuesday. Once the snow arrived, I've shoveled the walks and driveway 3 times so far. The snow is expected to end after 48 hours of continuous accumulation at midnight. We've got 28 inches so far and expect another ten. At least the Colorado Rockies dd not make it into the World Series this year. I'll get back to blogging here next Monday, Nov 2nd.

Trying smarter for a change

Sometimes we succeed by simply trying harder to achieve our objective. Getting the lid off a jar or a garage cleaned out -- calls for trying harder. All it took was a little determination and focus on the goal. Too often, these successes get over-generalized. We jump to the conclusion that we can always succeed by trying harder. Most of the time, trying harder backfires after stringing us along with false hope that our determination will win out in the end.

Trying harder to succeed can make the original problem worse. It depends whether the problem has a life of its own. Living problems can retaliate when we mess with them. They can feed off our problem-solving attention. They can escalate the dynamics into a crisis or a "can of worms". They make us appear naive, gullible, simple minded or mistaken. Living problems say things like 'there's a lot more to this than meets the eye" or "it's not a simple as it first appears".

One way to recognize the warning signs of a living pattern is to consider if there are any cycles involved. Inert problems are straightforward. Living problems come back around to haunt us, go in in circles or flip flop back and forth between extremes.  They indicate there's a deeper level to the problem that we're ignoring. There make it obvious there is no solution at the level of the presenting problem. They redirect our efforts from what evident to what's inferred, implied or implicit.

We may have heard of the distinction between "trying harder and trying smarter". That does not mean we know how to try smarter. Usually our only options are to try harder or to quit. If we knew how to try smarter, we would not be trying harder in the first place. We'd already know how to try differently and not rely on determination to overcome the obstacles.

We try smarter when we get below the surface evidence to understand the underlying issues. Below bravado may be panic and desperate urges. Under bullying there are usually lurking insecurities and patterns of self contempt. Deeper than sales pitches we may find hidden agendas and long established successes with deceiving others.

When we encounter what keeps the problem so alive, we see ways to transform the complex dynamics. The problem we're inclined to fuss at may be the solution to a deeper problem. The issues that seem to be contested may be invitations to become more respected, understood and trusted. Chronic problems with making changes happen may show the way for the changes to fall into place once stability is valued equally. In each case, we've made the switch from "trying harder to trying smarter".