I missed this back in early June, but Chinese hurdler Liu Xiang was in Oregon at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene. From the Associated Presss article “Liu Xiang wins in 12.87 seconds” (here):
Liu Xiang lunged across the finish line and quickly looked up to his left at the giant scoreboard.
Then, he impatiently waited.
A split second later -- only it felt like an eternity -- the board flashed Liu's time in big, white characters -- 12.87 seconds.
That sent the 110-meter hurdler from China straight into euphoria as he thrust his fist into the air before dancing and skipping around the track with unbridled exuberance.
Sure, there was the excitement from holding off a star-studded field to get the win at the Prefontaine Classic on Saturday. But there also was that glittering time on the scoreboard.
Maybe at first he thought he had tied the world record, but it turned out to be wind-aided by a slight margin. So the world mark set by Cuba's Dayron Robles remains safe for now.
Long after the race was finished -- and after Liu did a celebratory lap around the track to high-five anyone with an extended hand -- he was asked if he ever thought about breaking world records.
"No. I never think about that," Liu said through a translator. "I think I can run that fast. I'm ready for that."
Liu once held the world mark when he finished in 12.88 seconds during a race in July 2006. Nearly two years later -- just before the 2008 Beijing Olympics -- Robles took the record.
Stanford President John Hennessey and Salman Khan of the Khan Academy discuss higher education and digital technology. Lots of the issues of online education are aired. Salman Khan continues to impress me. I like his distinction between learning and credentialing. Online education will grow to the extent that credentialing innovations give it value. To “bend the cost curve” such credentialing innovations will be required.
This circular chart from the Financial Times shows the combined growth of exports (dark blue) and imports (light blue) as a percentage of US GDP. They grew 11 percent from 20.5 percent in 1981 to 31.7 percent in 2012.
See the Financial Times article "US economy: Declaration of interdependence" by Ed Crooks and Keith Fray (here)
From the NY Times article “Foreign Languages Fade in Class – Except Chinese” by Sam Dill0n (here):
Thousands of public schools stopped teaching foreign languages in the last decade, according to a government-financed survey — dismal news for a nation that needs more linguists to conduct its global business and diplomacy.
But another contrary trend has educators and policy makers abuzz: a rush by schools in all parts of America to offer instruction in Chinese.
Some schools are paying for Chinese classes on their own, but hundreds are getting some help. The Chinese government is sending teachers from China to schools all over the world — and paying part of their salaries.
At a time of tight budgets, many American schools are finding that offer too good to refuse.
And:
Experts said several factors were fueling the surge in Chinese. Parents, students and educators recognize China’s emergence as an important country and believe that fluency in its language can open opportunities.
Also stoking the interest has been a joint program by the College Board and Hanban, a language council affiliated with the Chinese Education Ministry, that since 2006 has sent hundreds of American school superintendents and other educators to visit schools in China, with travel costs subsidized by Hanban. Many have started Chinese programs upon their return.
Since 2006, Hanban and the College Board have also sent more than 325 volunteer Chinese “guest teachers” to work in American schools with fledgling programs and paying $13,000 to subsidize each teacher’s salary for a year. Teachers can then renew for up to three more years.
The State Department has paid for a smaller program — the Teachers of Critical Languages Program — to bring Chinese teachers to schools here, with each staying for a year.
In the first two years of its Chinese program, the Jackson District in Ohio said it had provided its guest teacher housing, a car and gasoline, health insurance and other support worth about $26,000. This year, the district is paying a more experienced Chinese guest teacher $49,910 in salary and other support, in addition to the $13,000 in travel expenses he receives from Hanban, bringing his compensation into rough parity with Ohio teachers.
From the Oregonian guest column “Technology overhaul can transform schools to help fix U.S. education” by Colin Karr-Morse, former principal of Lincoln and Marshall high schools in Portland (here):
Almost everything we do in our schools, from placing students into grade levels to using letter grades, is archaic. Lacking the tools and resources needed to provide dynamic, individualized lessons appropriate in this information age, our teachers must do the best they can in the pre-information-age environment in which they must function.
Just before the Civil War, America made use of the Pony Express to move information from St. Joseph, Mo., to Sacramento at a rate of about 10 miles per hour. When the telegraph line was completed and could move information almost instantly, the Pony Express went immediately out of business. No amount of reform could make ponies competitive with the telegraph in terms of moving information.
Today, in this age of exploding information capabilities, our schools are the Pony Express of our time. The technologies they use (textbooks, teacher talk, blackboards, etc.) are as incapable of competing with modern means of information exchange as the Pony Express was in competing with the telegraph.
Our culture has the tools and know-how needed to bring our archaic schools back into touch with the real educational needs of today's students, but none of the current so-called reform efforts has even understood the problem, much less found any authentic solutions…..
I agree, but Karr-Morse goes on to call for a national effort. I think we could do much more right here in Oregon by aggressively, but thoughtfully, pursuing online education efforts.
“I describe universities, American universities, this way. I think that we're elephants. I think we have to become ballerinas, or else we're going to become dinosaurs.” – Gordon Gee of Ohio State University
“And I would suggest that, if public higher education continues on its current course , that it is, in fact, on a collision course. One of the things that we have noted in our various studies is that, today, we spend two times the average of any industrialized nation on higher ed, but our results are far worse.” – Anne Neal of the American Council of Trustee and Alumni
Teresa Sullivan has been rehired as president of the University of Virginia. Faced with the furor of faculty, students, alumni and donors, the Rector of the Board of Visitors Dragas (their governing board) apologized.
From the Washington Post article “U-VA seeks normalcy after Sullivan reinstatement, but question linger” by Jenna Johnson and Anita Kumar (here):
The university has been seeking to reassure donors who were upset by the tumult that ensued when the popular Sullivan was ousted on June 10, less than two years into her term. The governing Board of Visitors unanimously voted to reinstate her Tuesday.
After the vote, Wood said, two anonymous donors made pledges of $1 million apiece, in explicit support of Sullivan, and 657 gifts were made online. The online donations, ranging from $5 to $10,000, totaled more than $218,000.
Tom Faulders, president of the U-Va. alumni association, said 6,000 alums had weighed in over an 11-day period by commenting through the association’s Web site. About 10 percent of them vowed to withhold donations until the president was reinstated, the rector resigned or the entire board was removed — or some combination of such changes. Six or 7 percent expressed faith in the board. A majority complained about the process that led to Sullivan’s ouster.
The university’s future with online education was central to the controversy, as the NY Times article “Public Universities See Familiar Fight at Virginia” by Tamar Lewin (here):
She has been especially concerned about pushing ahead in online learning, to keep up with Stanford, M.I.T. and other universities that have, just in the last year, begun to offer “massive open online courses,” or MOOCs, free to anyone with an Internet connection, carving out new territory in an area that most universities are just beginning to explore.
Ms. Dragas sent her board a newspaper editorial on the issue, in an e-mail headed “why we can’t afford to wait.” And in a June 10 statement about Dr. Sullivan’s ouster, Ms. Dragas said that the world “is simply moving too fast” for the University of Virginia to maintain its position “under a model of incremental marginal change.”
While many of the new MOOCs are enrolling more than 100,000 students, most, so far, have been from overseas — so that, at least for the time being, the real competition is with foreign universities, not American ones.
Nonetheless, the sheer scale of the new online courses has jolted every leading university into thinking about how online learning may transform higher education: Will there be much demand for each university to develop its own courses, when a state-of-the-art version from a prestigious university is available online? Will employers accept a set of certificates from online courses as a traditional diploma? Will families pay ever-higher tuition if a free online alternative exists? Does it make sense for universities to invest in brick-and-mortar branch campuses, in the United States or abroad, when they can so easily take courses to students everywhere via the Internet?
Dr. Sullivan said that online education was no panacea — and indeed, was “surprisingly expensive, has limited revenue potential and unless carefully managed can undermine the quality of instruction.”
And while she agreed that she is, indeed, an incrementalist, she stressed that that did not mean she lacked a strategic plan.
“Corporate-style, top-down leadership does not work in a great university,” she said. “Sustained change with buy-in does work.”
I think the Board of Visitors overreacted in firing Sullivan. Why did not the Board (maybe they did, but its not in any reports I’ve seen) create a Board committee on online education and ask for information from Sullivan about current and future online education activities. This is what I think the Oregon Board of Higher Education needs to do across the Oregon University System. Put the issue out in public for consideration. David Karpf’s Huff Post article “UVA Board’s Lazy Business Sense” adds to this perspective (here):
The second hurdle is a market problem. Did you notice that Jeffrey Walker was describing one online course, being used at many universities? If Stanford and MIT are offering free online classes to everyone, what value is there in UVA creating its own content? The market for online intro-to-biology lectures simply isn't that big. If the top 10 private universities in the country offer these lectures for free, there is actually no market share for the top 10 public universities to exploit on their own. That would be a bit like launching a new company in 2012 that sells books through the Internet. Fantastic idea, but a bigger player already has that covered.
This isn't to say that universities shouldn't explore online learning. Properly rolled out, online classes can cost-effectively reach underserved communities. But the proper strategic position is to move slowly into this new space. Before you start massively slashing programs, you probably want to know what online learning can and cannot effectively replace. You also probably want a pilot program that tests key assumptions about how your students/customers will react to it.
Higher Ed, especially n Oregon, does need to change substantially.
Spoken by Anne Neal of the American Council of Trustee and Alumni:
And I would suggest that, if public higher education continues on its current course , that it is, in fact, on a collision course. One of the things that we have noted in our various studies is that, today, we spend two times the average of any industrialized nation on higher ed, but our results are far worse.
We're graduating less than 60 percent in six years. A study called "Academically Adrift" looked at the learning gains of college student across the country and found that 45 percent didn't learn or had very minimal cognitive gain in the first two years.
And, as you know, as a tuition-paying parent, tuitions have gone up, been skyrocketing for decades, and I think finally have reached a point where colleges and universities are beginning to realize -- and, thank you, board of the University of Virginia for bringing this to the fore -- that we start -- we have got to start looking at different ways of doing what we're doing.
In developing the recent post "Chennai, formerly Madras, India" (here), I came upon the above video. I did not know what an "idli" was. I looked them up and went in seach of a restaurant serving them in SE Portland. I found them at the Dwaraka Indian Cuisine restaruant on SE Hawthorne, only they served them for dinner not for breakfast and not for lunch.
Idli , also romanized idly or iddly, plural idlis, is a savory cake of south Indian origin popular throughout India. The cakes are usually two to three inches in diameter and are made by steaming a batter consisting of fermented black lentils(de-husked) and rice. The fermentation process breaks down the starches so that they are more readily metabolized by the body.
Most often eaten at breakfast or as a snack, idlis are usually served in pairs with chutney, sambar, or other accompaniments. Mixtures of crushed dry spices such as milagia podi are the preferred condiments for idlis eaten on the go. A variant of Idli known as sanna is very popular amongst the Goans and other Konkani people.
Photo below: sambar with two idlis at the Dwaraka Indian Cuisine restaurant>
“Facing a global economic challenge, the United States must build a multilingual workforce prepared to thrive in today's world market. Doing so requires that the federal government engage in a comprehensive, interagency national initiative to improve foreign language education in the United States.” – Council on Foreign Relations
The Council on Foreign Relations has a great article “A ‘Languages for Jobs’ Initiative” that reframes the case for foreign language instruction in terms of America’s economic future. Looking at global economic growth, it rightfully brings into consideration the importance of foreign languages beyond Spanish and Mandarin, like Brazilian Portuguese, Hindi and Urdu (I’d add others like Indonesian, Arabic, Japanese, Russian, French, German, and Turkish).
The Council on Foreign Relation focuses on a national initiative. But Oregon could easily, at little or no cost, have its own Oregon “Languages for Jobs” initiative by expanding foreign language immersion programs (like Utah), by making such expansions part of the “Achievement Compacts” accountability process, by supporting and blending in heritage language speakers into immersion or online programs, by making strategic foreign language classes available online all across Oregon, and by creating state and local high school study abroad programs. All doable on little or no additional funding. But it requires change, and political and educational leadership now lacking.
Read the whole article “A ‘Languages for Jobs’ Initiative.” It begins (here):
The promotion of foreign language instruction should be a national priority. In an increasingly competitive international economy, a workforce with more market-relevant foreign language skills is a strategic economic asset for the United States. Yet foreign language education is on the decline, particularly at the primary level when foreign languages are best learned. Federal policy is not stepping up. Recent federal efforts to promote foreign language instruction are not designed to have a broad-based impact and have been focused almost exclusively on achieving national security goals. U.S. economic competitiveness goals are equally important, but there are no comprehensive efforts to promote the instruction of languages, including Mandarin Chinese, Portuguese, German, and Hindi, in local school districts where foreign language education must occur to improve proficiency more broadly. The federal government should launch an interagency "Languages for Jobs" initiative, with funding levels at least equal to security language programs. As part of the initiative, the Department of Education would develop foreign language education accountability metrics and primary-level immersion programming that leverages the country's existing multilingual population.
The Economic Case for Foreign Language Skills
The global economy is shifting away from the English-speaking world. Since 1975, the English-speaking share of global GDP has fallen significantly and will continue to fall. The Chinese economy will surpass the U.S. economy in size soon after 2030. Latin America (Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking) and South Asia (Hindi- and Urdu-speaking) are growing strongly as well. Exports have accounted for half of post recession U.S. economic growth, and future U.S. growth will increasingly depend on selling U.S. goods and services to foreign consumers who do not necessarily speak English.
In a competitive global export market, there will be a premium on foreign language skills and international competency. It is an old adage that you can buy in any language, but you must sell in the language of your customer. Business services such as banking, insurance, and architecture are the fastest-growing U.S. export sectors, and selling these services requires employees able to work effectively in non-English-speaking countries. In a survey of large U.S. corporations conducted ten years ago—when exports were less critical for the U.S. economy—30 percent responded that personnel with insufficient international skills prevented their companies from fully exploiting business opportunities. Eighty percent believed their sales would increase if they had more internationally competent staff.
The widespread use of English as the leading global second language, especially in business, does not offset the disadvantage faced by monolingual Americans. A 2011 survey of more than one hundred executives in large U.S. businesses found foreign nationals have an advantage in competing for international jobs. Three-quarters agreed that language skills made it easier for foreign nationals to work in the United States than for U.S. nationals to work overseas, leaving Americans at a significant disadvantage at a time when U.S.-based multinational companies are growing faster abroad than at home……..more
“We do not believe we can even maintain our current standard under a model of incremental, marginal change. The world is simply moving too fast.” University of Virginia Board of Visitors Rector Helen Dragas
The Board of the University of Virginia, called the Board of Visitors, rather suddenly fired (or requested the resignation of) University President Teresa Sullivan. Given the furor the firing has created, especially among faculty and students, they are currently reconsidering their decision. Apparently, from news reports, disagreement over online education was at the core of the Board’s dissatisfaction, with the Board wanting more change (although what change is not clear) and the President resisting such changes
This is curious. Oregon education, both higher ed and K-12, is doing nothing to capture costs savings and only modest efforts to expand opportunities with online education. I recently wrote the Oregon Education Investment Board saying (here):
You as a Board cannot get Oregon to the goals you have set without immersing yourselves in the emerging potentials of online learning. One of your tasks is figuring out how to do that. You cannot avoid it and do anything meaningful.
Yet the OEIB, as well as the Oregon Board of Higher Education, does nothing. There are no committees nor staff report to examine the potential and chart some choices. Nothing. They are flying blind. Further, the OEIB recently hired a Chief Education Officer for Oregon without any public discussion with him about his views on online education. Similarly, the Board of Higher Education recently hired a President for the University of Oregon. Again, there was no public airing of his views on online education and its place in the future of the University of Oregon, or higher ed in Oregon more generally.
The Board of the University of Virginia may have overreacted, but at least they are concerned and engaged in the issues of online education. Oregon educational leaders are living in denial. I know of no online education efforts in the Oregon University System aimed at cutting the costs of higher ed. Oregon is adrift and this needs to change!
From the Inside Higher Ed article “The E-Mail Trail at UVa” by Scott Jaschik (here):
E-mail messages were flying among leaders of the Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia in the weeks leading up to the ouster of Teresa A. Sullivan as president of the university. The e-mail messages show that one reason board leaders wanted to move quickly was the belief that UVa needed to get involved in a serious way with online education.
The board leaders traded articles in which various pundits suggested that online education is the only real future for higher education -- and the e-mail messages suggest that board members believe this view. On May 31, for example, Helen Dragas, the rector (UVa-speak for board chair) sent the vice rector, Mark Kington, the URL for a Wall Street Journal column about online education. Dragas's subject line was "good piece in WSJ today -- why we can't afford to wait." The column, a look at the MOOC (massively online open course) movement in higher education, has the subhead: "The substitution of technology (which is cheap) for labor (which is expensive) can vastly increase access to an elite-caliber education." …..
The column argues that the MOOCs have the potential to change the cost structure in higher education, as long as institutions are willing to replace some in-person education with online education. "[I]n this way, college X might have its students take calculus, computer science and many other lecture courses online from MIT-Harvard (or other suppliers), and have them take other classes with their own local professors for subjects that are better taught in small seminars. College X can thus offer stellar lectures from the best professors in the world — and do locally what it does best, person to person," the column says.
And from The Nation article “Sullivan Resignation Spotlights Debate About Online Education” by Charlie Tyson (here):
Emails from Board of Visitors Rector Helen Dragas and former Vice Rector Mark Kington obtained Tuesday by The Cavalier Daily through a Freedom of Information Act request suggest the two believed the University should become more amenable to online learning — and quickly.
On May 31, Dragas sent Kington a Wall Street Journal op-ed discussing the “coming revolution” in higher education. The article detailed how universities could become “much more productive” by replacing human labor with technology. The subject line of Dragas’ email was “[W]hy we can’t afford to wait.”
The world is simply moving too fast’
The role of online delivery in higher education has sparked contentious debate among academics in recent years. Many public universities are flailing under state budget cuts — state funding accounted for a mere 9.5 percent of the University’s academic operating budget this past academic year, down from 10.5 percent the year before. And with students facing swollen tuition rates and record-high unemployment numbers for recent college graduates, proponents of online learning point to higher education as a system seemingly in danger of collapse. Meanwhile, defenders of brick-and-mortar schooling, fearing a lapse in quality as courses go virtual, protest. They say the in-person exchange of ideas remains the time-tested way to impart deep critical-thinking skills.
At an institution that reveres tradition, Dragas and Kington wanted change — and more than just “incremental” change, as Dragas said in her June 10 remarks to vice presidents and deans, hours after announcing that University President Teresa A. Sullivan would step down Aug. 15.
“Higher education is on the brink of a transformation now that online delivery has been legitimized by some of the elite institutions,” Dragas said in her remarks that day. “We do not believe we can even maintain our current standard under a model of incremental, marginal change. The world is simply moving too fast.”