Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/63446
The wireless world is setting up an expectation that you can get to any information anytime. However, in an educational setting, we must decide where the technology fits best and where it doesn't belong. —Jason Frand and difficult to work with under the covers? Will we have the skill set to manage that level of complexity? Those are chal- lenging questions. What current developments in computer use for education do you find most intriguing? The technology of PDAs and laptops is well established. Now the questions are, How do we evolve student and faculty behavior to get the maximum benefit from them? How do we identify the most appropriate uses of technology in and out of the classroom? The letter that Anderson sent to our entering students this year was quite different from those in the past. In last year's letter, it told students, "You're required to have a laptop to be used extensively throughout the program." This year, we say, "You're required to have a laptop. In some classes you're not going to use it at all; in some classes we're going to use it min- imally, and in others more extensively." So, emphasis on using the laptop in the classroom has substantially diminished. It's appropriate in some settings and inappropriate in others. We have some faculty who have been extremely successful help students understand the company in the clearest context. Students look not only at a company's Web site, but also at its competitors' and suppliers' Web sites. This exercise helps stu- dents understand that these companies don't work in an iso- lated world. They look at these models to understand how organizations work. The wireless world is setting up an expectation that you We have another professor who uses Web technology to can get to any information anytime. However, in an educa- tional setting, we must decide where the technology fits best and where it doesn't belong. In many cases, our job is to teach the students how to decide which information they should be getting, not just providing it to them. We're trying to get closer, not just to understanding, but to enforcing a culture that says that there are some places where we just don't use the technology. Three years ago, the default was to plug in your comput- er. If the faculty didn't want you to use it, they would ask you to not use it. We've changed that. Now the default is, don't plug in your computer. The faculty will ask you to plug it in if they want you to do so. How can schools best keep up with technological advancement without being overwhelmed? We once did a graph that showed that mainframes came into schools over a 30-year period. Microcomputers came in between 1979 and 1989, moving from a point where they were not in any schools to being in 100 percent of them, essentially. Then we started looking at laptops and how quickly those with laptops. They bring it in at different points of their lec- tures and make it a dynamic and powerful tool. It adds insight into the concept that they're discussing. For example, we have a marketing professor who uses what have spread, almost overnight. And Palm Pilots have gone from nonexistent to essentially everywhere. So, these tech- nologies are being introduced and worked into the system at an ever-accelerating pace. As I said earlier, students don't necessarily think of com- he calls "the hourglass method." When he introduces cases, he tells students, "Let's start very broadly." He talks about the broad issues in a particular case. Then, he works them down to the question, "What is the decision that has to be made?" At that point, he invites them to bring out their lap- tops and use the data made available for the case to gain insights into the decision that needs to be made. He then gives the students a few minutes in class to do their analyses, find the best situation, pull that information up, display it in class, and discuss it. He calls it the "hourglass method" because he starts out broad, then narrows their focus to the data, and finally returns to a broad discussion. puters as "technology." They are just some of the tools avail- able for them to use on an ongoing basis. What we think of as very new and exciting technologies are just part and parcel to the tool kit that every student now expects to use. Can you imagine not having a telephone? For students it's no different. They can't imagine functioning without access to these tools. But the new technologies are spreading very quickly. Managing them and figuring out how they fit into other tech- nologies represent major managerial and financial challenges for universities. One simple strategy schools can use when introducing a new technology: Don't be the first one to do it. There isn't necessarily a first-user advantage with these tech- nologies. The learning experience that comes with waiting may far outweigh the advantage of being first. ■ z BizEd JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2002 33