elearnspace

Many institutions are slow to react to technology. Systemic inefficiencies trail new opportunities and technological affordances. For example, somewhere in the past at an unnamed institution, I developed a course for online delivery. We had many international students from Hong Kong and other Asian countries. The registration department at this organization handled enrollment and contacted learners with access information. When the course started, I noticed limited interaction in the online forums. I emailed the students to encourage them to log in and post introductions. I received several replies: we don’t have access information. I then contacted the registration department. “Has contact information been sent?” I asked. “Yes”. “When?”. “We sent it on Friday”. “Oh, that’s strange” I say “most students don’t have the information”. “Well, we only mailed the packages on Friday”. “MAILED?!?”. “Yes”.
Oh well. We move slowly in new directions…at least until we feel threatened. Many educators do not feel a sense of urgency around technology adoption. But many aspects of our organizations need to be adjusted to reflect what’s possible with technology. Sometimes the answer is not clear (for example, Wikipedia’s decision around how to record historical events). At other times, the decision is really quite simple (i.e. email vs. mail). I wonder how much productivity people and organizations lose as result of failure to rethink existing “ways of doing things”…