The prediction, in brief:

Most good education involves irreducible human costs. Students may be able to communicate with scientists, but not many, so this form of education will not be significant on a national scale. And discussion groups need moderators. In essence, a teacher or similarly knowledgeable person must be available to interact with students and assess their understanding, and that person needs to be compensated. As a result, most resources that can be scaled to reach large numbers of students will cost money that eventually will have to be paid directly by the end user or their schools. Network resources, because they involve bits and not atoms, will be less expensive than their physical counterparts; in effect, textbook funding will be transferred to network resources.

Predictor: Tinker, Bob

Prediction, in context:

In 1995, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology commissioned a series of white papers on various issues related to networking technologies. The department convened the authors for a workshop in November 1995 to discuss the implications. The following statement is taken from one of the white papers, “The Whole World in Their Hands,” by Bob Tinker, the president of Concord Consortium, he has a Ph.D. in physics from MIT and a reputation as a pioneer in constructivist uses of educational technology. Tinker writes:”Most good education involves irreducible human costs. Students may be able to communicate with scientists, but not many, so this form of education will not be significant on a national scale. And discussion groups need moderators. In essence, a teacher or similarly knowledgeable person must be available to interact with students and assess their understanding, and that person needs to be compensated. As a result, most resources that can be scaled to reach large numbers of students will cost money that eventually will have to be paid directly by the end user or their schools. Network resources, because they involve bits and not atoms, will be less expensive than their physical counterparts; in effect, textbook funding will be transferred to network resources.”

Date of prediction: January 1, 1995

Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information

Subtopic: E-learning

Name of publication: The Future of Networking Technologies for Learning

Title, headline, chapter name: The Whole World in Their Hands

Quote Type: Direct quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.ed.gov/Technology/Futures/

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney