DE Institute

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Equal Opportunity: Why so Many Questions?

What are the first few questions you can think of that are generally always on any application for employment or enrollment? Name, Race, ethnic background, male, female, eye color? I am sure that somewhere along the way the answers to these questions come in handy, such as the number of students in a certain ethnic group or the ratio between male to female students. Yet why are these questions, in any situation, the first to be asked? When were these questions adopted as the standard to many institutions across the United States?

I am not saying that gathering the information is inappropriate, the employer or school would be able to answer the majority of those questions for themselves the first time they lay eyes on us. But do the answers to these questions come into play more than what the public knows? Does it become a type of “book cover” that is formulated about the potential student or employee before ever taking a look at the qualifications that truly matter such as skills? I wonder how many times an application has been over looked (even subconsciously) because of these questions and the answers that they provide.

I mentioned, “name” as one of the listed questions because there is a lot that goes into a name. Even with interracial relationships blurring the line a bit, everybody gets a mental picture of a person when they read a name. What do you think of when you think of Juan Alfonso Mejia? How about Edda Mae Jones? This is the same way our brain works when you are told not to think of a pink elephant in skates.

Then where would we ever gain this information? Will we just ask for your facebook profile instead? Google it ourselves? Again, the information is not the problem. The problem is, can we, without a doubt, make a decision solely based on skills and qualifications while knowing all the answer to all of these questions? I believe there are a few institutions out there than can say yes. Maybe you should research when they were first incorporated into an admissions process. I think you will be surprised at the Ivey League. Go ahead, take a look.

I suggest to having a random number generated when we submit an application, be it for an educational institution or for employment. There isn’t anything wrong with a number.

Illegal to go to School

Throughout the history of the higher education institution there have been several time frames when certain individuals were kept out of the classes due to social requirements. The most familiar of these time frames being the era when women were kept out of the classroom and when people of color were not allowed on campus. Yet there is another highly controversial time frame occurring in America today. It involves students whose current legal status is categorized as “illegal.”

It doesn’t matter what side of the argument that you might be on, there is something larger to discuss here than simply “allowing” one class of individuals to enroll in class or not. It is the cloud of social norm and the ideas that are instilled in to the minds of the mass majority that make this issue such an interesting one. Where are the ideas coming from? How is it that we accept them so casually and side on them so passionately?

You may find yourself on the side that such “aliens” shouldn’t be allowed into colleges, and you may believe you have hard evidence and statistics that support your ideas. Yet, have you ever stopped to ask yourself what makes your point of view the right choice?

A hundred years ago, if someone had asked you if women or people of color should be allowed in your local college institutions you may have sided on keeping them out. That is, if you were on the voting side pool of wealthy white males. Your answer may have been quite different if you were one; a woman, two; a person of color or lastly; both. Very few times would individuals side against themselves or make a choice that could potentially affect them in the future. We see this across many issues that are circulating especially with the presidency candidates and upcoming election. People side on the side that best suites them, but where is the breaking point?

If you answer is in the majority rules idea, you may just have a point. Maybe you will even be surprised at the changes that are occurring in the population growth in the country and soon expect for laws to change. Immigrants that have found their way to this country for many different reasons usually bring the young with them. These children enter the educational system at an early age and adopt the American dream as their own. Yet, many of them hit a major roadblock after high school graduation. Both lack of financial support and legal hindrances keep them from obtaining a higher level of education.

Just how we have seen a change in public opinion about women and people of color in schools, maybe someday soon we will be able to witness a change in the higher education institution to allow students in every state in the United States to attend the college of their choice regardless of legal status.

Toward a Virtual Institution

From the toward a virtual library in Glut:

 In 1883 Cutter wrote a futuristic essay entitled “The Buffalo Public Library in 1983.” Imagining what a library might look like in 100 years, he envisioned readers sitting at desks equipped with “a little keyboard” through which they could connect with a central electronic catalog, ordering books from the stacks by punching in a call number. He even foresaw networks of libraries connected by a “fonographic foil” that would enable them to communicate telegraphically, accessing each other’s collections so readily that “all the libraries in the country … are practically one library.”16 He missed the mark by less than a decade. Wright, Alex (2007-06-01). Glut (Kindle Locations 3334-3340). Joseph Henry Press. Kindle Edition.

“All the libraries in the country… are practically one library.” In 1883, I doubt there were many librarians who would think that a library could do such a thing like Cutter thought it could. The technology that would have pointed Cutter toward such an idea was completely absent. The ideas that we may be contemplating now on the future of the Higher Education Institution may also be so foreign to others that most would think it would be impossible, which ever idea we choose to conjure and elaborate on.

I think that at the current state of the institution, no one would ever dare say that someday, maybe in the far future, definitely not within a hundred years of now, that the large institutions would ever be one in the same. Imagine it though; no more Ivy League only a networked chain of institutions that accept prospect students no matter their background, social status, or academic level of understanding. Could this ever be possible? I doubt that it wouldn’t be attacked if the idea were ever suggested. Where would the social prestige go? The branding power of a diploma on the wall with “Harvard” written in fancy lettering would be lost. Even the former institution graduates would be plagued as a dying breed.

Or would this be a benefiting institution that would once and for all break down the walls of the classes?  A unified class of potentially millions of graduates sharing the same educational background. Would this open the gates to those who could not afford a specialized education or would it act as a repellant to those in social classes that believe to be better than others?

It was in fact not long ago where there were other socially norm barriers that kept female students outside of the Institution, not to mention the segregation of races. Looking at it, from a further point of view, even the institution itself comes with a set of understandings that alienate some. What would a perfectly transparent establishment look like?

Like the idea of Cutter over a hundred years ago about the future of the library and knowledge was far fetched, maybe this idea too sounds a little more than impossible. Maybe the first signs of this future institution are already being witnessed and being put into action with students that now study online from around the world. Maybe, someday, a hundred years from now, when such an idea would only have made sense as the logical next step will be better received.

Ubiquitous Computing: Education Everywhere with Augmented Reality

In many hybrid systems for augmented reality, the user may wear special glasses or a headset that is not entirely opaque to the world of light. The user can see the physical world, but the headset can also display computer graphics over part or all of the field of view. Instead of blocking out the world, the computer writes over the world and therefore comments on and (in some cases literally) colors what the user sees.

The information is already there, hours of research and experimentation captured in a rendition we call objects. Everything the human race has ever invented carries in itself knowledge and information that can be parsed through computer vision. Instead of carrying special glasses or headsets, the users will have access to the information through devices we have recently grown accustomed to; mobile phones and pads. These devices already have access to the Internet, GPS, and built-in cameras, all which help the future of augmented reality.

In an educational form, students will be able to further explore objects and locations than what is visible to the human eye. Even in the case where the educator will lead the exploration, such as early implementation, students will be able to follow in the discussion by viewing what the teacher sets in front of them. The technology is already here and being used in such applications as restaurant finders on the iphone and android.

Even objects as books will be given new depths of information that they hold in their pages [see the video below]. Though in this case, the medium is not disappearing from the users perspective, it enriches the experience and enjoyment of the media itself. It furthers the understanding that former pages of text (or static digital text for that matter) would never be able to display.

Augmented reality is hypermediated, for it makes the user aware of computer graphics as medium, even if the goal is to keep the graphics and the external object in close registration. In this sense, augmented reality is the opposite of telepresence, although, like telepresence, augmented reality celebrates the reality of its own mediation, the power of computer graphics to act as objects in and therefore to affect the world.

The familiarity of computer graphics in today’s society makes the transition into augmented reality smoother and feel less artificial compared to actual reality. We see this happening in brand awareness and corporate identity. As consumers, we become accustomed to a particular icon representing a much larger company and associate even the color of a brand with a particular name. In the same sense, icons and graphics will have become so intertwined with reality, that the ability to tell the difference between augmented reality and reality will be grayed out, maybe eventually completely eradicated.

The future of augmented reality points us to the idea that education and knowledge that is already available in objects we come in contact will be able to be dissected in unforeseen manners.

Preservation of Knowledge

To ensure the survival of an idea, one might think that the best thing to do is to guard it by all means possible. When it comes to an idea of a new invention that requires patenting, that might just be the case. That is, if you wish to benefit from the royalties that are paid for an original invention that adds to the quality of life. When it comes to the survival of an idea that requires it to be shared with others, such as any information that builds up the knowledge of an individual, a point of perspective in a matter, the best way to guarantee its survival is to share it with the masses.

In a letter to George Wythe, Thomas Jefferson wrote about the most effective mode of preserving the written laws of Virginia were to mass-produce them using the printing press. He wrote:

 All the care I can take of them, will not preserve them from the worm, from the natural decay of the paper, from the accident of fire, or those of removal when it is necessary for any public purpose… This leads us then to the only means of preserving those remains of our laws now under consideration, that is, a multiplication of printed copies. (89, Eisenstein)

Over the last twenty years, the Internet has become the mainstream source of knowledge in developed countries. The growing availability and accessibility to the network continues to demonstrate the wide spread of ideas in a matter of seconds given the right circumstances.

Open source software is the most rapid growing in both development, exploration, and fine-tuning because if reveals the source code for others to build on to. Individual know how may be limited, but in combination, the knowledge shared between a large group of individuals with a common goal has exponential potential. It is as if each individual has one single piece of a much larger jigsaw puzzle, colleting each piece would be time consuming and frustrating. Yet, if the individuals combined forces to a common good, the puzzle would be completed rather quickly and the “bigger picture” or idea would be spread among them and any other future contributor to the cause.

When it comes to education, we may be used to the institutional relationship between teacher and student, and we much understand their individual roles. The teacher studied and became an educator that later shares his or her knowledge to a number of students in a particular subject. The subject may be multi-dimensional but taught in a very linear format. Generally students conduct their class work and or homework individually, rarely seeking help from fellow students in the class. The ideas of execution to a particular task come directly from the teacher or source, limiting the creative exploration to finding a new route to the solution.

Yet, if the students were encouraged to work together and to use the instruction from the professor as a launching pad, the collaboration could produce a better learning experience for all those involved.

The survival of an idea is best guaranteed when it is shared with other like minded individuals that will take the information and use it to further the common knowledge of a group.

Digital Culture: Standardization versus Customization

Digital Culture: Standardization versus Customization
By Nakoya Moss

In the book “The Printing Revolution Early Modern Europe”, Elizabeth Eisenstein details the implications of the shift from scribal culture to print culture and how the  introduction of the printing shop was one of the main catalyst behind several notable historical movements.  The printing shop was an agent of change. Eisenstein states the following in the introduction of the book:
“As an agent of change, printing altered methods of data collection, storage, and retrieval systems, and communications networks used by learned communities throughout Europe (Eisenstein, xvii).

As I read the passages we were assigned, I found myself reflecting on the current communication shift to the digital culture we are experiencing in our modern day and how it is affecting all areas of our lives—political, cultural, education, religion, etc. Standardization was heavily discussed in this text as a result of the emergence of printing. However, rather than standardization, I would like to briefly discuss how one of the most important implications of the present day shift to digital culture has been customization.

In October 2001, I was a freshman in undergrad and my dad decided to purchase  my first laptop, which was a Dell. At the time laptops were about 5 times the price they are now. However, my dad didn’t just purchase me any old laptop. What made this purchase so different was that it could be customized and built according to the specs my dad wanted for me to have. It had a removable drive that allowed me to either insert a DVD drive or hard disc drive.  Dell (and I’m sure other prominent computer companies at this time) had this new fad where you could build your own laptop.  This was something very new because we were accustomed to buying things according to the standard of what you see is what you get.

Consumer behavior and buying trends have definitely moved from standardization to customization. Today customizable technology is at the forefront and demanded down to every purchase you make —cell phones, clothes, cars, homes, banking, pets, etc.

One important aspect that Eisenstein points out is how the emergence of print culture did bring about changes to education.  Eisenstein points out how people’s way of thinking and learning evolved with the advent of printing. In reference to undergraduates, Eisenstein states:
“Gifted students no longer needed to sit at the feet of a given master in order
to learn a language or academic skill. Instead, they could swiftly achieve mastery of their own, even by sneaking books past their tutors… (Eisenstein, 38)”

Printing allowed for more information to be disseminated and viewed by the masses. Therefore, people had access to more knowledge that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to take advantage of. With regard to higher education, online education as option to obtain your degree is a byproduct of the movement towards customization. People no longer have to sit in class and listen to lecture. Instead, they can now learn at their own pace and in their own environment using their own technologies.