Abstract
Institutions of higher learning have been a part of the fabric of society for centuries, with some of the oldest universities tracing their roots to the Middle Ages, as illustrated by the University of Bologna, which has been continuously operating since 1088. As a consequence, many of those institutions ‘lived’ through anything from devastating conflicts to pandemics to crippling economic meltdowns. And while the world crumbled and changed time and time again, those institutions kept on, largely unchanged because as centers of knowledge creation and dissemination they were seen as unique and irreplaceable, which enabled them to transcend socio-politico-economic upheaval. That favored status, however, slowly began to be called into question with the rise of internet which has been slowly changing the face of learning, most notably by spurring the flow of technology-based learning alternatives that have been slowly but persistently eroding universities’ grip on all-things-knowledge. Those developments not only resulted in some degree of democratization of learning, they also opened up new avenues of instruction. Online education, once merely a sidekick to the traditional educational model, is now emerging as a viable alternative to place-bound face-to-face instructional model; it is also making possible more learning-friendly curricular designs. Within defined domains of knowledge, such as data science and analytics, thoughtfully identified elements of knowledge, framed in the context of ‘conceptual know-why’ and ‘experiential know-how’, can be used to structure an effective hybrid curriculum which combines the guided instruction of face-to-face teaching with the flexibility of remote instruction.
Presenters
Andrew BanasiewiczProfessor of Practice of Business Analytics, Girard School of Business, Merrimack College, Massachusetts, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2021 Special Focus - Transcending Social Distance: Emerging Practices in e-Learning
KEYWORDS
Hybrid Learning, Distance Education, Curriculum Design, Data Science and Analytics
