Toronto points to the future.

Jason, look for educational technology, e.g. simulations, which are cheap and self-paced to more and more displace teachers, professors. Digital technology has the capacity now to "automate" learning and relegate teachers to the role of facilitators more and more. Teaching is what somebody does to us. Learning is what we do for ourselves; what we do for ourselves in the final analysis has more lasting impact. Call it discovery learning if you need a theory, name for it. The teacher unions here in Wisconsin are already worrying about this looming trend; higher education will also embrace the trend. We are in short looking at "teacherless" education, one of the core workshops at the 2012 World Future Society in Toronto, which your humble servant here had the good fortune to attend. 2013 is in Chicago! Closer.

Oxford Style - in Canada

Ronda, think of our course this way. It is "Oxford style." At Oxford University, students get a tutor. They meet with their tutors one-to-one weekly. The tutor assigns reading; the student does the reading. Then, both student and tutor meet the following week to discuss the readings. The tutor, of course, is a world-class expert who likely has done all of the reading on the topics that libraries can provide! I had the great honor of engaging in such a learning experience at the University of Toronto for one entire academic year! Once weekly, I met one-to-one with Prof. John S. Moir, who passed away last year, ouch. He gave me reading assignments. Go to the library and read about this and that topic. Then, I would come back a week later to discuss what I had discovered and read on the subject with him! The bond between us became powerful, personal, and highly professional. We remained in contact after I earned my M.A. from Toronto under his guidance. This included periodic visits with him and his wife at their home in Brantford, Ontario. I told him when we last visited, two years ago, that he remains my hero; I want to be to my students what he was to me. There, we are going to do our course "Oxford style," although it will be only for eight weeks, not an academic year of nine months. Sadly, the factory model of learning has marginalized this one-to-one learning style, method. Yet, when we experience it, we never forget it. We can have this "Oxford style" experience.