The pace of change in the field of technology is fast and getting faster which for a geek like me is a bonus, apart from the constant craving for the latest and greatest bits of kit!
For a veteran like me who's first real contact with computing was the venerable Sinclair ZX81, the power and capability which we now have access to is incredible but, and it is a big but, how does everyone else cope?
For those people who grew up before me or those from the same era but without the interest in it, what do they make of it all and how are they coping? I'm not really sure because I'm not totally connected to them but I'm guessing that a certain proportion of the digital divide is down to individual choice about whether to engage with it or not.
In the corridors of power, there appears to be little hesitation in heading down the 'digital by default' route, the latest example being the retirement of the road tax disc but including other government services like benefits, taxation and access to information. Despite having at times a woeful record on implementing large scale IT projects, our rulers press ahead regardless and it makes me wonder how many people they are disenfranchising by doing so. How many people do you know that aren't connected and what proportion of them have no intention of doing so?
At the other end of the scale we have the young. People who have known nothing else other than being able to access the net to some degree. They've grown up through primary and secondary school with computers, laptops, mobile phones, tablets and now you can often add in things like 3D printers.
Now you'd think that this means that Universities have an easy time dealing with them. Sorry to burst your bubble, but that isn't how I see it working in the field.
Where Universities and possibly other further and higher education institutions struggle is how do we teach them without disappointing them and/ or breaking the bank?
You see there is a level of expectation from students that with the new fee structure a University should be able to provide them with every piece of kit and software that they could possibly wish for and to include this in how we teach them.
For quite a while now one of the buzzwords that I see time and time again is TELT, also known as Technology Enhanced Learning and Teaching. What it means in the real world is how do we engage student's interest in learning by adding technology into the mix?
If you think back to your own time within Education, and for some of us that's quite a stretch, the height of technology used was probably a TV showing a video which you then discussed in a lecture. Nowadays, the minimum is digital projection of lectures supported by teaching from interactive whiteboards, object visualisation, streaming media, electronic voting systems, online learning platforms, MOOC's (Massive Open Online Course's) and other things.
Now when you add in that students now want engagement via mobile platforms such as their smart phones and tablets and for some courses they now want ready access to 3D printers, laser cutters and rapid prototyping machines you can begin to appreciate how our budgets are really under pressure.
That's not the only pressure though. Perhaps just as crucially, our staff have to design and deliver courses using all of this technology and try to also build in creative approaches to engaging interest which is all well and good if the people doing the designing are technologically savvy and engaged with it. As you can perhaps imagine, not everyone is.
There are some lecturers still using their notes from years back, showing them from acetates and just standing at the front presenting them (We call it 'sage on the stage') which for the current generation is fairly boring. This often leads to low attendance and course swapping which isn't good.
So the current challenge is to try to get these 'sages' out of their comfort zones and into the modern world or out of the door, something that is not easy or quick. All the while we have to try to manage student expectations too.
Extrapolating this further, with the pace of technology showing no signs of abating, the future of learning and teaching is going to be very different. It will require multi tasking, creative people who have a genuine desire to learn new skills continually as well as being passionate about their subject.
The future's bright but you've got to bear change!
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