“Imagine an education system that’s built around unleashing the power of the individual,” says Philip Zelikow, professor of history at the University of Virginia and visiting managing director at the Markle Foundation. Zelikow envisions a new paradigm where someone can get the training and education they need even if it means starting classes in the middle of a traditional semester. Does that mean students will just pop online to get the credits they need? Not necessarily. “The future may be more likely a mixture of online plus people,” says Zelikow, with “navigators” helping to guide students through online options and pair them with real-world tutors. In additional to being much cheaper than a traditional model, this new system would allow students to achieve credentials that are configured to what employers really need, as opposed to the current credential system, which, says Zelikow, “was basically developed in the 1890s to solve problems of a very different age.”
This video was produced in partnership with genConnect.
