Equality in Education and the Elephant
What do you picture when you hear the phrase ‘equal education for all’? I guess that the vision you embrace is often framed by your context. For some ‘equal education for all’ means gender equality, for others it refers to children affected by conflict or refugee situations. For me, working in South Africa, it means […]
Four Things Educators Need to Do to Make Gamification Successful in the Classroom
Over the last few years, educators have been hearing inspiring stories about how incorporating game design techniques into their learning programs have had positive results. The flip side to this story are the times when the results are disappointing and unintended consequences occur. So the question arises: how best can educators ensure that gamification improves […]
Taking Action as Advocacy of Children with Autism
While people with autism often have the tendency not to make eye contact with you, chances are today, you have either seen or met someone with this neurodevelopmental condition, or at least know about it. This is partly due to the voices and the daily grind of the caregivers, educators and service providers of […]
Fixing Higher Education’s Access Problem: Let’s Start With Better Data
Editor’s note: This article is part of a series on how to combat inequalities in participation in higher education. Systemic barriers to accessing higher education (HE) are restricting who benefits from globalisation while fuelling the rise of populist forces across the globe. UNESCO has recognized the problem. One of its 2015 lifelong learning goals […]
Can Universities Save the Enlightenment?
The main challenge for higher education in 2017 is to discern how to educate citizens in a world in which the political philosophy of liberalism, the cornerstone of modern universities, is increasingly challenged by populist and nationalist movements. Universities are a relatively recent invention in the 200,000 or so years in which humans, in […]
Education: Change Is Here, But Are You Ready For It?
“Our education system is a mess; it is failing us, our children, our future” – a catchphrase I hear at conferences, during dinner and casual conversations. This refrain takes me back to my school years. I remember sitting in class, listening passively followed by hours of rote learning and note taking. There was no room […]
WISE@Madrid Infographics
Four Points to Consider Before Leveraging Technology for Equity
In one of my blog articles I wrote about research and tech in Kenya and if we are doing enough of both. Equally, another article asked the question: University-based research inspired Google – is research needed to inspire Kenyan innovators too? If these two articles are to go by then there is a real concern over the quality […]
The Changing Ends and Paradigm for Education in the World
EVEN THE MOST TRADITIONAL among us understand that the world is changing rapidly. Today, our most important educational question is “How do we adapt our children’s education to these exponential and ongoing changes?” Many already realize that the education we give our young people no longer prepares them to thrive in the future. But although reformers […]
Why Higher Education Must Transform Itself to Meet the Challenges of the 21st Century
On any given day, in college classrooms across the globe, a unique group of millennial students is putting to the test the true effectiveness of universities responsible for producing the next generation of world leaders. But their expectations are unlike those of their predecessors —these students are technologically savvy, socially engaged and forward-thinking individuals […]