Mobile is disrupting many facets of life as we know it. From how we consume content and music to how students learn and connect. In this presentation, Michael shares insights about mobile as the great disruptor from his background as the Founder and former CEO of Blackboard and his new venture as CEO of SocialRadar (www.socialradar.com).
Delivered at CTIA 2013 as a keynote on May 22, 2013.
2. The Blackboard Story
Born from
education in 1997
Brought to market a
eLearning system in 1998 Extended product lines
Serves
20,000+ institutions
30m+ users
Acquired other
eLearning providers
12. I am entirely certain that twenty years from
now we will look back at education as it is
practiced in most schools today and wonder
how we could have tolerated anything so
primitive.
JOHN W. GARDNER,
Education Secretary to
President Lyndon Johnson,
1965-1968
13.
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16. I believe by using your online learning tools, gradebook and quizzes
teachers can be more efficient and effective in delivering education.
And with the new mobile tools teachers can respond to their students
whenever they have a problem both inside and outside of class.
Dr. Betty Shiffman, Associate Professor of English
1. Mobile is becoming a core piece
of the education experience
17. I feel that I must tell you that your software is ruining the educational
experience that students are supposed to have in college.
With your built in plagiarism detection it’s as if the teachers no longer
trust the student’s work. And now with the ability to get everything
on our mobile device there is no excuse to ever miss an assignment.
Thanks for helping take the fun out of college.
1. Mobile is becoming a core piece
of the education experience
19. 3. Content can now successfully be
distributed on mobile devices.
20. 4. MOOCs are showing you can
teach thousands of students at once.
21. When you bring these four items together you have
successfully lowered the barriers and cost for students
to achieve a higher education thus disrupting the entire
education system.
So what this means is…
23. 1. Most college students have a smartphone
(a location beacon) and a profile on the web.
24. 2. Students are comfortable sharing their
profile and their location.
25. 3. Students have thousands of friends
online – it is difficult to remember who they
all are and how they know them.
26. So what this means is…
When you bring these three items together you allow for people
to walk into a room and be aware of the people and connections
around them thus disrupting the way people interact with each
other, meet and make connections in person.
27. Let me show you what that technology looks like.
SocialRadar Demo
28. Mobile is going to disrupt two of the most
fundamental pieces of our society – the way
people learn and the way people connect.
Look at the music industry. It wasn’t long ago when they were in a fight with technology and new sharing sites like Napster. There was a lot of upheaval over digital rights management and illegal downloading. But over time lots of people were working together to figure out new models for delivery and engagement. And the situation is much better for users. Today they have access to the next generation of music programs like iTunes and Spotify and Pandora.
Here are a couple of quotes that seem to capture what a lot of people today are thinking about education…The first is from the President’s Education Secretary…and while it sounds like something Arne Duncan would say, this is actually a quote from Lyndon Johnson’s Education Secretary in the 1960s.The next quote comes from the President of Indiana University and hits on the question of whether education is really worth it. Except the quote isn’t from the current Indiana president, but the one from the beginning of last century.So we’ve struggled with education for a long time. But are today’s challenges any different? And what do the current changes happening in technology and business and lifestyle mean for higher education?
I think part of the reason is that if you look at today’s classroom, it doesn’t really look that much different than it did 100 or 200 years ago.It’s often said that if Ben Franklin were alive today, the only thing he would recognize from his own lifetime is the inside of a classroom because it has changed so little.