School's Over - Learning Spaces in Europe in 2020. An Imagining Exercise on the Future of Learning

Attachment

JRC47412.pdf

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Description

“Learning Spaces” (LS) is the term used in a report published in 2006 by the Institute for Prospective Technological Studies, “as a way to embrace a different view of future learning”. This report moves the discussion of Learning Spaces forward by refining the concept and linking it to possible policy initiatives.

The report builds on the premise that the context for learning is already changing, and thus the characteristics and enabling infrastructure for learning spaces may also be changing. To clarify the nature of these changes an advanced scenario methodology is used. The report builds a scenario of a 21st Century Learning-intensive Society (LIS), which could emerge from the potential of the present. The scenario is an imaginary snapshot of how society might function with open learning at the core of what everyone does all the time, everywhere. In the LIS scenario, Learning Spaces (LS) are the next school. It is a vision of learning that differs radically from the conventional classroom model where blackboard knowledge and the imposing teacher represent the quintessential learning space of the industrial era.

In the imaginary snapshot of Europe in 2020 it is assumed that society is no longer dominated by the industrial-era logics of mass-production and mass-consumption. Scale is no longer the guiding principle. Instead, the pivotal act, the creation of added value, has changed locations. In the Learning-intensive Society of 2020, the daily (re)creation of the world around us through spoken or written words, pictures and movies, will generate the largest share of added value. Weak signals of this change are already detectable now in 2008 - there are hints of the potential of the present to create a society where the division between the supply side and demand side is marginal. These include tendencies towards self-generated personalization, the “unique creation” expressed in a widespread do-it-yourself attitude, the breakdown of the professional/amateur distinction, and the emergence of Web 2.0 technologies that give rise to social networking, collaborative content creation and democratized innovation.

This means that the crucial moment in industrial society when the entrepreneur or engineer or designer comes up with an idea that can then be implemented by taking advantage of economies of scale is no longer central. The aims and organization of wealth creation no longer take on the form of a pyramid or hierarchy, with the genius who generates new ideas and the technocrat manager who implements them occupying the top floor, while down below at end of the chain of command is the “front-line” worker. The Learning-intensive Society is heterarchical (antonym of hierarchical). Everyone is the inventor and implementer of his or her own designs, the unique, personalized set of artefacts, services, and experiences. As a result, in the Learning-intensive Society there is a profound difference when compared to industrial society in the relationship of knowledge to production or, in more general terms, the activities that (re)create daily life.

In 2020, Learning Spaces will enable people to construct their identities as inter-dependent and inter-connected social beings and on this basis to produce the wealth and community that sustain their well-being. In general terms, this functional role or purpose of learning infrastructure in 2020 is not much different from before. It continues to serve the main economic and social requirements of society. However, by 2020 the leading economic and social requirements have changed.

From the perspective of learning the two most marked contrasts between the vision of Learning Spaces in a Learning-intensive Society and the current framework for learning, are (a) the abandonment of the technocratic, hierarchical and exclusive approach to education and skill achievement, and (b) the marginalization of institutionalized learning.

Author

Riel Miller, Hanne Shapiro, Knud Erik Hilding-Hamann. Editors: Yves Punie, Kirsti Ala-Mutka and Christine Redecker