iHack, therefore iBlog

A primer on the ongoing transformation of education, for my cousin-in-law who runs a seminary startup.

1. Use video to “flip the classroom” so teachers are more “guide on the side” than “sage on the stage.”
2. Shift the goal from passive content acquisition to constructive skill mastery: Khan Academy Vision – YouTube
3. Personalize education for different learning styles and goals: Mass Customized Learning
4. Team students together as teachers and builders:  Challenge Based Learning – Home Page
5. Prepare students to create jobs rather than find them: The Lean LaunchPad – Teaching Entrepreneurship as a Management Science « Steve Blank
6. Develop a coherent theology of work and life: Strive For Work-Life Integration, Not Balance | Fast Company
7. Nurture an organic learning network, not an institution: Stoos Learning Change » Think Productivity!
8. Create a viral business model enabling lower cost yet higher quality: The Makers Triversity: A Father’s Education Dream « iHack, therefore iBlog

Did I miss anything important?

Appendix: Related tweets

• What if seminarians were graduated solely based on the theology that the non-Christians they knew inferred from their behavior?
• The skill theologians ought to be mastering is how to discern & articulate the purpose & activity of God in new contexts.
• Seminary should train Christians to follow the process of Aquinas, Athanasius, Augustine, Luther & Calvin — not their results!
• Christendom is dying for theological entrepreneurs who will convene new resources to fulfill God’s vision in new contexts.

Everyone knows that great teachers are the key to a great education. But how do we get more of them?

One popular request is to treat teachers as professionals, a “certified expert who is afforded prestige and autonomy in return for performing at a high level” rather than “interchangeable cogs in an educational factory line out of the last century.” Advocates of this approach typically focus on:

1. Greater respect
2. Higher pay
3. Tougher certification
4. Clearer accountability

While those are noble goals, there seems to be very little discussion about the structural changes necessary to achieve those results. Nobody even seems to realize that those four are signs of professionalization rather than the cause:

• Pay and respect are outcomes of professionalization
• Certification and accountability are consequences of professionalization.

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