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比尔盖茨谈未来教育

来源:本站原创    点击率:    发布: 2011-4-14

比尔·盖茨的预言会成真,不久的将来远程教育将会比实体教育更重要。

 比尔·盖茨终于赶上趟了。这位世界第二富有的人最近预言说,在线学习将降低实体高校的重要性。在美国一场数字精英会议上,盖茨表示“五年内,人们就可以免费在网上找到全世界最棒的课程讲座。这比就读任何一所高校都要好”。几周后,在另一场精英会议上,盖茨对“可汉学院”(kahn academy)不吝溢美之词(可汉学院是非营利性的网络数学和科学辅导机构)。据说,盖茨惊呼“可汉教授用这么少的资源做了这么多的贡献,太令人惊讶了(可汉教授确实做到了这一点)。”

我很赞同盖茨先生新发现的这一变化,并且同意他的观点——对于世界上绝大多数学生来说,远程教育很快将成为比实体学校更为强大的教育媒介。但是,为什么这么长时间了,我们还没有看到这一转变呢?

早在1997年,我所在的公司就推出了网络学习业务。不夸张地说,我觉得自己高估了学习行为和市场行为变化的速度。不过,犯这种错误的不止我一个。10年前,麻省理工学院决定推出免费的在线视频讲座,任何人都能在网上学习麻省理工学院的所有课程。《连线杂志》(wired magazine)的一篇文章表示,麻省理工学院掀起的“开放式课程”(opencourseware)运动,成为了终结实体教育的开端。《连线杂志》引用了一个实例,一位欣喜若狂的越南天才利用“开放式课程”,直接跟随世界另一端的其他天才们学习物理。

但是现在,有多少学生通过麻省理工学院的在线视频学会了微分方程和粒子物理学呢?我想,并不多。为什么?在我所属行业中,大部分人都提出了一个简单的答案,那就是基础设施的匮乏。带宽在阻止我们向前发展。现在,一个越南学生在当地网络咖啡厅上网的费用是每小时0.5美元,而且其中并不包含消费可口的越南咖啡的费用。对于日平均工资只有2美元的越南人来说,这实在是太不划算了。

基础设施的缺乏仅仅是问题的一部分。我对此有自己的一套见解。我认为,真正的问题在于,教育者所提供的内容和体验的质量。登陆麻省理工学院的网站http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/,然后用realplayer观看他们的在线课程视频。当然,观看这些视频的都是非常聪明的人,但这和玩魔兽世界不一样。只有那些最专注的学生,才会费力学完这些在线视频,而他们通常也本来就是自己班上最好的学生。

教育产业仅次于医疗保健产业,是全球第二大产业。可我们为什么会被这一产业中那些富有进取心和魅力的教授放在youtube上的简单视频所震撼?教育界的《阿凡达》在哪儿?想想看,好莱坞每年全球的故事片市场值300亿美元,可是,单单中国一个国家,在教育上的投资就有4,000亿美元,占其gdp的3%到4%。全球每年的教育市场是万亿级的,是好莱坞电影业的几百倍。可是呢,迄今为止,全球最昂贵的数字教学系统的建造费用还不到1,000万美元(我所在的公司——英孚教育集团,已经在语言学习系统上投资了5,000万美元,是业内投资最多的了)。

比尔·盖茨的预言确实会成真。在不久的将来,远程教育将会比实体教育更重要。不过,只有当我们创造出比实体教育更能吸引并激励人的重磅级教育内容和体验时,这一预言才会实现。我们有这个能力,也有这个基础设施——我们缺少的是雄心。谁能将在线教育推到一个新高度?谁能向盖茨先生证明,网络学习对于全球学生来说是无比强大的工具?我们将拭目以待。



以下为英文原文:

bill gates and the future of education, again.

 bill gates has finally caught on. the world’s 2nd richest man recently predicted that online learning will make “place-based” colleges “less crucial.” speaking at a conference for the digital elite in the us he said that “five years from now on the web for free you'll be able to find the best lectures in the world. it will be better than any single university". a few weeks later, speaking at yet another conference for a different set of elite he showered praise on the not-for-profit online math and science tutoring operation “ kahn academy ”. gates was said to have exclaimed that it was “amazing how much [professor kahn] has done with very little in the way of resources.” (and indeed he has).

 i applaud mr. gates for his newfound conversion and agree that distance education will soon be a more powerful medium than place-based education for the vast majority of students in the world. but what’s taking us so long?

 having launched our e-learning business in 1997 i think it’s fair to say that i overestimated the pace of change in learner behavior and market behavior. but i was not alone. ten years ago mit decided to post videos of all university lectures and the course plan for every course online, for free, for all of humanity. an article in wired magazine implied that this “opencourseware” movement was (also) the beginning of the end for “place-based” education, quoting an enraptured vietnamese genius on the virtues of learning physics straight from other geniuses on the other side of the world.

but today, how many students have you met who mastered differential equations and particle physics from an mit online video? not many, i imagine. why? the simple answer offered by most people in our industry is lack of infrastructure. bandwidth is holding us back- right now, it costs a vietnamese student  $0.50 an hour to surf the web at his local web café (not including his tasty vietnamese coffee). that adds up for people in countries where the average wage earner makes $2 per day.

 infrastructure is part of the problem. but i have a different theory. i think the real problem is simply in the quality of the content and experience provided by educators. go to mit’s web site at http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/ and use realplayer to watch some of their courses online. surely these are some very smart people, but it’s not exactly like playing world of warcraft. only the world’s most dedicated students, often those who are already the best in their classes, will dedicate themselves to plowing through these online videos.

 why, in the 2nd largest industry in the world (education being 2nd only to health care), are we so impressed by simple youtube clips posted by enterprising and engaging professors? where is theavatar of education? think about this -- the market for hollywood feature films per year is worth something like 30 billion usd a year worldwide. but china alone spends more than 400 billion usd on education, 3-4% of gdp. education in the world is a trillion dollar a year market, 100s of times bigger than hollywood movies, yet at the same time the most expensive digital learning systems ever built cost well under 100 million dollars to build. (my company, ef, has spent 50 million usd to date on our language learning system, the most in our industry).

 bill gates’ prediction is going to happen ╟ “place-based”education will be less important than distance-education in the near future. but this will happen only once we create “blockbuster”-level educational content, experiences that engage and excite more than has ever been possible in the real world. we have the ability and the infrastructure ╟ what the world lacks is the ambition. now we need to see who among us can take it to the next level and really show mr. gates what a powerful tool online learning can be for students of the world.

 

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