Within the library community, discussions about the long-term impacts of
electronic networking tend to spark debates about whether certain
facilities (such as libraries), functions (such as cataloging), and
artifacts (such as books and periodicals) will continue to exist in the
age of networks. Of course, these concerns are not limited to libraries.
What about the classroom? the laboratory? the registrar's office? (Even
corporate strategic planners are wondering if the doctor's office is
still a place, or the department store, or the bank.)
The broader and more fundamental question is, what will networking
mean to the future of higher education in general? Without a widely
shared understanding of this broader issue, the networking community has
little chance of mobilizing the concerned parties and garnering the
attention of decision makers, both of which are necessary if we are to
frame and address specific questions about facilities, functions, and
artifacts.
Networks and networked information present both opportunities and
threats to higher education's primary missions of research, teaching and
learning, and community service.
The Research Mission
The long-term opportunity that networks and networked information offer
the research mission is an enhanced "context of work." This new context
of work will be constituted by increased access to and interactions
among three fundamental resources: people (theorists and empiricists,
experts and novices, local and remote, etc.), types of knowledge
(theories, primary data, findings, commentary on theories and findings,
documentation, curricular materials, etc.), and formats of knowledge
(text, graphics, sound, photos, animation, moving pictures, etc.). The
immediate, even intimate, "copresence" of these resources in networked
communities, coupled with the rapid and frequent interactivity enabled
by basic networking technologies, creates a context of work in which
ideas and facts flow so widely, with such little resistance, and with
such high resolution that productivity will rise to much higher levels
and knowledge accumulate at a much faster rate than ever before attained
or even imagined.
The long-term threat that networks and networked information
present to the research mission of higher education is their enabling of
effective and sustainable communication among researchers in ever
smaller research specialties. There is a real possibility that the
decomposition of research problems into progressively more esoteric
research programs and projects will fragment human knowledge to the
degree that the whole research system will be destabilized.
The Teaching and Learning Mission
The long-term opportunity that networks and networked information
present to the teaching and learning mission is a world in which
"immersion" and "immediacy" are the norm and in which learning is a
lifelong activity. We now have within our reach the technological means
to construct learning environments that have the information density of
the Library of Congress, the pedagogical skill of Socrates, and the
excitement and holding power of a video game. Learners in the new
networked environment will be able to marshal faculty, libraries,
laboratories, and other resources at their own pace, according to their
own schedule, in a setting of their own choosing, and in close contact
and cooperation with other learners.
By the same token, networks are certain to pose a threat to higher
education by creating a far more competitive marketplace for learners
than education institutions have faced to this point. Parties other than
formal institutions of higher education will be able to offer
educational services, even certification, to the public, something that
will very likely be perceived by the public as an opportunity. In order
to compete in this new environment, some higher education institutions
have become more student centered, less dependent on keeping students in
residence, and less devoted to granting degrees.
The Community Service Mission
The long-term opportunity that networks and networked information
present for community service is their enabling of the easy and regular
flow of communications and ideas, which is necessary for the
identification and management of activities and initiatives that bring
higher education institutions and their communities closer together. In
some cases, these activities and initiatives will arise from concerns
about economic development. In other cases, they will arise from
concerns about elementary and secondary education. In other cases still,
they will arise from a desire for expert knowledge to be applied to some
community problem or objective, such as solid waste disposal or zoning.
With networked communication, ideas and proposals are brought to the
table, discussed, and resolved in a much more responsive fashion than
has generally been the case.
The long-term threat that networks and networked information
present to higher education's community service mission is their
enabling of a situation in which immediate, concrete community interests
could become overwhelming (an example of the "insurmountable
opportunity" syndrome). Community service is but one of three higher
education missions, and it is important that higher education
institutions pursue the other two missions in a manner that is
relatively free of the immediate, concrete interests of any individual
community. Institutions need to find ways to use networks to improve
communication with community figures about community interests without
assuming the inappropriate position of general accountability to those
leaders and those interests.
Resolving the Bigger Issues
For every new technology there are threats and opportunities, and
sometimes the difference between the two is not easily discerned. But
the more we think about that difference, and the more often we remind
ourselves that technology is a tool and not a goal, the better chance we
have of achieving our goals and finding the right place for our
facilities, functions, and artifacts.