Christensen (2006), ‘The ongoing process of building a theory of disruption’

Christensen has updated his original Disruptive Technology theory. His most significant change is replacing ‘technology’ with ‘innovation.’ It is not the case, Christensen argues, that innovators have mastery over a technology, whereas established providers don’t. Instead, the established provider finds that the new technology does not fit within its business model. Hence, it is undesirable, not unattainable: ‘A disruptive innovation is financially unattractive to pursue, relative to its profit model and relative to other investments that are competing for the organization’s resources’ (p. 49).

To apply this principle to technology-enhanced learning in the higher education sector in the UK, it is apparent that universities have no major technical issues with setting up social networking technologies. Existing, institutional Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) have chat facilities. However, students are electing to have their discussions elsewhere. We can speculate on possible reasons for this practice. It may be that students have already established an online presence and identity via existing social networking technologies and therefore feel no need to have a further online presence in an institutional VLE. It may also be the case that institutional VLEs are perceived as less attractive and less interesting environments than the more popular social networking technologies. In addition, students may prefer to hold discussions in environments where the institution has no control, and no means of monitoring usage. Moreover, students may be opting to blur the boundaries between a range of social, work and educational activities; this was one of the conclusions drawn by Conole et al (2008), in their survey of 427 students.

Christensen engages with one of the major criticisms of his theory, namely that it is analysis in hindsight. He deals with the criticism directly, stating ‘data exists only about the past’ (p. 41). He further details his understanding of disruption as ‘a process, not an event’ (p. 48). In addition, he argues ‘disruptiveness is not an absolute phenomenon but can only be measured relative to the business model of another firm’ (p. 48). Therefore, a picture emerges of disruption as a practice defined by the context within which it takes place, and propelled not necessarily by the intrinsic properties of the innovation, but by the environmental suitability, or unsuitability, of the innovation. When the innovation finds an environment in which it is able to flourish, then it tends to do so. Students talk far more freely in freely-available social networking technologies that meld their social and learning identities than in institutional VLEs. Exploring why this is the case may lead us to a deeper understanding of students’ perceptions of their institutions, of their learning and who has control over it, and of their online selves.

References
Christensen, C. M. (2006) ‘The Ongoing process of Building a Theory of Disruption’ The Journal of Product Innovation Management vol. 23, pp. 39-55.

Conole, G., Laat, Maarten de, Dillon, T. and Darby, J. (2008) ‘“Disruptive technologies”, “pedagogical innovation”: What’s new? Findings from an in-depth study of students’ use and perception of technology’ Computers and Education, vol. 50, pp. 511-524.

Creanor et al (2006) ‘Who’s learning and how?…’

Creanor et al interviewed a total of 55 participants in post-16 education, exploring not only how technologies are used for learning, but also how technologies are used in everyday life, and how the quotidian use of technology shapes ‘attitudes and approaches to learning’ (p. 179).

Creanor et al used interpretative phenomenonological analysis (IPA) to interview participants, an approach which ‘relies on a very open approach to interview, and on the assumption that the interviewee is expert on their own experience’. The role of the researcher ‘is to encourage reflection and self-awareness’ (p. 180). Therefore, the interviewer does not have a prescribed list of questions but allows the interviewee to articulate their own experiences in their own way. The interviewer’s role is closer to therapist than interrogator.

A large proportion (71%) of the interviewees were in employment, and hence had significant issues relating to work-life balance. The researchers noted, ‘Several interviewees preferred to separate technology use into study and leisure activities… while others managed to combine them successfully’ (p. 183). Some students opted not to use a particular technology for learning, despite the possibility that the technology could enhance learning. The practice of learners compartmentalising their uses of technologies supports the idea that people construct their online identities and opt to be in control of those identities. Streaming out their learning persona may be a question of effective time and resources management, or it may be more fundamental, relating to the personae that individuals construct for different contexts. More broadly, the selection of different technologies for different digital identities highlights the complexities of online selfhood, where a breadcrumb trail of comments can result in the self being exposed in ways that do not apply in face-to-face contexts, where the spoken word is replaced by more spoken words, but without the trails of utterances remaining in perpetuity, as can happen online.

When social networking technologies outside the H.E.I.’s control are used to support learning it generates an additional complexity, namely that the ongoing work of students is not recorded by the H.E.I.’s systems. This leads Creanor et al to posit an ‘“underworld” of digital communication among learners’ (p.186), the effectiveness of which is influenced by its taking place outside the H.E.I. (learners do not feel they are under scrutiny from an authority figure, which can happen within institutional settings). However, the separateness of the digital underworld means that its deliberations do not get credited in assessment. The challenge for H.E.I.s is to find ways of crediting informal learning, while each individual is faced with the challenge of shaping online identities in virtual spaces where utterances can be indelible.

Reference
Creanor, L., Trinder, K., Gowan, D. and Howells, C. (2006) ‘Who’s learning and how? Researching the learner experience’ Proceedings of the 23rd annual ascilite conference: Who’s learning? Whose technology? University of Sydney

‘Becoming individual in education and cyberspace’ (2004)

Krejsler advocates project work for assessment: ‘the purpose of the project is to build up knowledge about the phenomenon investigated and to mediate that knowledge to others to whom it might be useful. A further purpose may be to take action on a knowledge-based background’ (p. 490). In the digital age, an online space (a blog, for example) comprises a canvas on which a range of project activities can be undertaken.

Building on the work of Foucault, Krejsler sees institutional learning as confined by a distinct hierarchy and values: ‘populations are made into useful individuals in various institutions that operate according to similar principles no matter whether we talk about prisons, schools, factories or nucleus families. Each institution represents an enclosure that subjects individuals to specific criteria for entry into and exit out of the enclosure’ (p. 492). The Community of Practice theory is interested in the subject’s movement from entry to exit, but less interested in entry and exit criteria. Krejsler imbues the community with sinister undertones, as its boundaries become associated with containment and constraint.

Krejsler argues we are in a post-Industrial age in which the structure of our institutions has changed: ‘Culture, marketing and service that respond sensitively to the whims of fashion and markets in a globalized economy with a high-speed turnover increasingly replace the production of basic goods, which moves to the Third World. The job market is no longer stable. One cannot anymore expect long-term steady employment on the basis of a diploma from an authorized educational institution’ (p. 492). Krejsler’s analysis challenges the Community of Practice theory because the community itself becomes unstable and febrile; individuals cannot rely on continued membership of the community, as the community’s terms of membership may shift. This was not a problem in the original communities of practice (eg, Yucatan midwives, West African tailors) studied by Lave and Wenger (1991). As Krejsler argues, ‘Enclosure within the disciplinary institution is replaced by individualized anxiety. It is expected that one can constantly market one’s competencies so that they match at any given time the volatile needs of the job market. One is constantly und pressure to convince one’s employers that one is indispensable’ (p. 493).

Krejsler cites Deleuze (1990), who ‘distinguishes between the individual, who has an indivisible identity within a certain enclosure, and the dividual, who is under constant pressure to simultaneously divide his/her attention between several different projects, environments, and relations’ (p. 494). Individuals have multiple personae for different institutional contexts and, in the twenty-first century, these personae are digitised.

Krejsler suggests learning in the digital age can threaten institutions: ‘Learning that is organized in accordance with military principles of hierarchy, obedience and discipline increasingly dissipates into more volatile forms. Computers and the internet threaten to distribute knowledge and learning from the authorized enclosures of school to a virtual ubiquitous space’ (p. 495). Furthermore, the digital age learner has a new set of resources: ‘When access to the Internet, chat rooms and e-mail is part of project work, the student is constantly subject to the temptation to surf out into spaces that genuinely interest and excite him/her’ (p. 497). Therefore, Krejsler argues, the institution cannot be assured of full control over learning.

Kejsler’s analysis is frequently dystopian, yet he accurately describes classroom encounters, and the power relations that underpin them. Describing the teacher responding to off-message behaviour by the student, ‘he/she applies the tactics of the lifted eyebrows at first, seasoned, if necessary, with joking or slightly ironic comments. This should make the students aware that they are leaving the path of the virtuous.’ Next, ‘The teacher, being trained as an expert in communication, here asks the students to explain how their work proceeds, whether something blocks their learning or whether they are inadvertently being led astray from the formulated goals of their project. The students decode the situation and the futility of taking recourse to any other outlet than confessing that they are astray. They therefore express that they have already realized their wrongdoing and are rapidly returning to what they are expected to do. The teacher wraps up his/her absolution in informal and joking language. Employing an inescapable logic of reason, however, he/she leaves no doubt about what is expected of the students’ (p. 498).

Most people could recognise teacher behaviour along these lines. However, Krejsler argues that what he calls a ‘logbook’ (‘blog’ is better suited to the digital age) ‘makes us enter a foggy area where it becomes difficult to distinguish private from public matters, where the role of the student gets thoroughly intertwined with the role of the private person… [enabling] the student to enter spaces of reflection and wondering resembling the diary as a point of departure for challenging dialogues’ (pp. 498-99). A log, digital or otherwise, allows personal factors, including emotions, to be brought into institutional learning contexts in which emotions have not always been welcomed.

Having conducted a gloomy analysis, Krejsler concludes with a more uplifting quote from Morss (2000, p. 196): ‘learning can be an eventfulness whereby the teacher is not “empowering” students (as though power were something in the students’ future), but where their learning is already an expression of their own power, energy and joy.’

Krejsler’s focus is on how knowledge is managed and controlled in institutional settings. He does not mention Communites of Practice but it applies, because he is interested in entry and exit criteria for institutions/communities, and what people have to accomplish to meet the criteria. He does not examine, however, the nature of knowledge itself. Knowledge is not stable, and its effects are not predictable. The subversive potential of knowledge is intrinsic to knowledge; the educator may have a clear sense of what values they wish to convey, but students may form their own interpretation of the information in front of them, even if they have to suppress their own insights in an institutional setting, for their own good. For example, a teacher may tell students that Lear is mad when he says, ‘Plate sin with gold and the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks. Arm it in rags, a pygymy’s straw doth pierce it,’ but the student may yet interpret the statement as saying the rich and powerful get away with it, and the poor get screwed. That could be a useful insight.

References

Deleuze, G. (1990) Postscript on the societies of control, Cambridge, MA, MIT Press.

Krejsler, J. (2004) ‘Becoming individual in education and cyberspace’ Teachers and Teaching: theory and practice, vol. 10. no. 5, pp. 489-503.

Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Morss, J. R. (2000) ‘The passional pedagogy of Giles Deleuze,’ Educational Philosophy and Theory, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 185-200.

Engestrom – Enriching the Theory of Expansive Learning… (2007)

Engestrom (2007) posits a form of learning without the presence of an expert, the kind of learning where the answer is not already known (he uses the term ‘knotworking’). Some of the key characteristics of this form of learning are that it is horizontal (without a predetermined hierarchy of authority and influence) and interested in ‘boundary crossing’ (p. 24); learning need not reaffirm something already known but, instead, learning results in the creation of new knowledge.

Another feature of Engestrom’s approach is that tools (a term broadly defined, and incorporating technology) do not need an instruction manual but, instead, usage should be discovered by the user. He employs the hammer as an example: ‘A hammer is typically used as a recognition device: It helps you to recognize what may be hammered, such as nails. But a hammer may also serve as a symbol of workers’ power…. In other words, the material form and shape of the artifact have only limited power to determine its epistemic use’ (pp. 34-35). This leads Engestrom to conclude, ‘In expansive learning… reconfiguration of given technologies by their users is essential’ (p. 35). Learners start with a problem or a common purpose, they have tools made available to them, and then they strive for and (ideally) arrive at a workable solution, using technologies in ways they may not have been used before.

The central distinction between expansive learning and the communities of practice theory is that there is no centre of authority in the former. However, both approaches agree that learning is tied-in with identity. Engestrom quotes Gee (2003) who argues that entrants to a learning community need ‘to see themselves as the kind of a person who can learn, use, and value the new semiotic domain’ (p. 36). However, Engestrom (following the work of Turkel [1995]) recognises that virtual identities are not stable; they can be adopted and discarded at will. That said, is this not at least partially true of identity per se? It is problematic to assume that identity is fixed and stable, not least because most people maintain different personae in different contexts. T.S. Eliot was onto this a long time ago: ‘prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet.’

Regarding learning in the digital age, learners have a plethora of tools at their disposal. The tools come to mean whatever the learners do with them. If learners are given a goal or a dilemma, their use of the tools is axiomatically going to be less amorphous than it otherwise would be because an end is in mind, not configured as a result known a priori, but like a contest in play in which the outcome is shaped by the resourcefulness of the players within the frame of their activity. If they commit to the identity of a person or collective who can undertake the task, they are more likely to use the tools as they perceive that new identity would use them, and are therefore more likely to achieve the outcome they desire.

References
Engestrom, Y. (2007) ‘Enriching the Theory of Expansive Learning: Lessons From Journeys Toward Coconfiguration,’ Mind, Culture and Activity, vol. 14, nos. 1-2, pp. 23-39.

Gee, J. P. (2003) What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy, New York: Palgrave Macmilan.

Turkle, S. (1995) Life on the Screen, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Bringing in the Excluded?…

Nickson et al.’s article in the Journal of Education and Work (2003) contributes to the communities of practice discussion, because it explores potential barriers to entry to a community, before the individual can even be considered a peripheral participant: ‘A key consideration is the possibility that certain potential employees will be excluded from these “style” labour market jobs, and indeed more general employment involving interactive service work. This exclusion arises firstly because employers determine who is aesthetically acceptable during recruitment and selection processes’ (p. 186).

The authors’ focus is the service industry, and the idea that applicants have to hold particular persona attributes before they can be allowed entrance to the community (Wenger and Lave [1991] are interested in what happens within the community, but less interested in what the individual has to do in order to gain entry). In addition, the authors pick up on Nolan’s (2001) concept of the Hourglass Economy, characterised by ‘an expansion of high skill, high wage, high value added work at the top end of the labour market and the expansion of low skill, low wage, low value added work at the bottom end’ (Nickson et al, p. 187).

In common with Jewson (2007), the authors have a dystopian vision: ‘there will be cyber workers who enjoy their time musing in and able to afford high price lattes and cappuccinos at the style bars, cafes and restaurants. And they will want these places, its hardware (that is the physical environment) and software (that is the people serving them), to be pleasing to them’ (p. 191).

One of the questions explored in the article relates to who is most likely to gain entrance to these communities of practice. For the authors, following-on from the argument of Langlois and Lucas (2002) the role of higher education is important in this regard: ‘Students who have access to higher education, in particular, may undergo a process of socialisation that allows them to further refine and develop the cultural capital which may be inherent anyway from their largely middle-class backgrounds’ (p. 194).

The authors attempt a balanced conclusion, noting that ‘hospitality and retail can offer rapid career progression, often without formal qualifications’ and suggest that individuals would benefit from cultivating ‘masks for tasks’ (p. 201). Individuals adjusting their personae to suit particular contexts is probably as old as human civilisation, but possessing a niche set of attributes as a precursor to entering a certain employment sector is a marked feature of the Hourglass Economy, and the correlation between those attributes and a particular social class gives an advantage to the class that has been socialised in those behavioural patterns from infancy. Service sector communities of practice can offer rapid centripetal progress, but the gatekeepers to those communities exercise considerable power, leading to closed communities of practice, or maybe Lodges of Practice.

References

Langlois, M. and Lucas, R. (2002) ‘Knowledge and skill in the labour process: student workers in hospitality’ 20th Annual International Labour Process Conference, April, University of Strathclyde.

Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Nickson, D., Warhurst, C., Cullen, A.M. and Watt, A. (2003) ‘Bringing in the Excluded? Aesthetic labour, skills and training in the “new” economy’ Journal of Education and Work, vol. 16, no. 2, pp. 185-203.

Nolan, P. (2001) ‘Shaping things to come’ People Management, 27 December, pp. 30-31.

Communities of practice in their place

Another chapter from Communities of Practice: critical perspectives (2007).

The impact of the internet on learning, teaching and working has been widely discussed, but in this chapter Nick Jewson is more interested in changes to physical working and learning environments as communities of practice, and what these changes might imply for the role of work in our lives as a whole.

Jewson points out that Lave and Wenger’s original formulation of the communities of practice model did not require the community to be a physical one; co-presence is not a necessary requirement for a community of practice. However, while acknowledging the importance of virtual environments, Jewson’s argument takes a different focus: ‘A major shift is occurring in the physical spaces of work alongside the emergence of virtual work space’ (p. 160). Drawing upon the work of Felstead et al (2005) he suggest that the panopticon is replaced by the polyopticon, where everyone is able to see everyone else in open plan offices (or, for that matter, rooms full of desktop computers in H.E.I.s).

Jewson argues that the underlying design vision is ‘intended to foster serendipitous cross-fertilization of thoughts and perspectives’ (p. 163). Networking becomes a more-or-less unavoidable consequence of inhabiting the same place and, while some exchanges may go nowhere, others may develop into new initiatives.

Within this framework ‘performance of personality’ becomes a ‘key career asset’, thereby linking Jewson’s argument with the aesthetic labour idea cited in a previous chapter of the same book.

The implications of Jewson’s argument are significant, because he suggests that individuals have to have ‘a chameleon-like quality, involving the capacity to switch between sharply contrasting locations, moving into and out of quite different ways of behaving’ (p. 167). He goes on to argue that work now permeates other areas of an individual’s existence: ‘after a long period in which employment relationships and tasks were largely confined behind the walls of factories and offices, work is now spreading out across time and space. It is intruding into, and even colonizing, other spheres of life, such as family and leisure’ (p. 167).

Demarcations between work and leisure were not pronounced in pre-industrial societies. In particular, leisure was not marked off into a particular space, nor commoditised as something to be bought with wages. Industrial societies need a firm demarcation between work and leisure, as people leave their homes and attend workplaces where their conduct is regulated, to an extent in some cases that toilet breaks are monitored. The advent of mass computer technology prompted a perception that people would have to work far less and manage greater leisure time, but this has simply not happened. Instead, people work on public transport and in their own homes, as well as at formal workplaces. It seems fair to say that work has permeated into other spheres.

Jewson’s is the most dystopian chapter in Communities of practice: critical perspectives. Private space is more difficult to attain at work and at home (though perhaps not for the over 30% of households in the UK that are now occupied by one person only [can this be linked to a need to attain some privacy in a socio-economic world that increasingly forbids it?]). Furthermore, in the public space of work, performance becomes a basis for career advancement. Consequently, Jewson’s chameleon-like quality becomes a necessary strategy to enable an effective work and non-work personae, capable of making emotional as well as economic decisions.

References

Felstead, A., Jewson, N. and Waters, S. (2005) Changing Places of Work, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.

Jewson, N. (2007) ‘Communities of practice in their place: some implications of changes in the spatial location of work’, in Hughes, J., Jewson, N. and Unwin, L. (eds.) Communities of Practice: critical perspectives, Abingdon, Routledge.

English apprenticeship from past to present

Another chapter from Communities of Practice: critical perspectives (2007).

Unwin identifies a tension inherent in the communities of practice model: ‘the survival and reproduction of communities of practice depends on newcomers but, at the same time, their arrival threatens the role of old-timers’ (p. 112). Therefore, communities of practice learning is not necessarily smoothly centripetal. Instead, tension is inscribed within it. Does it follow therefrom that the new entrant is axiomatically threatening? Not necessarily, but as the entrant to the community forms their identity within that community, a perception of their identity as, ultimately, either threat or asset will be formed by the other community members. The new entrant therefore needs to be mindful of the identity they are creating, in order to gain acceptance.

Unwin also nuances her discussion through inclusion of what Nickson et al (2003) call ‘aesthetic labour’, in which ‘“looking good” or “sounding right” are the most overt manifestations of aesthetic labour. In essence, with aesthetic labour, employers are seeking employees who can portray the firm’s image through their work, and at the same time appeal to the sense of the customer for those firms’ commercial benefit’ (p. 113). Acceptance into a community of practice is not simply a question of technical competence, but of cultural acclimatisation. Therefore, the new entrant either requires an a priori identity which is in harmony with the ideal identity desired by the institution, or the new entrant has sufficient flexibility to shape their identity to the context they find themselves in.

It seems, therefore, that a lot is demanded of the new entrant, who needs to be concerned about how they are perceived by established figures. A measure of acceptance by the wider community precedes a willingness to induct the new entrant effectively; the new entrant may spend a long time on the periphery, or may be excluded if they do not acquire an identity that the community finds acceptable. The entrant who does have an identity that finds favour with the institution is at a clear advantage.

It may seem, therefore, that the new entrant is best advised to ‘not rock the boat’ and to ensure they gain acceptance, but this makes innovation harder because there is pressure to conform to an existing culture, not challenge it. Maybe the edges of communities of practice need to be the most tolerant spaces, rather than the most well fortified.

References

Nickson, D., Warhurst, C., Cullen, A.M. and Watt, A. (2003) ‘Bringing in the excluded? Aesthetic labour, skills and training in the “new” economy’, Journal of Education and Work, vol. 16, no. 2, pp. 185-203.

Unwin, L. (2007) ‘English apprenticeship from past to present’ in Hughes, J., Jewson, N. and Unwin, L. (eds.) Communities of Practice: critical perspectives, Abingdon, Routledge.

Critiquing theories of learning…

‘Critiquing theories of learning and communities of practice,’ by Alison Fuller, is the first chapter in Communities of Practice: critical perspectives (Hughes et al. [ed.] 2007). Fuller argues that the standard communities of practice model sees learning as a process of identity formation, rather than as the acquisition of products (p. 19). Participation becomes the point of the thing, which is similar to the argument made by Sfard (1998).

If participation is the point, then social relations in communities of practice become critical. The purpose of the community of practice is the centre of gravity shaping the social relations.

However, Fuller cites the criticism of Eraut (2002) who argues that advanced industrial economies do not lend themselves to the stable kinds of communities posited in the community of practice model. In addition, Fuller and Unwin (2004) argue that, even within the community of practice model, the roles of novice and expert are not stable; novices can be more adept than experts at some tasks, for example those relying on information technology (it’s hard not hear echoes of Prensky [2001] in this argument).

Novices may be more expert in certain fields than those labelled ‘experts’ within any community of practice, but the key determinant is power relations. If the experts engage in dialogue with the adept novices, then the community as a whole can benefit, but the role of expert may have to be reconfigured. Alternatively, the experts can assert their power by excluding the expertise of the novices; novices can use technologies to support learning, but experts can deem those technologies inadmissible within the H.E.I.. The community is likely to suffer in the long run, but those in power retain their position, for a while at least.

Furthermore, it is taken as axiomatic that advanced industrial economies are radically different to their predecessors in industrial societies, yet wealth and power are still more concentrated than diffuse. A statistical breakdown of university vice-chancellors in terms of gender, education, age would expose a largely homogeneous community.

Novices in H.E.I.s in the UK have a great deal to bring to the game, but in a chillingly competitive environment a degree from an ‘old’ university will probably be perceived to have greater weight by employers, and so the older universities may feel they have most to gain from not changing. How much participation do they want?

References

Eraut, M. (2002) ‘Conceptual Analysis and Research Questions: Do the Concepts of “Learning Community” and “Community of Practice” provide added value?’ paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, New Orleans, 1-5 April.

Fuller, A. and Unwin, L. (2004) ‘Young people as teachers and learners in the workplace: challenging the novice-expert dichotomy’, International Journal of Training and Decvelopment, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 31-41.

Fuller, A. (2007) ‘Critiquing theories of learning and communities of practice’ in Hughes J., Jewson N. and Unwin L. (eds.) Communities of Practice: critical perspectives, Abingdon, Routledge.

Prensky, M. (2001) ‘Digital natives, digital immigrants’ On the horizon, vol. 9, no. 5, pp. 1-6.

Sfard, A. (1998) ‘On two metaphors for learning and the dangers of choosing just one’, Educational researcher, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 4-13.

Leadership for Open and Flexible Learning

Latchem and Hanna (2002) argue, ‘Distance learning has historically been disruptive to traditional educational systems’ (p. 204). It’s an interesting point to start from; distance learning does have an effect on control. Unlike the traditional classroom, there isn’t an authority figure physically present, and so other imperatives come into play. Maybe the learner has an economic need to learn, or maybe the drive is more personal, or maybe the learner can learn effectively with no form of coercion.

The authors also argue that a major achievement of open universities has been to ‘provide academic, professional development and general programmes to a far wider public’ (p. 204). In this sense open universities can be identified as disruptive institutions, changing the learning that happens in the act of making that learning available to a section of the population who had not already obtained their training for H.E. study successfully through the school system.

The impact of the open universities leads the authors to conclude, ‘What began at the “low end” of the marketplace as correspondence education is becoming a dominant force.’ There is an argument for seeing the open universities as disruptive in opposition to the sustaining model offered by older H.E.I.s, and Latchem and Hanna assemble this argument convincingly. Traditional H.E.I.s are now offering online and distance learning as a support to or replacement for the traditional lecture hall.

From promising beginnings, however, the authors lapse into truism: ‘Achieving systemic and radical change in higher education is no easy matter.’ The same point was made in a more illuminating way by Hearn (1996) who argued that trying to change an education system is like trying to move a cemetery, in the sense that there is not a lot of internal support for it. More interestingly, Latchem and Hanna see the traditional paraphernalia of learning, ‘the textbook, the lecturer as the authority, and the test as the all-inclusive means of assessing the learning’ as ‘an 18th century way of knowing the world that is expressly empirical and representational’ (p. 208). Personally, I think educational structures in the UK owe more to the nineteenth century; Gladstone’s government’s Education Act of 1870, which made education compulsory for children aged 5-13, was about preparing children to function as adults in an industrial economy. If our economic base has shifted markedly since then, it is surprising that relatively little has changed about our classrooms and our ways of assessing learning. Alternatively, the lack of change in our classrooms might signify that our economic model has not altered a great deal.

The occasional truism aside, the article is valuable for applying the sustaining/disruptive dualism to higher education on a ‘macro’ scale. If technologies do democratise learning (a contentious argument) and if, therefore, an acceleration in the availability of technologies democratises learning at an accelerated pace, then academics will need to re-think their professional identities, to a degree that challenges their status as an authority. More fundamentally, the fact that more people are paying more for higher education means that a ‘goods and services’ mentality will increasingly permeate the sector. The disruptions to come may be on at least as grand a scale as that identified by Latchem and Hanna.

References

Hearn, J. C. (1996) ‘Transforming U.S. Higher Education: An organizational perspective’ Innovative Higher Education, vol. 21, no. 2, pp. 141-154.

Latchem, C. and Hanna, D. E. (2002) ‘Leadership for Open and Flexible learning’ Open Learning, vol. 17, no. 3, pp. 203-215.

Etienne Wenger at the SEDA conference

Etienne Wenger gave the keynote address at the SEDA conference in Leeds. Watching Wenger is a bit like watching Eddie Izzard, as both are right-brain performers, all loose and associative.

Wenger is interested in the apprenticeship form of learning. Picking up the skills for a job is important, but so is having exposure to a master practitioner, a role model. On a day to day basis an apprentice doesn’t go to the master practitioner but does go to someone a little further advanced within the community, and so a learning community exists.

The Communities of Practice theory, therefore, isn’t new. Instead, it observes and classifies what is there already but, significantly, it gives Communities of Practice academic legitimacy and a vocabulary, both of which help to make the model transferable.

Communities of Practice is more of a horizontal learning partnership than a vertical learning model. With the latter, the expert comes in and pours knowledge into empty vessels. In the Communities of Practice model the expert has to rethink their own position because the learning is driven by the community.

Wenger argues that we create educational systems that relegate meaning. Instead, we teach skills. He further argues that meaning is more important than technique. This leads me to think that education systems resemble production lines in industrial societies, whereby people perform one task, but aren’t always encouraged to take pride in the collective achievement. They have the skill to perform the task, but it’s hard to extract meaning and purpose from the task, and so alienation ensues.

Wenger also argues that successful organisations enable informal meaning-making processes. However, Communities of Practice also require internal leadership in order to work well. They need two or three people who will make the community’s priorities happen. Furthermore, external structures also matter, to recognise the importance of the Community of Practice.

The new idea in Wenger’s keynote was the tension between expressibility and accountability. He posed a rhetorical question: ‘In a given community, how much of who you are is expressible?’ Putting aside the complexities of identity itself, Wenger’s interest is in the extent to which communities require people to compromise in order to fulfil their accountability to the community. Successful Communities of Practice have high degrees of expressibility.

He closed by identifying twenty-first century knowledge trends. On the one hand we have the verticalisation of knowledge, typified by audit culture. Yet at the same time we are encouraged to network horizontally with our peers. Hence we have a managerial paradox: ‘I order you vertically to connect horizontally.’ Technology enables us to follow both directions swiftly and efficiently.

I was left thinking that people who manage organisations, from schools to universities to workplaces, obsess about control, yet interesting things happen when people in control let go and allow bottom-up innovation. Successful Communities of Practice need time, and it may be no coincidence that Google allows its engineers 20% of their time to work on their own projects. Maybe managers worry about being made obsolete by creative thinking. I doubt if Wenger would claim that he has done much that is new, but he has described how effective learning happens and, in so doing, he has produced a rough template that can be imported to a range of contexts.