AI is only a threat to the existing orthodoxies of learning in higher education. This paper will suggest that we should interrogate what learning is in higher education and argue that there is an emergent paradigm shift that shouldn’t be resisted. It will argue that we should take a radical view of how learning can occur in higher education and the ways in which we organise the curriculum.
The history of technology in education is characterised by fear and the defence of traditional positions. We can see from the evidence of the recent past, that cultural conservatism in universities hasn’t in the end been able to prevent change. Written exams, essays, lectures now exist alongside practical assessment, online learning and digital resources. In the end all systems adapt to change and reconfigure. In recent history the university system has reconfigured and new technologies and modest changes to assessment strategies have been able to maintain the existing traditions of learning. However an opportunity has been missed. Are we to imagine there is an eternal and essential idea of higher learning which needs only periodically rebrand and adapt itself? Or is this merely reactive behaviour and not progressive? Should the vision be to redefine higher learning, rather than preserve its existing and perhaps dated notions of learning and excellence?
The paper speculates about opportunity for change given the new context. It will consider how in the first instance we need to reveal the hidden orthodoxies of higher education and assess their validity. It will go on to look at alternative models of learning and consider what these might mean for the design of the curriculum (and in particular the creative curriculum) and propose that an opportunity has arisen to achieve new types of excellence.
