MEDIA|BUSINESSLINE

This is an excerpt of an article published in the BusinessLine on January 15, 2018. 

“Today, 2.5 billion people have smartphones and they have options in terms of data, apps and capabilities. This has an impact on education too,” said Nandan Nilekani Chairman, EkStep, and Non-Executive Chairman, Infosys.

Inaugurating a three-day conference on ‘The Future of Learning’ here on Monday, hosted by IIM-B in collaboration with IIT-Bombay, Nilekani said: “Digital unbundling leads every sector, including education, to go from mega to micro and creates new ways to mix and match.”

The Future of Learning Conference is the first in the series of annual conferences alternating between IIM-Bangalore and IIT-Bombay for the next three years. In his presentation, ‘Micro is the New Mega’, Nilekani focused on how to learn in a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) world.

We are seeing the third mass revolution in education, he said, triggered and powered by new-age platforms. Data is the “new soil”, he added. He spoke of how unbundling to micro and the data avalanche will lead to more automation and millions of micro work packets, and rise of second-generation platforms or the gig economy.

“In terms of the future of learning, this means we must re-imagine what will happen in terms of these mega trends because universities will become platforms that distribute the ability to teach and learn,” Nilekani said, adding that universities will become testing grounds for blended learning models.

The question and answer session following Nilekani’s address revolved around the forces that are driving the change in the education sector, such as increasing globalisation (fiercely competitive domestic and international student markets), greater global mobility (of academics, students and academic brands), an intensifying clamour for democratisation of knowledge and access, and the emergence of disruptive digital technologies that drive innovations and offer leapfrogging opportunities....for more, click here.