Higher education should seek to understand learners- Worldviews Speaker

Getting to understand people should be the most critical business strategy in higher education today, Chad Gaffield, one of the speakers at the Worldviews 2013 conference, has said.
The two-day conference, which started on Thursday, is holding in Toronto, Canada.
 

At the conference, prominent thinkers in media and higher education  have been engaged in debates and conversations on how media coverage of higher education is changing in a dynamic global landscape.
 

The conference with the theme,” Global trends in media and higher education, is organized by the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations.
 

Looking at the impact of social media and other forms of emerging communications technology, Gaffield, a keynote speaker and President, Social Science and Humanities Research Council,  wonders  if the new media are becoming 21st century newspapers.

He spoke on Understanding People: How new insights are transforming campuses, companies and communities in the digital age.
 

To him, deep conceptual changes are being enabled, accelerated and influenced by digital technology  as a result of taking seriously the challenge of understanding human behaviour.
 

Since researches are pointing towards the need for a paradigm shift in the concept of teaching and learning, Gaffield says the development of new policies and practices nationally and internationally is necessary.
” We should start focusing on how children learn best because the way we are taught is not necessarily the way we should be teaching others,” he notes as he challenges people in the  business of teaching at every level.
 

According to him, innovative business people now seek to focus on what drives customers’ decisions; how to partner for effective collaboration; how to empower employees; how to engage citizens in politics ; and how to enhance student learning.
 

He notes that complexity could be simplicity if looked closely, diversity, foundation of strength and resilience while creativity could mean tapping the entire pool of talent.

He urges higher education to shift focus from teaching content to concentrating on learning content and competences. ”Technology is not enough, it must be married with humanities,” he says.
He explains that the job of imagination should be producing out of the present society the future that is desired

Source: Punch