Module Tutor: Dr. Emma Williams
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Three contemporary waves of change are creating both the conditions and the need for educational innovation:
· Digital technology and the growing use of machine learning/artificial intelligence
· Tensions between our ways of life and the needs of the environment we depend on
· The declining power of national governments to harvest tax revenue
Innovation is guided by a range of factors including considerations of efficient use of resources, national participation in economic competition and environmental efforts, and concerns for social justice, including the preservation of the view that education promotes meritocracy.
Week by week, this module charts the unfolding results and implications of these waves of change for education in the UK and elsewhere. By week 10 we will be in a position to consider a range of innovations in relation to education, meritocracy and social justice.
Throughout the module we will be taking a constructively critical approach toward educational innovation. Some innovative educational practices raise expectations of dramatic progress and improvement. Others offer targeted problem solving or marginal efficiency gains. These offerings are often realistic. But innovation also carries costs of investment and reorganization. Sometimes the new pathway taken is not the only possible way forward. Understandable enthusiasm about innovation therefore needs to be balanced by reflection on how ‘better’ is defined and by whom.