DID YOU KNOW ...
THE CAMPUS RE-ENGINEERED
The traditional campus has closed classrooms , sports and club facilities , labs and workshops . That won ' t serve tomorrow ' s students . “ The question is , do we need hundreds of classes physically on campus ? About 70 % of university campuses consist of classrooms within four walls . But all of this information is available online , virtually . To create the campus of tomorrow we need to convert our campuses to become more of an open lab space for innovation , to incubate those ideas , open labs for learning spaces to discuss a project . More importantly , create more of a simulated work environment for students to gain experiential learning . We want to create a networking and social environment here . We want our students to feel excited about coming to the campus , and not just because they have to .
“ One big advantage of this opportunity is that it will reduce the footprint of our campus . Future campuses will accommodate many times more students , lowering the cost of higher education and at the same time making it more exciting for them . Our young people ' s prospects will be better because they will be more skilled and have better prospects of employment in their chosen field than those from traditional institutions .”
In place of one-size-fits all , lecture-based teaching does ( which does not serve the ‘ Gen Zs ’!) the vision is to offer customised curricula for every student , enabled by technology . “ At HCT today we have 23,000 students , and around 70 different programmes . Not all of these will meet their expectations : some they are excited about , others may be a filler that they have to do to get their degree . So what do we mean by customised curricula ? Well instead of 70 programmes we should have 23,000 ! We can do that . We have big data relating to the students – social media from their high school days and other experiences that reveal their interests and will define for us their interests , what motivates them , where their strengths lie and what excites them . On the other hand , we have access to the needs of employers . With this framework , I can come up , aided by AI , with a study programme specially designed for this student only , and surely that will make him or her more engaged and excited .”
This part of the transformation , he admits , may take a little longer but he believes it can be fulfilled within 20 years . But another initiative , on which personalised learning will depend , is already in place . The days when employers took on people solely on their potential , then trained them to do the job , are gone , he says . “ We strongly believe
“ We contracted with McGraw-Hill and gained access to tens of thousands of books and supplemental materials online ”
ABDULLATIF ALSHAMSI PRESIDENT & CEO , HIGHER COLLEGES OF TECHNOLOGY
310 December 2021