References:

1) Bull, G. L. (1997). Technology and schools. Advances in Computers, 5, 321-356.

2) Cetron, M., & Davies, O. (1994). Mastering information in the new century. Washington 

D.C., Special Libraries Association.

3) Fulton, K. (1989). Technology training for teachers: a federal perspective. Educational 

Technology, 29(3). 12-19.

4) Gentry, G., & Csete, J. (1990). Educational Technology in the 1990s. In G. Anglin (Ed.), 

Instructional technology: Past, present and future. (pp. 20-33). Colorado: Libraries 

Unlimited.

5) Goldschmidt, A., & Akera, A. (1998). John W. Mauchly and the development of the 

ENIAC computer. University of Pennsylvania [On-line]. Available: 

http://www.library.upenn.edu/special/gallery/mauchly/jwmintro.html [October 1, 1998].

6) Graham, D. (1997). The classroom computer revolution that hasn't happened-yet! 

Education Canada, 37(1). 10-14, 52. 

7) Greenspan, A. (1997). Our nation's ability to compete worldwide: Unprecedented 

flexibility to adopt to change. Vital speeches of the day, 64. 98-101.

Conclusion: The Author's Views

Experts from all fields, including education, business, and government agree that we have moved

into the information age. As much as 97% of the world's knowledge will be accumulated over one

person's lifetime (Molitor, 1998). Against statistics like this, teaching students a host of facts "just

in case" they need them later on in life is a fruitless effort. The ability to find and use facts as they

are needed becomes the skill that will enable students to become lifelong learners. The roll of

education is no longer to provide educational opportunities through early adulthood, but to

provide the scaffolding necessary to support individuals and families from all walks of life,

throughout their entire lives. In order to prevent a further widening between the upper and lower

classes, it will become increasingly important for educational institutions to provide this support by

providing weeknight and weekend adult classes focused on emerging technologies. 

Very soon we can look for interactive video technologies to allow parents to play a more active

role in their children's education (e.g. watching a class presentation via online video). Schools

that actively pursue such avenues will be in great demand. School days will grow to seven hours

in length to provide more instruction and to meet the needs of dual income families. As more

states pass school voucher initiatives, a greater dependency upon private education will result.

Schools will compete to hire teachers, raising teacher salaries. Dissatisfaction with public

education and national and statewide acceptance of school vouchers will cause the private and

home schooling markets to grow well into the next century.

The Future of Education: Futurists' Views

It is no secret that our educational system is slow to adopting innovations. The old adage, "the
only constant in life is change," has rarely been applied to education. Gentry and Csete have
stated, "educators are slow to recognize the need to develop a curriculum that will prepare the
workforce for the demands they will face" (1990, pg. 25). Some would argue that change in
education will continue to be a dream unrealized well into the new millennium, but many opinions
run contrary to this argument.

A 1997 study performed by the National Home Education Research Institute showed that there
are approximately 1.23 million American children being taught at home. Home school students
collectively outnumber the individual statewide public school enrollments in each of 41 states. On
average, home schoolers out perform their public school counterparts by a minimum of 30
percentile points across all subjects. The study further shows that family income, parental
education, gender and minority differences have no impact on the success of home school
student performance. Also, the amount spent per student is staggeringly different: $546/student
for home school versus $5,325/student for public schools. The study shows that nearly 84% of
home school children use a computer in their education, compared to the national average of
26% (Ray, 1997).
School vouchers appear to be another factor that might create a larger private market for
education. Initiatives in California and Florida have already shown that vouchers are gaining
support among the American public.

Future Technologies

If one lesson can be learned from our past it is to NOT put limits on what technology might
someday produce. Assuming that ANYTHING is possible might be the best assumption. For
example, consider what happens when we begin to extrapolate Moore's Law 10 and 20 years into
the future (see Tab. 2 below)?
Moore's Law
1984 1990 1999 2009 2020
RAM (in Megabytes) 0.13 2 131 17000 2000000
HD (in Megabytes) 0.4 23 10000 12000000 14000000000
CPU (in MHz) 10 51 411 5500 75000
Cost $4,000.00 $2,600.00 $1,400.00 $670.00 $320.00
Table 2 - Moore's Law Extrapolated
Gordon Moore believes that his Law will someday hit a wall: "Some time in the next several years
we get to some finite limits, but not before we get through five generations" (in Kanellos, 1997).
One study has shown that limitations could be reached by 2017. It does seem likely that we can
assume growth to continue for several years to come. At current rates, by the time today's first
and second graders graduate from high school, they will be using a computer that has 17,000
Megabytes of RAM, a HD of 12,000,000 Megabytes, a CPU speed of 5,500 Megahertz, and at a
cost of less than $700. Extrapolating further is even more staggering.
We can hardly even begin to imagine what these computers will do. Metcalfe's Law combined
with technology fusion should lead us to believe that we will have an increased reliance on a
Global Digital Network, capable of sending and receiving any form of digital communication to
and from anywhere in the world at any time. A global economy reliant on these emerging
technologies is evidenced by current statistics. Still, we must ask what else is possible?
 In the very near future we will have a keyboardless computer. Voice software is already proving
to be effective in its implementation and it seems only a matter of years before the keyboard will
be removed from many if not most computer environments. Computers are shrinking in size and
are now wearable. For under $5,000 Xybernaut sells a powerful speech-activated computer (see
Fig. 2). Taking this one step farther, although more difficult to implement than originally
anticipated, voice translation technologies will allow for nearly instantaneous communication with
people of different languages (Molitor, 1998). The business and educational implications are
staggering. For example, what if American students could instantly communicate with Chinese
students? Would this change education?

Also possible are body-implant transceivers, all connected to the Global Digital Network, or
medical breakthroughs such as video lens implants, which are already allowing individuals who
were once blind to regain partial sight! For any Star Trek fans reading this paper, it might sound
like we are slowly turning into the Borg (see Fig. 3). If this creature walked into your classroom,
how would you react? The idea might seem ludicrous, but the idea of students walking into class
with Sony Walkmans, pagers, and cell phones was recently considered ludicrous as well. The
technology might someday make unbelievable things possible. It is therefore important for
teachers to work closely with technology designers "to create a world that celebrates and
promotes humanity through the judicious use of technology"

One must keep in mind that there are countless ways technology might develop during the next
several decades. Knowing exactly what these developments will be or where they will lead is not
only impossible, it is unimportant. It is the recognition of what is possible that educators must
consider. Social implications could possibly be the hardest of all to predict, yet it will be education
that many will look to in dealing with these implications. Adequately preparing for these
implications will only occur if we look ahead, which ultimately requires us to ask, what do
members of the educational community see when they look ahead?

The Future

Order Out of Chaos

Many factors or "wild cards" contribute to forecasting a possible future. Many futurists have
likened these wild cards to the "butterfly effect" of chaos theory. The premise in the butterfly effect
is that a butterfly flapping its wings in Singapore could cause a rippling effect that would
eventually lead to a hurricane in the Caribbean. The premise behind chaos theory is that there
can be order to chaos. The beauty of fractals is based upon this premise. Out of the chaos in
today's world, we have found several trends: Moore's Law, Metcalfe's Law, technology fusion,
and our technologically dependent world economy. We must finally ask where are these trends
leading us and how might they impact education?

Using technology can change the way teachers teach. Some teachers use technology in 'teacher-centered' ways...On the other hand, some teachers use technology to support more student-centered approaches to instruction, so that students can conduct their own scientific inquiries and engage in collaborative activities while the teacher assumes the role of facilitator or coach."

When the rate of change inside an institution is less than the rate of change outside, the end is in 
site... 
Jack Welch, CEO of General Electric
Right now, education is moving along at a snail's pace, while the world outside is speeding by at 
a supersonic rate. According to Fulton (1989, pg. 12), "Classrooms of today resemble their 
ancestors of 50 and 100 years ago much more closely than do today's hospital operating rooms, 
business offices, manufacturing plants, or scientific labs." If you put a doctor of 100 years ago in 
today's operating room, she would be lost, yet if you placed a teacher of 100 years ago into one 
of today's classrooms she wouldn't skip a beat. Does this mean that the end is in sight for 
education? The answer is YES, if your asking if it means the end of education as we know it 
today. Let us take a peek at what the future might look like

 Being a Webmaster is one of today's hottest careers, yet five or six years ago Webmasters did
not even exist. This is an example of how education must consider preparing students for jobs
that have yet to be created. Alan Greenspan, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board,
recently said (1997), "One of the most central dynamic forces [in the economy] is the accelerated
expansion of computer and telecommunications technologies...clearly our educational institutions
will continue to play an important role in preparing workers to meet these demands" (pg. 98). He
also stated, "workers are facing the likelihood that they will need retooling during their
careers...education is increasingly becoming a lifelong activity" (pg. 100). To prepare students to
be lifelong learners requires a new approach to teaching, one in which students are taught how to
learn on their own.

Unfortunately, we don't have to look hard to find teachers utilizing new technological tools to
replicate old educational models. For example, most uses of distance education employ the same
instructor delivering the same lecture to the same audience, only now the audience can be larger.
This distance education model does nothing to address the concept of lifelong learning. This
traditional model still places the student in a passive role, merely absorbing as much information
as possible. Instead, more collaborative models of distance education could be employed. For
example, The Center for Technology and Teacher Education at the University of Virginia uses live
video connections with partner universities to bring together professors and students in a forum
where all parties contribute and benefit from the collaborative learning experience. However, the
overall dependence on the traditional instructional model dominates the majority of today's
educational system.

Much of the failure to utilize technology in education today is, as Thornburg puts it, "the 

assumption that content [is] king...in a world of rapid information growth, it is context that 

matters...context is king" (in Thorburg, 1997, pg. 5). Thornburg advocates that rather than teach 

students a stockpile of facts to use "just in case" they might need them some day, that instead 

learning be put in context - i.e. master the ability to gather the appropriate facts and then 

creatively leverage those facts towards the learning objective. Teachers should create situations 

where the students are required to locate the facts and information specifically related to the 

context of the question at hand, and then to utilize that information effectively. 

economy

If education is responsible for preparing its students to be contributing members to the world 

economy (it is the opinion of the author that this is a responsibility of education), we must 

consider what type of an economy these students will be entering. In October 1998, The World 

Information Technology and Services Alliance (WISTA) published a report entitled, Digital Planet, 

the Global Information Economy. WISTA commissioned International Data Corporation to perform 

this study which presents the broadest view of current levels of customer spending on information 

technology and communications ever assembled. The study concluded that spending on 

information and communications technology (ICT) is a critically important element of the 

worldwide economy. Below are some of the study's findings (WISTA, 1998):

 ICT was responsible for $1.8 trillion in spending in 1997. 

 In 1997, ICT spending was nearly 40% larger than in 1992. 

 ICT spending is growing 27% faster than the overall worldwide Gross Domestic Product. 

 Spending on ICT is a key accelerator, catalyst, and multiplier of a wide variety of social 

and economic measures, including company and job growth. 

 An average of 7,200 new tax-paying ICT companies have been added in the United 

States during each of the last five years. 

 380,000 "software and service" jobs have been added in the United States during the 

past five years. 

 ICT increases overall economic activity. 

With the world economy so intricately tied to information and communications technologies, the 

careers of today and tomorrow are directly related to these technologies. The Thornburg Center 

recently conducted a study of the 54 jobs identified by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics as 

having the highest numerical growth between now and the year 2005. Of the 54 jobs, 46 required 

technological fluency, and none of the remaining eight paid more than double minimum wage 

(Thorburg, 1997). Technological fluency is more than technological literacy; it requires that an 

individual be as comfortable using technology as they are reading the newspaper. The lack of 

technologically fluent workers is already a problem. The Information Technology Association of 

America (ITAA) has warned that one out of ten jobs requiring information technology skills is 

going unfilled (Thornburg, 1997). Clearly, our educational system is failing to adequately prepare 

technologically fluent workers, so we must ask what does education need to do to address this 

problem? 

Technology Fusion

another event that will likely have a significant impact on education is technology fusion. Twenty
years ago we saw sharp distinctions between computers, photos, publishing, TV/video, and
telecommunications. Now the distinctions between these media are blurring (see Fig. 1 below). In a few more years there will be virtually no distinction between them (Jukes & McCain, 1997)
(Land & Portway, No Date). The result of this fusion is the manufacturing of computers that can
perform all of the functions that not long ago needed separate devices. The Education Coalition
(TEC) considers the merger of computing, television, printing and telecommunications as the
most significant trend in education and technology. "Bringing them together results in the whole
having greater impact than each individual part..." (Land & Portway).

1978

1998

Internet and the Web

The merging of Moore's Law, Metcalfe's Law, and easy-to-use graphical interfaces form the 

foundation of the communication revolution we are now experiencing. The International Data 

Corporation (IDC) forecasts that 320 million people will be able to access the World Wide Web by 

2002. In 1997, 78 million devices connected to the Web; by 2002 this number will increase to 515 

million (WISTA, 1998). In 1996, the U.S. Postal Service delivered an astonishing 185 billion 

pieces of first class mail, yet in that same year the Internet handled about one trillion e-mail 

messages. Federal Communications Committee Chairman Reed Hunt has said, "The 

communication age is connected to the greatest revolution in the history of education since the 

invention of the printing press" (Thourburg, 1997).

Telecommunications/Networks and Metcalfe's Law

       As the power of the computer increases, so do the capabilities of communications media 

including glass fibers, copper wires, and wireless communication systems. For example, 

scientists at Fujitsu and other companies have demonstrated the capacity to send data over a 

single strand of glass the diameter of a human hair at a speed of one trillion bits per second 

(Thornburg, 1997). At this rate the entire Library of Congress could be transmitted in seconds 

(Molitor, 1998), or 70 million simultaneous voice conversations could be sent on a single fiber 

(Tobias, 1993). Conventional copper wires cannot compete with these rates of transmission, but 

by using an Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) transmissions in excess of six million 

bits per second can be achieved. Many cable television providers are providing broadband 

services of up to ten million bits per second over copper wire systems as well. Much like the 

phenomenon with computer memory, as these speeds increase, the cost of using these services 

decreases. Take for example the consistent decrease in long distance telephone rates over the 

last few years; the ability to transmit enormous numbers of calls through one wire has driven 

prices down substantially. 

The combination of better, cheaper computers and increased bandwidth has caused a boon in 

the network community (i.e. the Internet). Bob Metcalfe, inventor of the Ethernet, suggested that 

the power of a network increases proportionally by the square of the number of users. Over time 

this has become known as Metcalfe's Law. Like Moore's Law, Metcalfe's Law has played a major 

role in shaping the business world, and now it is beginning to affect education. Simply put, 

Metcalfe's Law states that the more people that are connected to a network, the more powerful 

that network becomes. As millions connect to the Internet, the Network of networks, the power of 

sharing information and ideas grows. Education is in the business of sharing information and 

ideas, making Metcalfe's Law a force that will play a major role in shaping the institution in the 

years ahead.

The Graphical Interface and Educational Resistance

I see no advantage whatsoever to the graphical user interface

...Bill Gates, 1981

The graphical user interface was first developed by Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center. After a 

visit to this lab, Steve Jobs, the chairman of Apple Computers, bought the idea and named it 

Macintosh. "For many, this event has been heralded as the most significant conceptual 

breakthrough in the history of PCs" (Jukes & McCain, 1997). Eventually, even the recalcitrant Bill 

Gates adopted the graphical interface into his Windows operating system. 

 During the 1990s, the graphical interface environment has allowed the general public to use 

computers in a variety of ways never imagined possible. The skills in operating a computer have 

become much like those necessary to play a video game -- point there, click the button, and 

something happens! The generation of video game players, our youth, effectively has become the 

best audience for computers, yet educators resist using them.

Since the large-scale induction of computers into America's schools in the early 1980s, there has 

been reluctance of educators to implement them. Teachers can hardly be blamed for this 

reluctance. A major barrier has been a lack of a universal agreement on how teachers should be 

prepared to use the technology (Willis & Mehlinger, 1996). This is not cause to write off the 

personal computer for classroom use. In reference to preparing pre- and in-service teachers, Bull 

and Cooper (1997) believe, "it is important to be realistic about the time frame that will be 

required to accomplish this [integration of technology] in the depth that may be eventually 

desired" (pg. 101). In fact, the last 15 to 20 years might be viewed more as a time of courtship 

between computers and K-12 educators. Clearly, in order for educators to adopt current 

technologies an emphasis must be placed on adequately preparing pre- and in-service teachers.

The Trends of Today

Computers and Moore's Law

In order to understand today's technological trends, it helps to take a look at how they have
developed over the years. Even in education, computers have a long history. For example, the
ENIAC, built at the University of Pennsylvania's Moore School of Electrical Engineering between
1944 and 1946, was the first large-scale general-purpose electronic computer (Goldschmidt &
Akera, 1998). It weighed 30-tons, contained 19,000 vacuum tubes, 1,500 relays, and consumed
almost 200 kilowatts of electrical power (Weik, 1961). Designed to calculate trajectory tables for
new guns, the ENIAC failed on an average of every seven minutes, but when it worked it could
compute 10-digit multiplication in 3/1000th of a second -- a huge accomplishment for its day
(Jukes & McCain, 1997).

More recently, the 1980 model Cray supercomputer was the fastest machine of its day. It cost 

$12 million, weighed five tons, and consumed 150kW of electricity -- all this and it had only 8MB 

of RAM and operated at speed of 80 MHz (Jukes & McCain, 1997). By comparison, a used 

computer today with the same capabilities can be purchased for under $300. 

 Since the popularization of the desktop computer in the 1980s, we have become painfully aware 

of how quickly computers become outdated. Many of today's educators point to this trend in their 

argument against the use of computers. This trend of increased power at lower cost is likely to 

continue well into the next century and has popularly become known as Moore's Law, after 

Gordon Moore, the cofounder of Intel Corporation. In 1965 he suggested (half in jest) that 

technology doubled in processing power approximately every 18 months and at the same time 

the price for that technology declined by about 35% a year relative to this power. The accuracy of 

Mr. Moore's prediction has proven to be frighteningly accurate. The table below (Tab. 1) 

illustrates the effects of Moore's Law from 1984 to 1999, with some minor adjustments. In a 1993 

speech, Randall Tobias, the Vice Chairman of AT&T, put Moore's Law in perspective when he 

said, "...if we had had similar gains in automotive technology, today you could buy a Lexus for 

about $2. It would travel at the speed of sound, and go 600 miles on a thimble of gas. It would be 

only three inches long...but easy to parallel park!" (pg. 244).

(Assumptions: Every 18 months RAM doubles in size, HD increase 275% in size, CPU speed 

increases 40%, and cost drops 10%).

Moore's Law
                                              1984             1990                  1999
RAM      (in Megabytes)         0.13               2                         131
HD        (in Megabytes)           0.4               23                         10000
CP        (in MHz)                    10                51                         411
Cost                                $4,000.00      $2,600.00             $1,400.00
                                        Table 1 - Moore's Law

Taking the reverse stance of education, business and industry have adopted the approach of
staying up-to-date with technology. The current economy appears to support the notion that this
approach is valid, yet the majority of our schools continue to adopt the approach of remaining
several technological generations behind business and industry. 

Introduction

Education Today

For over a century, education has remained largely unchanged. Classrooms full of students 

deferring to the wisdom of an all-knowing professor has, is, and many believe, will continue to be 

the accepted mode of instruction. Despite many technological advances and the introduction of 

new pedagogical concepts, the majority of today's classrooms continue to utilize this traditional 

mode. Educators have thrived in a bubble immune from advancements in technology, but the 

increasing rate of change of these advances now look to be threatening to burst this bubble. 

The world is changing -- it is getting both smaller and bigger at the same time. Our world shrinks 

as technologies now allow us to communicate both synchronously and asynchronously with peers 

around the world. Conversely, the explosion of information now available to us expands our view 

of the world. As a result of the ability to communicate globally and the information explosion, 

education must change. Most educators might not want to change, but the change is coming -- it 

is a matter of when not if. The challenge is to prepare the children of today for a world that has 

yet to be created, for jobs yet to be invented, and for technologies yet undreamed. As we will see, 

the driving forces of Moore's Law, Metcalfe's Law, technology fusion, and a changing world 

economy are redefining the way our children need to be taught. The current teaching paradigm of 

the teacher as the possessor and transferor of information is shifting to a new paradigm of the 

Disclaimer: The research materials are collated from web based resources.teacher as a facilitator or coach. This new teacher will provide contextual learning environments that engage students in collaborative activities that will require communications and access to 

information that only technology can provide. 

It is no secret that education is slow to change, especially in incorporating new technologies. This 

is described by Jukes and McCain (1997) as paradigm paralysis, the delay or limit in our ability to 

understand and use new technology due to previous experiences. It takes new experiences to 

replace the old ones, and this simply takes time. Unfortunately, education can no longer take the 

time it wants. The trends in technology are creating a future that is arriving faster than education 

is preparing for it. We must therefore ask what are these trends and how will education adapt to 

them? To answer these questions, the techniques of H.G. Wells will be used. Wells, the father of 

futures studies, "had a gift for seeing how all the activities of humankind -- social, cultural, 

technological, economic, political -- fit together to produce a single past, and by extension a 

single future" (Wagar, 1993, pg. 52). First we will take a brief look at our past to formulate an 

understanding of the trends of today. This will be followed by a detailed analysis of these trends. 

Finally, we will peek into the crystal ball and predict the future of technology and education.

Technology and Education : Current and Future Trends

 

 Author: Philip Molebash

 

Why predict the future? More than an attempt at being Nostradamus, the value is in providing
targets against which others may compare their thoughts and to stimulate efforts to either
facilitate or inhibit possible futures implied by the predictions. As technology plays a larger role in
education, any predictions concerning the future of education must include an analysis of
technological trends. The purpose of this paper is to do just that: Analyze the trends in technology
and how they relate to education, and then to extrapolate these trends in an attempt to predict the
future of technology and education. Much of what is predicted in this paper might offend ardent
supporters of our traditional educational system and a large portion of it will probably miss the
target substantially. However, it will be clear that as technology is adopted into education, the end
result will be change.