Group One

Most Critical Trends

1. Increasing numbers of distance learning students
2. Little increase in on-campus students
3. Increasing number of young people who are technologically competent [The age of the Screen-Ager]
4. Increasing number of jobs requiring technological competence.
5. Traditional market borders becoming diffuse.

Selected Trend: Business and industry setting occupational standards (as opposed to college degrees and certificates)

Recommended Actions:

1. Work closer with industry so that we can anticipate their needs
2. Develop and market products that meet these needs
3. Develop partnerships with competitors to provide just in time education
4. Change the faculty reward structure to focus on competency-based education (e.g., pay per student outcome)
5. Evaluate progress in implementing our strategic plan
6. Establish 10 business/industry partnerships within the year
7. Include new course development or major course revision in salary schedule

Group Two

Most Critical Trends

1. Increasing numbers of people accessing the Internet
2. Increasing computer literacy
3. Increasing distance between technological have and have nots
4. Increasing numbers of distance learning students
5. Increase need to retrain the workforce in a global economy

Selected trend: increased global access to information

Implications:

1. Need faculty development program to assist faculty change roles (from sage on stage to guide on the side)
2. Need to be able to deliver courses anytime, anyplace,
3. Need to retrain workforce
4. Need to develop more interdisciplinary courses

Recommendations for Action

1. Reassess the way we develop and deliver our curricular programs
2. Develop programs that rely on languages other than English (e.g., teach economics in Japanese)
3. Develop incentive program (e.g., tenure, additional compensation via raises or bonuses, promotion) that recognizes faculty and staff who successfully implement these new programs
4. Pursue new funding with constituents (e.g., alumni, affluent individuals)
5. Raise expectations for giving with current constituents
6. Develop continuous training programs via the Internet to update technological skills
7. Re-evaluate our facilities vis-à-vis do they meet our needs for curriculum development and access to global information

 Group 3

Most critical trends

1. Increased need for competency-based (as opposed to time-based) learning
2. Increased need for continual retraining, for lifelong education
3. Increasing diversity on college campuses
4. Increased number of decentralized delivery programs
5. Increased business involvement in education

Selected Trend: Trend towards a more competency-based learning curriculum

Implications

1. Faculty contracts must incorporate development and implementation of competency-based courses
2. Incorporate competency-based pre-testing and student placement
3. We will have greater dependency on high tech
4. We must retool curriculum
5. We must develop open entry / open exit programs
6. We must officially recognize the change in faculty role
7. We must evaluate the impact on our fees impact given a competency-based learning curriculum
8. We must reexamine our facilities plan
9. We must redesign our support systems (e.g., registration, financial aid)
10. We must develop an on going assessment program
11. Look for emerging opportunities to partner with corporations
12. Reexamine the scheduling process structure

Recommendations for Action

1. Prepare to benchmark the program
2. Market the concept internally and externally
3. Provide institutional support
4. Pilot a strong competency based program in order to assess implications for


-curriculum retooling
-faculty retraining
-modifying support services
-the effects on faculty and administration roles
-program assessment

Group 4

Most Critical Trends

1. Less emphasis on physical location given the virtual learning explosion
2. Increased need for workforce retraining
3. Increased need for life long learning programs
4. Decreased need for semester paradigm
5. Increasing diverse student population
6. Increasing requirements of entry level job market skills
7. Increased competition from corporate universities
8. Increased consumer demands for diploma/certificate guarantees

Implications of these trends

1. Need for anytime anywhere learning
2. Need for curricular revision
3. Need for staff development
4. Need to increase technology and personnel budget
5. Greater depersonalization on and off campus
6. Need for increased student access to technology
7. Threat to existing core curriculum

Recommendations for Action

1. Create awareness of virtual learning and its implications for faculty role, curriculum, facilities, marketing
2. Support and expand current efforts in virtual curriculum and staff development
3. Demonstrate the blend of virtual learning with other pedagogy
4. Create virtual support services

Group 5

Most Critical Trends

1. Rapid change in demographics (e.g., increasing proportion of seniors, Hispanics, blacks)
2. Increasing proportion of low pay, low skill jobs
3. Increasing need for technologically competent workforce
4. Increased competition from commercial providers of educational services
5. Increased call for accountability
6. Increased need for life-long learning activities
7. Increased disparity in access by technological haves and have nots
8. Increasing focus on educational delivery mechanisms and processes at the expense of traditional pedagogical methods and techniques
9. Increasing proportion of non-English speaking population
10. Decreasing importance of traditional market boundaries
11. Decreased funding for public education
12. Increased use of technology in the work place
13. Decrease in verbal communication skills
14. Increasing proportion of educationally under-prepared students

Selected trend: Learning methodology more sensual (i.e., visual, sound, tactile, individualized, focus on learning by doing, and use of small groups)

Implications

1. Requires paradigm change from sage on the stage to learner focused delivery (from preaching to a group to focus on collaborative and individual learning)
2. Requires refocus from classroom learning to on-the-job learning
3. Driving force: global competition requires focus on outcomes and instructional accountability
4. Question: How to adapt these changes to students with disabilities
5. Question: where will we get the money to implement faculty development an retraining
6. Need to restructure advisory committee membership to be more in line with technological trends

Recommendations for Action

1. Provide faculty with opportunities to understand impact of new trends from various sectors
2. Integrate experience on the job training into curriculum
3. Provide leader opportunities
4. Hire faculty with alternative delivery of instruction skills and attitudes
5. Provide support and resources to implement
6. Encourage visionaries or outside contact experts to be on advisory panels
7. Seek partnerships with each program to supply resources
8. Gather data from current or former students regarding preferred teaching methods (also future students)