Highlight the future trends in higher education and role of technology in distance mode of learning.

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The Future of Higher Education:
The most important challenge involves a shift in the way students consume higher education. Instead of attending a single institution, students receive credit in multiple ways, including from early-college/dual-degree programs, community colleges, online providers, and multiple universities. Students are voting with their feet, embracing online courses and undermining core curricula, which served as a cash cow, by turning to alternate providers, and pursuing fewer majors that require study of a foreign language.

As a result, colleges must become more nimble, entrepreneurial, student-focused, and accountable for what students learn. I am a historian and far better at interpreting the past than forecasting the future.” This report goes on to predict 15 innovations that will alter the face of higher education.

The future of higher education depends on innovation.
We have put together 4 articles consisting of educated predictions, research, and reports that can provide an indication as to what the future holds for universities and business schools: “The most important challenge involves a shift in the way students consume higher education. Instead of attending a single institution, students receive credit in multiple ways, including from early-college/dual-degree programs, community colleges, online providers, and multiple universities. Students are voting with their feet, embracing online courses and undermining core curricula, which served as a cash cow, by turning to alternate providers, and pursuing fewer majors that require study of a foreign language.

As a result, colleges must become more nimble, entrepreneurial, student-focused, and accountable for what students learn. I am a historian and far better at interpreting the past than forecasting the future.” This report goes on to predict 15 innovations that will alter the face of higher education.

Full Story: The Chronicle
Everything from the emergence of MOOCs to new learning styles and mounting financial and sustainability pressures are impacting the education landscape. Every day higher education leaders are developing new strategies to leverage these developing challenges and opportunities.

The common denominator amidst all this change: students. To best recruit and retain students, universities need to evaluate how they offer a student life experience that prepares students to be healthy and dynamic people in the future. That means universities need to embrace sustainability and wellness as key components of campus life. Spelman College recently differentiated itself by diverting all of its athletic funding to create a “Wellness Revolution,” focused on best promoting the health of its students. 

Expect that in the coming years, long-standing models of higher education that prefer tradition and stability will be supplemented, if not displaced, by new models that embrace organizational innovation, responsivity, and adaptation. 

A dual transformation design strategy has proved especially effective for addressing both legacy and emerging markets. According to this approach, operations acting in parallel—one to develop strategies that optimize the core organization to become more responsive to the new profile of demands it faces, and a second to design and implement disruptive innovations that provide a basis for future growth, agility, and responsivity.1 We provide here a set of recommendations for how dual transformation can be implemented in higher education. virtual reality, robotic telepresence and cyber defense will be driving forces in digital learning at colleges and universities over the next 20 years.

Role Technology in Distance Education
The concept of ‘Distance Education‘ is not new, and can be traced as far back as the first century. The Apostle Paul wrote to the early Christian Churches, teaching them from a distance even from his prison cell. But, organizational use of distance learning methods was first introduced in the 19th century. One of the first universities to deliver distance learning in an organized manner was Pennsylvania State University which established its first distance learning network in 1886.

Today, distance education calls upon an impressive, range of technologies to enable teachers and students who are separated by distance, to communicate with each other either in real time (synchronous) or delayed time (asynchronous). Due to modern communication and technologies, today the educational transactions through distance mode is being utilized by students and teachers engaged in both formal and open system of education. Rai (2000) has defined three types of distance education systems, viz., Institute-centered, Person-centered and Society-based.

(i). Institute – Centered Distance Education System: In this system there is a predominance of systematic models of education. The institutional mission focuses on the cost-effectiveness and cost-efficiency of the system. Academics become consultants to the institution for material design and development. All other functionaries in the institution are assigned key functions with accountability and individual responsibility.

(ii). Person – Centered Distance Education system: Under this system of distance education, the programmers are more individualized and negotiable as the aim is to serve the individual learner. Individualized learning is personally negotiated and is followed up by tutors/counselors.

(iii). Society Based Distance Education System: In the society based distance education system learning, materials are developed in accordance with the needs of the community. These are used in community situations where the teacher strives to involve the entire community i n the study of the learning materials. The teacher functions as a facilitator to identify learning goals, to evaluate learning materials, etc.

Before discussing the various media and technologies of distance education, appropriate to deliberate upon its objectives in brif the distance education attempts :
 to provide an opportunity of education to those who had discontinued their formal education due to one reason or other at any age and class. The working persons, economically and otherwise disabled persons or persons residing in remote areas may improve and advance their academic career through distance education;
 to provide quality education and training to large number of students at lower costs than conventional education system;
 to make access to higher education; 

 to promote education as a lifelong activity by providing necessary access to the masses, particularly to the disadvantageous groups like those living in rural areas, the employed, women, weaker sections of the society and many others wishing to acquire and upgrade knowledge and skills, at their door steps;
 to provide a flexible and diversified innovative education system which is open in the methods of learning, pace, place, eligibility criterion as well as in every operation of the program;
 to promote courses leading to gainful employment, tailored to specific vocational/professional needs, as also being relevant to local needs; 

Media in distance education is a kind of delivery system, which includes all kinds of mechanical devices directed to educational use. These devices are used to communicate knowledge or ideas to a large number of people who are located in far off rural and remote areas. Distance education program can be enriched and made more attractive, effective and satisfying for learning by using a variety of media i n accordance with the content. The facilities that can be provided for these programmes should attempt an exploitation of the potential of the variety of powerful media rendered by modem technology.