Page 25 - Campus Technology, January/February 2020

some university credits associated with them. As we look at workforce readiness, we will start to find learners looking for specific skills and for programs that fit their needs. We are no longer looking at students that are willing to spend four- plus years getting a bachelor’s degree in an on- campus setting; rather, they are looking for just- in-time learning for the skills that are needed for the job or jobs that they have or aspire to get.
In addition, workforce readiness comes to play later on in life when learners are looking to get graduate degrees while holding down jobs, tak- ing care of their families or staying at home. On- line degrees are aplenty but what we will start seeing more of are affordable degrees at scale. For example, here at Boston University, we are offering an online MBA program starting in Fall 2020 that will cost $24,000 all in.
2) ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND CHATBOTS
Burns: I think we’ll see more institutions adopt the use of chatbots to meet student expecta- tions while also maximizing staff and faculty time. Through the University Innovation Alliance’s early experimentation with chatbots, we’re seeing chat- bots as a way to reorient the university around customer (student) service. It’s not so much the technology — although chatbots are helping au- tomate basic tasks so advisers can focus more on
students — but about what you do with it. We also think it’s time for institutions to hold the IP we cre- ate, so our institutions are working to develop an open source database of common student ques- tions and confusion that has been surfaced by the chatbots. Those insights are forcing new conver- sations about how we serve our students, and that holds tremendous promise.
3) EXTENDED REALITY
James Frazee: By the end of this decade we’re going to wonder how we ever taught without eXtended Reality (XR)! Today, we’re doing some groundbreaking work with our Virtual Immersive Teaching and Learning (VITaL) initiative at San Di- ego State University. For instance, early research studying the impact of XR on motivation to learn among our nursing students (Hauze, 2017) re- vealed that the use of the XR delivered via three- dimensional hologram resulted in higher student attention and greater satisfaction compared with delivery via two-dimensional video or written case study. In this study, the XR treatment was more effective than a comparable 2D video or written case in terms of commanding student at- tention. It also was better at presenting the con- tent so that it was perceived as more relevant. Most of all, it enabled the students to build con- fidence in a risk-free setting, thereby providing a
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