Herein lies the opportunity to use technology as a teaching and learning tool. In combination with books, databases, and Web sites, students can listen to radio spots, watch a podcast, or work through a Web Quest. This provides an array of resources and information with which students need to evaluate and synthesize.

We need to combine “old” and “new” resources in order for these students to be conscientious and literate users of information and technology.

I also am struck by the issue of whether this “give ‘em the information on whichever channel they prefer” might lessen the communal aspect of learning (learners as members of discourse communities). In a somewhat related way, the ability to pay attention to whichever news source suits you – and even limit what you receive to those stories you think will interest you – may mean we have fewer moments when something momentus is shared as a common experience. Brian Williams comments on the effect that Joseph Welch had on the nation when he faced down Joe McCarthy with a single question. Would we respond the same way if some of us were watching Fox, others CNN, and still others reading only the spin provided on their blog of choice?

Another big question mark for me is whether this digitalizing of higher ed will create an even greater digital divide. There are more US citizens who don’t even consider going to college than there were twenty years ago – does all this frantic preparation for the wired workforce just leave them even further out in the cold? And if they do find a way to come to college, what are the chances they won’t have their pockets full of electronic gadgets, or come from school systems that have it all? Or are we leaving people who live in poverty out of this “millenial generation” definition altogether because their daily experience just doesn’t seem significant or mainstream? It’s a growing group – and we’re not doing a good job thinking about including them in higher education planning.

Barbara