Sunday Posts

When someone asks what I do, I like to say I work on Education Innovation. This sounds vague enough to give me two advantages: Most conversations end there, and only the interested, and interesting, progress. I get an opportunity to make the point that I am in Education, but play no part in the current multi-billion dollar 'industry', that gigantic factory of human processing; rather, I slog in the twilight zone of impossible transformation, hoping that another, fairer and better, way is possible. And, then, I am hit with the question: 'So, EdTech, eh?' At this point, it becomes a choice how boring I want to be. Imagine this moment as one when the Party gets going and other people are already engaged in more interesting conversations about money, cars, holidays and other things that fascinate men. I am about to hide in the quiet corner where no one can find me to pull me to the Dance Floor. This is usually the worst sort of moment to try make my point that Educati

'Neo-Liberalism' has come to eat the world.  The term pops up every now and then, sometimes in unexpected places. Usually derogatory in its employ, it appears to signify both the cause of the disease and its symptoms. I am not sure if anyone calls oneself 'neo-Liberal' by choice, but in a sense, all of us, mortgage-wielding, Cappuccino-sipping, Economist-reading, English-speaking, Starbucks-bound middle-class men, are. In its usage, it is nothing like 'Nazi', or 'Fascist', or 'Communist', as each one of those were specific categories (one could be called a communist and could admit to be a communist), but rather a label that is necessarily bestowed on others, with its main function being absolution for the speaker: That is, if I can call something, or someone, 'Neo-Liberal', then I am not. One thing for sure though: It is deemed to be something bad. Just calling someone 'Neo-Liberal' isn't enough, you have to say the

It has become a commonplace to say that, with globalisation and automation transforming the world of work, we need more 'soft skills'. There are various lists of these 'skills' available on Twitter or Linkedin, and often they are just similar things expressed with a slightly different twist. The idea is that when cost pressures push the corporations and investors look to capitalise every ounce of 'value', our very human qualities matter more than our ability to carry out instructions. In the battle for our career with robots, we can only survive by being more ourselves. However, these things are usual staple in Conference Circuits. Books have also started to appear on the subject - a few dystopian ones in a sea of very enthusiastic elegies to the brave new world - and the message is very similar. Howard Gardner may label something 'Creativity' which Daniel Pink calls 'Play'; Howard Rheingold may call something 'participation' which

Apprenticeships seem like one idea whose time never comes. Or, its time may have come and gone, long time ago. Its past makes it appear romantic, just like medieval castles and knights. Its reality, however, might have been very different: Apprenticeships might have been too long and too limiting. There was a reason why it was one of the practises that died off with time. But its passing is mourned, and its memory evokes a time when work meant a long commitment and lifelong engagement. It signifies a different reality from today's uprooted workers and dehumanised workplaces, something we feel nostalgic about. So it is evoked from time to time, as the policy-makers run out of ideas. As job crisis hits countries - an effect of the twin forces of globalisation and automation - college, the enabler of middle class dream, seems to fall short. College's own medieval mystic, that of a detached pursuit of humanistic knowledge, looks out of place - too long, too academic, too

Automation sounds like Science Fiction. There is an eerie feeling watching a Humanoid Robot on stage. It's indeed there, all over Facebook, but like the other strange things, it is easy to assume that this is distant, out of the ordinary and not going to come and live next door. The more it is hyped, the easier it becomes to dismiss. Until it arrives, not with a bang but in just everyday-way! That moment is now, almost. One may dispute how long it will take for technology to become smart enough to replace humans in one specific role or the other, but the indisputable fact is that it would happen. That moment is not lifetimes away: Within our lifetime, and definitely within that of our Children, it is going to get there. Humanities great hope of survival can not be that Moore's Law may not hold. And, besides, it is not just the technology but also the financial will behind automation that will power us into the 'second machine age'. The challenge we should focus on