Instead of spending so much money trying to make the new technology work within their existing business model, RCA and others would have been better off spending that money to reinvent their business.
Christensen drew a parallel with today’s schools: Public schools have spent an estimated $60 billion putting technology into classrooms, he said–but they’ve largely been doing the same thing RCA was doing: applying a new technology on top of an old business model. And that’s a key reason today’s schools have struggled to improve.
Whenever a disruptive innovation occurs, the substitution pattern in which the new model replaces the old one follows an S-curve pattern that can be calculated mathematically, Christensen said. At first, as the suppliers of a new innovation work out its flaws, adoption is fairly flat. But then, as the innovation improves to the point where it’s widely affordable, accessible, and delivers a satisfactory experience, adoption spikes exponentially.
This mathematical model has proven to be remarkably consistent throughout history, Christensen said. And if that historical pattern holds true, then the latest disruptive innovation that is sure to affect education–online learning–is set to take off dramatically.
Online enrollments have grown from an estimated 45,000 in 2000 to more than a million last year. By 2013, he said, 10 percent of all “seat time” will be occupied by online instruction–and within 10 years, he predicted, more than half of all seat time will be online enrollments.
“This is a very dramatic change that will happen in 10 years,” he said.
Until now, the providers of online instruction have catered primarily to areas of “non-consumption” in education, Christensen said, such as credit recovery, AP courses, and home-schooled or homebound students.
But that will change once online instruction reaches its tipping point–and if schools want to compete for these “customers” (their students), they should consider partnering with an online-learning provider or starting an online program of their own.
Another reason schools have struggled is the conflict between how they’ve traditionally had to teach and how students learn most effectively, Christensen said.
Until now, it has been very expensive to teach to students’ individual needs, he said–and yet, research shows that’s how students learn best.
One reason online learning is attractive is because it allows for more of this customized approach to instruction than can be found in many classrooms. But now, software that enables every child to learn at his or her own pace is becoming a scalable, modular way to deliver customized learning, Christensen said–and it’s another economically important solution for schools.
He concluded with a warning to the senior school district executives who’d come to hear him speak: “Charging education isn’t changing education.”
“My fear is that all this federal funding [from the stimulus package] will give us the complacency to continue as we’ve been doing things,” he said. “I hope we have the discipline to use this money to really address the reasons why kids aren’t learning.”
(Editor’s note: For more coverage of this year’s AASA conference in San Francisco Feb. 19-21, visit the AASA Conference Information Center page at eSN Online: http://www.eschoolnews.com/conference-info/aasa.)
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American Association of School Administrators
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