If twentieth-century education was standardized in its forms and metrics to prepare us for the twentieth-century workplace, it is now time to rethink what the classroom should look like in order to prepare students for the 21st century world of connected, merged, distributed, always-on, DIY, collaborative labor.  “Workplace” might be an office—or my living room.   “Colleagues” might be down the hall or on the other side of the world.   The “workday” might be any time and, if my closest associate is in Bangalore, it might be twenty-four hours long, not eight.  What preparation does school give us for handling these new demands, including self-paced ones that require new forms of motivation and self-control?

These are questions I will be addressing this week at Aspen Institute on the Future of Higher Education.   I’ll report back next week on what we all come to think about there!  And let me know your thoughts too.