The Spectrum of Future Education by Edgar Nicolas

The Spectrum of Future Education by Edgar Nicolas - May 2020 Scholarship Essay

In Back to the Future Part II, there would be hoverboards and fully electric cars in the year 2015, though we may have those now, our hoverboards and electric cars are far from flying. Science fiction books and movies have always filled my imagination about what the human future would look like, however, the reality never matched the expectations. Nonetheless, in 1936 the first functional computer was invented and today it seems like every college or university has an abundance of desktop computers for students to use. So it is difficult to picture what education would look like 50 years.

On one end of the spectrum, I envision physical campuses and classrooms becoming a thing of the past where students would all be learning at home. Each and every student would have their own personal virtual reality headset to plug into a computer and “attend” their digital classes. Especially with this post-COVID-19 world, social distancing and online learning appear to be a tangible route.

On the other end, I contemplate that education could represent a class divide and the price of learning is too expensive for some. Where a consumer hungry middle class has all the future technology for learning, while a broadening low-income group would be struggling to afford school in general. Tuition and costs would essentially be a luxury, similar to today.

While I am far from an oracle or a foreseer, I can only hope that education in 50 years will be cost-free for everyone. So that all people, no matter their background, would have access to the ever-changing standards of learning. Where everyone has the opportunity to grow with and contribute to human progress. Maybe with this dream of what education would be, our reality would actually have flying hoverboards and electric cars.