Change In Learning
 By Chancellor Bill Snyder
It's a cliché to say we live in an information society, but information technologies-computers, the Internet, telecommunications-in higher education will be central to students' becoming independent, life-long learners.
One of UTK's major challenges is to help our students become information literate. We must teach them to recognize, locate, evaluate, and use information. Libraries traditionally have been our information centers, but technology has broken those physical boundaries. The historic challenge we have faced in acquiring financial and physical resources for libraries is similar to the challenge we now face in deploying information technologies on campus. But there's one major difference.
Unlike the almost glacial pace of a library's development, information technology moves much faster. Already technology has radically changed information access and use. The computer has had as great an impact on access to information as did the invention of the printing press. The teacher's role as the gatekeeper of information is changing dramatically. Teachers, someone has said, will no longer be the "sage on the stage" but the "guide on the side," because students will depend less on teachers and access more information on their own. The greatest challenge the 21st century university faces in dealing with information technologies is cultural change. Coping with change is stressful, and rethinking the role of teacher is threatening to some. There is a great deal of denial in academia about the changes that will result from information technologies.
I agree with Chuck Nielsen, vice president of Texas Instruments, who suggested that our paradigm of change must shift from "Change is a threat to security" to "There can be no security without change." To that end, UT Knoxville is working to meet change head on and provide our students the training they need to succeed in our increasingly information-driven society.
Return to Spring 1997 table of contents.
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