Judging
from my students’ comments about their online learning experience in the
pandemic, the majority cannot wait to be back on campus. Some have never even
seen the university and want to see it as soon as possible. While eager to engage
online in a multitude of ways, they crave physical interaction and university social
life generally. They are starry-eyed about the prospect of getting back to “normal”.
In the past fall semester, only a quarter of my students felt their online
learning was “real” as opposed to virtual – and in the spring semester, even
fewer did. Will these same students yearn for the flexibility of the online environment
once back in class, one wonders? Will some even demand online sections of their
own? It is hard to tell at the moment, but what is clear is that higher
education will not be the same after Covid-19.
A Vice
Dean at a Moroccan university, Dr Jamal Eddine Benhayoun, has rightly
noted, “There is no better time for rethinking the idea and future of higher
education than today, as the world seems to have realised that universities
matter the most not as buildings but as global networks for the production and
exchange of skills and ideas.” Going beyond that, he coined the term NGU – New
Global University – for a vision of the best institutions of higher education
merging online, regardless of place and culture, allowing open access to high
quality learning across the world.
AUB is
also changing. As with many other institutions of higher education, learning at
AUB will still generally center around face-to-face interaction in the short
term, but it will gradually allow for more online opportunities with time.
Perhaps people are realizing that, for example, learning to construct a
building may be more important than which building you happen to be in at the
time.
