How do you feel about his perspective on education and why “A Domain of Your Own? This is a question professor Michael want us to respond to the article “A personal Cyberingrastructure,” and the video “No Digital Facelifts: Thinking the Unthinkable About Open Educational Experiences,” by Gardner Campbell who is the director of the Academy for Teaching and Learning and an Associate Professor of Literature and Media at Baylor University.

In his article, he arises the question “So, how might colleges and universities shape curricula to support and inspire the imaginations that students need?” Well, the answer  is to  build a personal cyberinfrastructure and to  and extend it throughout our college career, Gardner says. However, my question is: Who is going to lead this project? According to his article, Gardner says: “Those of us who work with students must guide them to build their own personal cyberinfrastructures, to embark on their own web odysseys. And yes, we must be ready to receive their guidance as well.”

However, how a student can build their own cyber school space when teachers believe that students must be always present in class, and give a high percentage to attendance? They are marking us up for any minute late or early. I do no think this is the way a professor is building a students self responsibility, and guidance to his/her knowledge. Instead, they are taking parents’ role. In his video, Gardner explain that the best thing of the creation of a student’s digital space is the fascination of her/his own creation, expression, digitalization of their own dreams, ideas, etc., which I totally agree.

Therefore, what is the purpose of having a teacher? The purpose of a professor is to convey knowledge, to assist in the creation of knowledge, and to evaluate the student’s knowledge with respect to established academic standards. However, to convey knowledge does not imply attendance, because the student can follow the professor’s sources and study from them.  The professor may not be the source of knowledge, but rather a map that indicates where knowledge can be located. Thanks to current technology, attendance is not required for receiving input from the professor, or for evaluations.  Therefore, attendance  is not needed for fulfilling any of the professor’s purposes.  Of course, a lot is missed by not going to a class. However, a lot is missed by not reading a good book, and there are millions of good books we cannot read as well.  We should not be punished for missing a professor’s knowledge. Indeed, to become the only acceptable source of knowledge cannot be the role of a teacher.

Thus, the cyberinfrastructure and a domain of our own is something must be reinforced in schools in our actual world. Where distances are short, where technology grows so fast, where we live in big cities full of immigrants  who has not a home but a place to shape their minds, and share their digital life with the world.