2. Bryan Alexander – The Visible College: Four futures for Higher Education – Choose one of Alexander’s four views of higher education in 2022 (this part of begins at the 37th minute of the talk) and imagine how your life will be in such a society. Since you will most likely be finished with university by then, I’d like you to talk about imagined personal and professional life. You will have to build from Alexander’s model how society as a whole might be under the particular future scenario you choose.

Process: Alexander’s presentation is sort of interesting when he looks back the old days and predicts the future.

Story:

Future

Frankly, it is hard for me to picture myself in the future when I don’t even know what I’m going to be next semester. I do not want to expect anything good because they might disappoint me, but meanwhile, I need some short term goals to keep me living. Basically, I have no specific goals for my life. I just try my best to do something “right” in order to not be a loser. Therefore, I do not really care how the world will change. I do not like the current system anyway. In 2022, No matter how bad the society can change, I have faith that I will survive. First of all, I don’t think I’m that physically though, but I do can live well in a chaos. I am always calm and I see a “disaster” as an “opportunity”. The ways how I think might make me deviant, but it could be useful in some situations. Secondly, I do speak 3 languages and understand 4 which mean I can adopt a new culture faster in a “nonsense” world. Lastly, I am a theist who believes that he has a strong patron. That is why I think I will be more useful in a chaos/ lost age, but it doesn’t mean that I want to see the collapse of the current society. Most people have no confidences to Japan’s future. However, Japan still has the potential when the citizens are not spoiled in a wealthy environment. There are no riots after the economic bubble burst in Japan while there are riots in current Europe.

Does Higher Education Help in 2022?

A campus does provide an environment where you can find some people to discuss your thoughts and be evaluated. Yet, I personally do not think a higher education does really matter.  It is not worthy to pay the incredible expensive tuition to learn mostly unpractical things in the first 2 years. Students do not necessary need a college to learn while the books and internet are available. They can get licenses instead. Many pioneers have not graduated form a college such as Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and the famous Japanese architect, Anto. They do save more time and money because they did not let a university to limit their potentials. Unfortunately, the majority have to be in a debit for getting just the “paper”(degree), because most companies will not accept and hire a person without the status/ degree. In 2022, the society may realize that there are an overwhelming majority of “useless” college students. What does a “higher” degree mean? The person is smarter? More productive? Or have a better philosophy? No, it does not mean anything, but means this person is evaluated/ labeled in a “good” way by professors who have just been evaluated by other professors (No offense, my parents are professors as well). A higher education is basically discrimination when people think others who cannot go through a college are dumbass and lazy sods. Therefore, the expensive paper may be “expired” in the “lost decade”. The “lost decade” will evaluate people by their experiences and perspectives rather than the piece of paper which represents discrimination.

It is a new age that freaks most people out, but also a new opportunity for the rest.