Arthur Levine

America’s schools and universities face pressures for education reform in the early 21st century. Today’s global information economy, and especially its technology, demands new kinds of education. These needs go far beyond employing different classroom devices and methods. They must shift to meet the needs of a generation of digital natives—a shift that will change the very nature of educational institutions.

As we confront these challenges, the Luddite rebellion that struck Britain in the early 19^th century can offer some important lessons. Contrary to their popular image, the Luddites were not unthinking rebels against technology. They were, in fact, artisans and craftsmen who correctly believed that industrialization would eliminate the need for their work and destroy the social and economic world in which they lived.

Their response was an attack on industrialization, particularly the looms and mills springing up across Britain that threatened their existence. Between 1811 and 1813, they attacked more than 1,100 factories and mechanized looms. They killed or wounded magistrates, mill owners and workers. The reaction of the British government was to make “breaking machinery” a capital offense; to deploy 14,000 troops to combat the Luddites; and to conduct public trials, mass executions and deportations.

While these tactics abated the rebellions, what brought them to a close was the rapid expansion of mills and looms. There were simply too many to destroy. Moreover, as the mills expanded, they created jobs rather than eliminating them. Ultimately these jobs paid well enough to raise the former artisans’ and craftsmen’s standard of living as industrialization reduced the cost of food and clothing.

The Luddite rebellion was not unique. It was a product of a period of profound economic, social and technological change. Such times are rare, but when they do occur, the response is similar:

• Many individuals—especially those heading institutions that are being fundamentally changed—feel that the familiar world is dying, being snatched away, and that a new world, threatening and undesirable, is replacing it.
• This fear spawns fundamentalist movements, framed in moral and religious terms, to reclaim the world and values being lost.
• These movements attempt to destroy or discredit the most visible initiators and manifestations of the changes.
• Government and those under attack retaliate, seeking to punish rebels and quash the revolt, with partial success.
• The rebellion ultimately peters out as change spreads swiftly and powerfully, thinning the ranks of rebels as they begin to recognize the hopelessness of their cause and conferring benefits on both the rebels and their supporters. This shift, in turn, robs the rebellion of its motivation.

In schools today, the clash between old and new is manifest in profound differences between the institutions and the students they enroll. Today’s students are digital natives. They grew up in a world of computers, Internet, cell phone, MP3 players, and social networking. From the cradle, they have learned and communicated in different ways. For example:

• Schools operate in fixed locales, on fixed calendars, with classes of a set length meeting at a specified time, while digital natives are highly mobile. They live in an anytime/anyplace world, operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, unbounded by physical location.
• Schools emphasize the education process, exposing students to a set curriculum for specific periods of time, while digital natives focus on outcomes, such as content mastery achieved in the manner of games.
• Schools are constructed largely around individual achievement, while digital natives collaborate, network, link, and share content—methods that have traditionally been described as plagiarism, except for the occasional group project assignment.

Today most schools are struggling to incorporate new technologies into old instructional models, putting teachers in the position of constantly changing their methods. In fact, it is time not just to introduce online resources for homework or bring simulations into the classroom, but to dramatically rethink the very nature of schools for digital natives.

Teachers know first-hand how different their students’ digital lives are from traditional models of learning and instruction. How can they drive change—not by resisting or breaking new technologies, like the Luddites, but by embracing them, as so many already do? This is one of several questions we will raise together at the 2012 Celebration.