by Chris Mayer

Book Review of Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Historic period of Bogus Intelligence

by Joseph Eastward. Aoun; Cambridge: MIT Press, 2017

Book review past Chris Mayer

Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence, by Joseph Aoun.
Robot-Proof: Higher Didactics in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.

Advances in bogus intelligence, robotics, and big data volition radically modify the nature of work. Predictions on the impact of these advances range from the elimination of many types of jobs to the automation of a significant number of tasks. What is certain is that employees will need unlike types of skills to conform to these changes, and higher didactics must play a cardinal function in responding to this need.

It is with this time to come in mind that Joseph Aoun has written Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Historic period of Artificial Intelligence. Aoun, President of Northeastern University, proposes a new model of higher education that he believes volition enable college graduates to succeed in a workforce where "any anticipated work – including many jobs considered 'knowledge economy jobs' – are now within the purview of machines." 1 Considering of the importance of preparing students for success after graduation, Robot-Proof should be on the reading list of higher education leaders.

In the introduction, Aoun identifies two questions that provide a framework for the book:

1) How should we be preparing people for this fast-changing world?

2) How should instruction be used to assist people in the professional and economical spheres? 2

Aoun addresses these questions by providing context for and describing the challenges facing those entering and already in the workforce, identifying what skills employers desire, and proposing how colleges and universities can change to better prepare students for workforce success. A theme that runs throughout the volume is that while machines will soon perform most predictable piece of work, they will non be able to replicate the uniquely human skill of creativity. Therefore, higher education needs to prioritize the development of students into creators. 3

The task of chapter ane is to talk over the relationship people have with engineering and explicate why the 4th industrial revolution is different from other industrial revolutions. From the Luddite resistance to engineering science, to post-war America'due south concerns about the bear upon of technology on labor, Aoun demonstrates how technological advances oftentimes create fearfulness. 4 He also maps the trajectory of technological advancements with the history and shifting purpose of higher education in the U.s.a., showing that one of higher education'due south roles has get to help students larn the noesis and skills needed to secure and advance in meaningful careers. five Given this office and the alter beingness brought by technology, colleges and universities must adapt if they are to finer prepare their students for the future.

Aoun offers the employer perspective in affiliate 2. He begins by demonstrating how applied science has enabled the automation of tasks in occupations such as banking 6 and law 7 . Readers so run across examples of the types of skills employers are seeking in their employees, which include leadership, teamwork, the ability to write and solve problems 8 , innovation, curiosity, 9 and disquisitional and systems thinking. x These types of uniquely human skills are discussed throughout the book.

In chapter iii Aoun introduces humanics and its 3 literacies, a framework he thinks should inform developmental goals for students given employers' needs and technological advances. Humanics is defined every bit a "new model of learning that enables learners to understand the highly technical world around them and that simultaneously allows them to transcend information technology past nurturing the mental and intellectual qualities that are unique to humans." 11

Technological literacy is "cognition of mathematics, coding and basic engineering principles." 12 Data literacy prepares students to "understand and utilize Large Data through analysis." 13 Finally, man literacy, the one that Aoun thinks is the most important, prepares students "to communicate, engage with others, and tap into our human being capacity for grace and beauty." fourteen

Aoun focuses on education in chapter iv. Experiential learning, not lectures, is the best method of enabling student achievement of the goals presented in chapter three, which concurs with research on how people acquire. Aoun thinks an essential attribute of experiential learning is that it "integrates classroom and real-world experiences" through activities such as "internships, co-ops, piece of work-study hubs, global experiences, and original enquiry opportunities," fifteen which are all activities that the Association for American Colleges and Universities consider high-impact practices because of their pregnant impact on student learning. sixteen

Aoun mentions various studies that demonstrate why experiential learning is effective and proposes that an important benefit of this type of learning is far transfer, which is the power to use skills and cognition learned in i context to a unlike context. 17 Aoun proposes that "far transfer is our [human]competitive advantage over machines" and allows u.s. to exercise creative thinking, entrepreneurialism, and cultural agility. 18

The last chapter of the book makes the case that students need to go lifelong learners, and that colleges and universities will need to adjust to accommodate older students and work with employers and the learners themselves to blueprint curricula. Included throughout the chapter are examples of lifelong learning opportunities, such every bit a programme to assistance liberal arts graduates go calculator scientists, xix kick camps that are separate from and office of traditional institutions, 20 and learning opportunities for alumni. 21

Aoun ends the book by urging college pedagogy and employers to work together past collaborating on program development to ensure that programs are effectively preparing students for the workforce. Aoun also returns to the idea of preparing students to be creators as he predicts that "the roles human beings fill up will be largely concerned with inventiveness." 22

Robot-Proof is an of import book for higher education leaders as it can help them learn and think about the fast pace of change in the workplace and what this ways for how they develop students. It can help academic institutions think nigh the public's concern that institutions and their leaders are disconnected from work, and that this leads to graduates who are unprepared for the workforce. Robot-Proof would be peculiarly useful for a campus leader reading group or for those well-nigh to embark on curricular alter.

This commodity is from our May 1, 2019 outcome. Read the total newsletter here!

Virtually the author:

Chris Mayer is Acquaintance Dean for Strategy and Initiatives and an Acquaintance Professor at the Us Military Academy (West Point). He teaches courses in the areas of moral philosophy, the ethics of war, political philosophy, and the philosophy of religion, and his enquiry focuses on ethical theory, the ethics of war, and college didactics. He serves as an evaluator and workshop leader for the Heart States Commission on College Education and was a Teagle Assessment Scholar with the Center of Inquiry at Wabash College from 2011-2018. He has a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Virginia, an 1000.A. in philosophy from Virginia Tech, and a B.S from the United States War machine Academy.

  1. Joseph East. Aoun, Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
  2. Aoun, Robot Proof, xv.
  3. Aoun, Robot Proof, 16.
  4. Aoun, Robot Proof, v, 6.
  5. Aoun, Robot Proof, eleven.
  6. Aoun, Robot Proof, 29.
  7. Aoun, Robot Proof, 31.
  8. Aoun, Robot Proof, 27.
  9. Aoun, Robot Proof, 38.
  10. Aoun, Robot Proof, 42.
  11. Aoun, Robot Proof, 53.
  12. Aoun, Robot Proof, 55.
  13. Aoun, Robot Proof, 57.
  14. Aoun, Robot Proof, 59.
  15. Aoun, Robot Proof, 81.
  16. "High-Impact Practices," Association of American Colleges and Universities, https://world wide web.aacu.org/resources/high-impact-practices (as of Apr 12, 2019).
  17. Aoun, Robot Proof, 85.
  18. Aoun, Robot Proof, 87.
  19. Aoun, Robot Proof, 123.
  20. Aoun, Robot Proof, 129.
  21. Aoun, Robot Proof, 133.
  22. Aoun, Robot Proof, 148.