Keynote Abstracts Keynote Talk #1 Preparing the University for Rapid Digital Evolution

Abstract

New disruptions – technological, business and social – are being facilitated by the evolution of digital technologies. There are, of course, many valuable pilot efforts across the world that integrate a deep understanding of new research on digital technologies with student learning. Yet the classical classroom that does not fully include digital learning dominates globally. There are many curricula that allow postsecondary students to learn about digital opportunities, but these are not ubiquitous and neither are they based on current advances. As educators, we want students to learn and become more self-aware about how their academic disciplines intersect with the enlarging digital world and new research. How do we do so? First, we must convey that digital transformation and innovation are not synonymous. While digital transformations are typically realized over longer periods, digital innovations on the other hand are generated by the more immediate ignition of creativity and relatively shorter term design thinking. Digital creativity is enabled both within the classroom and outside it, in the latter case sometimes even without a formal curriculum. It thus follows that, in addition to discipline-specific fundamentals, students and researchers should learn to embrace digital evolution regardless of their area of academic discipline to enable longer term digital transformation. In this presentation, we will discuss some examples of how the awareness and understanding of digital evolution has been integrated into student learning and research in various engineering disciplines. This includes, for instance, teaching and learning related to new research in autonomous systems, data analytics, IoT implementations, e.g., for advanced manufacturing, and the evolution of graphical user interfaces and apps. Finally, we present some strategies to encourage the more ubiquitous implementation of these integrations.