Abstract:

A fundamental problem for educational institutions, in general, and universities specifically is student motivation. University students globally do have choices in terms of the courses they take but little say in their role as actors within the classroom. For the most the student role is to take in knowledge and information chosen by the teacher/professor. There can be legitimate reasons for this “banking process” of depositing knowledge in the heads of students but it always comes at a great cost. Most fundamentally, the cost is that the education itself, the knowledge taken in is imposed on students and therefore provides little intrinsic student motivation. With this diminished intrinsic motivation, the real motivator for most students is the grade they get at the end of the semester. Ask most students how their semester went and without hesitation they mention their grades. If this lack of intrinsic motivation is to be challenged students must be given an opportunity to play a significant role in creating their learning experiences. This means not only actively participating in the construction of these experiences but also having some say in where and when the education takes place. The where and when are very important because any standardization of time and place makes the false assumption that students can learn at any time and in any space regardless of their developing identities and cultural histories. This false assumption about standardization therefore works against student success and motivation because again education is imposed on students. It also means that shallow learning, learning that focuses on a guess about what is needed to do well in the test, is rep-laced by deep learning that is motivated by a need about the way students want to live and work as well as the relationships they want to develop and the society they want to live in. This paper investigates one way to do so by considering the possibilities of a Global University Student Network (GUSN). The GUSN is a virtual network that utilizes a platform wired to provide university students at all levels and their ally’s with opportunities to make connections based on an advanced search function, form groups, including study, project and tutoring groups, and have the collaborative work created and produced by the groups saved and stored and noted on their evolving profile. Further, because students would be choosing other students based on need, interest and ambition from across the globe differences could be used to further and deepen the learning process as differing cultural perspectives would likely be applied to a common focus. Finally, this network also challenges the notion that sharing knowledge between U. students is cheating and rather sees this sharing process as an essential part of collaboration and deep learning. It should also be noted that because all communication and documents /videos could be instantly translated, across language groups connections and across language groups not only become possible but are encouraged on this platform. Language and other differences that are encouraged within this virtual platform space are referred to as spaces of difference. Spaces of difference are the spaces that allow for student to student connections that stick and can then reattach such that there is continuous fluidity between the cultural differences of U. students (this is in direct contrast to the university classroom that has little or no fluidity and separates students by institution major and course). Importantly, this network also challenges the stop and go nature of a university classroom that every semester the learning starts over as if nothing happened before and what students actually mastered. The GUSN is a network that doesn’t erase past learning and by doing so provides an opportunity for all students to build on the past in creating a new reshaped future driven by the intrinsic motivation of their differing cultural experiences and identities.

Keywords:

Spaces of difference, technology, school change.