Innovation in Education

Three things need to be flagged in the discourse on innovation in education from the standpoint of both theory and practice. Firstly, post-disciplinary education ought to be mainstreamed for nurturing innovation in the minds of the people. Disciplinary training tends to create silos and make people attain a tunnel vision of life. Secondly, there is a need to create a ‘de-class space’ and replace the traditional ‘classroom’ for education. Throughout history and in almost all societies, the empowered class has had the privilege of getting an education and benefitting from it. ‘Class-room’ cannot shy away from the fact that the empowered class still has greater access and dominates the ‘room,’ despite the reform towards equity and ‘education for all.’ But there is now a greater possibility of attaining a ‘de-class’ education in the ‘room’ and the ‘cyber-space’ with access to the new technology. Finally, innovation in education cannot escape the ‘butterfly effect!’ No one can contain innovation within a particular country or region. This is more the case with education. But then, like the ‘butterfly effect,’ it can end up creating changes somewhere else, and not always for the good of society. At times, the ripples or intrusion can create disruptions, even chaos, in places that have unwittingly embraced the changes or had the misfortune of getting infected unwillingly for reasons of physical or intellectual domination. Now with de-colonization and rapid globalization of economies and new technologies, there is a golden opportunity for the ‘butterfly effect’ to be non-linear even in education, creating win-win ripples in all directions―from south to north, north to south, east to west, west to east. But then, it will not happen on its own. Humans would require, above all, innovation in education to nurture non-linear goals, indeed, to make a difference for the good of society.