SERMAN ON THE ADVANCEMENT OF ELECTRONIC EDUCATION

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A SERMON ON THE ADVANCEMENT OF ELECTRONIC EDUCATION

THRUST
VECTOR

EDUCATOR
RIGHTS

LIQUID
KNOWLEDGE

FOR THE
CREATIVE
MIND

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A SERMON ON THE ADVANCEMENT OF ELECTRONIC EDUCATION

March 1998

by
Harvey Harrison

People would say I have a religious zeal about the advancement of education, and that is the first reason I call this a "sermon". The second is that a sermon often reports a transforming vision. I have had such a vision, and I need to report it here.

But first, I must share the two histories leading to this vision: my history and the important history. My history is that I have been engaged professionally in the entertainment industry throughout my entire career, and I embrace the calling of the literary and software agent as my most important role. Thus, I have participated in and studied the history of the entertainment industry. It is that history which is the important one.

Throughout all human history until roughly a century ago, audio-visual entertainment was the live performer in front of a live audience; this was called "theater". Then, came the beginning of the entertainment industry as we know it today.

"In the beginning": love that phrase. In the beginning of the entertainment industry, electronic technology started to appear and spread: radio, phonograph, motion pictures, and, later, television. This technology collided with audio-visual entertainment. The effect of this collision was that audio-visual entertainment expanded by astronomical dimensions and reinvented itself aesthetically. This history is the background for my transforming vision.

My transforming vision is this: throughout human history until, well, about right NOW, audio-visual education has been a live performer in front of a live audience; this was called a "teacher" and a "class". I beg you, understand this vision: electronic technology, now including the digital device like the computer and its neural system, the internet, is colliding with audio-visual education. The effect of this collision is that audio-visual education will expand by astronomical dimensions and must reinvent itself aesthetically and on a business level as well!

This is no vision in a vacuum. Evidence abounds. The California Education Technology Initiative is designed to bring an initial investment of at least $300,000,000, that’s three hundred million dollars, by Microsoft, Fujitsu, GTE, and Hughes to the activation of the California State University system of over twenty campuses and three hundred thousand students into a unified, vertically integrated, state-of-the-art digital education entity. (For the CSU official administration website and related presentation see http://ceti.calstate.edu/ [the "CETI main site"]; for CSU Faculty Resolutions and Faculty and Other Criticisms see websites at http://www.csus.edu/acse/ceti00.htm; http://www.ecst.csuchico.edu/~droopy/ceti.html; http://www.netaction.org/monitor/mon20.html#fax.)

Consider California Governor Pete Wilson’s project, the "California Virtual University", consisting of selected offerings from public and private universities throughout the state publicized and presented over the internet. The Califonia Virtual University can be accessed at http://www.california.edu/.

California is by no means alone in its plunge into mass digital electronic education. A group of various western States in the United States have joined in a single such enterprise called "Western Governors University". (See http://www.westgov.org/smart/vu/vu.html.)

Fine: so much for that part of the vision. But, to paraphrase Paul Simon, and a song from his album Graceland:

"Breakthroughs come and breakthroughs go; What are you going to do about it? That’s what I’d like to know."

This question brings me to the rest of the vision. I call it a "transforming" vision, because I am transformed by it. Here is how. As a literary and software agent, I provide four main services to the artist: planning, research, selling, and negotiating. These services are all devoted to the principal goal: the advancement of the artist and his or her art by assuring that creative opportunities and financial reward are the result of effective artistic effort. (I have written widely about what the agent should, in my view, do. For present purposes, this will suffice.)

In briefest possible terms, then, what we call these digital days "my skill set", which has been refined on behalf of the artist, "ports" perfectly over to the needs of the educator as the electronic education explosion ignites. The entertainment industry artist is a communicator in an electronic mass medium. This too, in my vision, is the future of the educator: to be a communicator in an electronic mass medium.

Beware! The situation is perilous and urgent. It is perilous because educators I have encountered, for the most part, cling in fear to a world view of the live performer before a live audience. I detect from these educators a sense of confusion and even despair.

The situation is urgent because technology happens fast and large. The opportunity for the educator to prepare for mass electronic education now exists, but, if not firmly taken, may disappear.

Here is an example from entertainment industry history. Suppose you were the talented visual artist who designed the character or animated that character in a hugely successful animated theatrical motion picture musical. Customarily, you would have received your regular weekly salary and a handshake for a job well done. However, if you had composed the hit theme song that very same character sang in the movie, you would have received nearly endless royalties from your musical performing rights society. The point is simply this: in the entertainment industry, different artists enjoyed different rewards because, historically, custom and practice developed differently.

The educator stands at the beginning of mass electronic education today. Unless the opportunity to assure creative opportunity and financial reward is seized, it may well be lost forever.

I love the advancement of art, and I love the advancement of education. I commit to the advancement of the educator’s interest in mass electronic education in three ways. First, I have and will continue to volunteer to help faculty groups, associations and senates become sensitized to the vision I report here. I will try to help refresh the world view of educators who teach any student: from kindergarten to graduate and professional schools.

Second, I will try to act as a catalyst for the creation of wide-scale entities, analogous to the performing rights societies in music and organizations like the Writers Guild of America for movie and television writers, which afford industry support and protection for educators in electronic mass education.

Finally, I will proudly work as an agent on behalf of the distinguished, individual educator, and I am now well underway in that mission. In this third and most intensely personal role, I expect to encounter the skeptic. In the Superbowl of worthwhile communication, the team of skeptics is my opponent. The skeptic will whine, "But Harvey, how can you even suggest an educator needs an agent?"

I reply that the educator is most analogous to the actor/director or even actor/writer/director in motion pictures in terms of the absolute, complete and total responsibility the educator has over the work presented. Consider these examples from Academy Award-winning motion pictures: Mel Gibson for Braveheart; Clint Eastwood for Unforgiven; Kevin Costner for Dances With Wolves; and Woody Allen for Annie Hall. I say to the skeptic: the masterful educator is Gibson, Eastwood, Costner, Allen, and, until that educator is similarly recognized and rewarded that educator needs an agent more than anyone.

The skeptic whines, "But Harvey, teachers know little about electronic mass education, let alone the need for or value of an agent." I reply: this does not concern me at all. By 1982, I was representing interactive game designers, a group of artists that had never before been represented. In the early 1990’s, I was representing certain animation artists, a group that had largely been unrepresented. If anyone has experience in bringing representation to those who need it but have not had it, it is I.

The skeptic whines, "But Harvey, there’s no established model for making money as an agent in this field." I answer: that is entirely correct at the present. I know this, though: when you provide a service that people want and need, the economic rewards will follow.

Finally, for the skeptic, I declare it is not primarily about money. For the skeptic and everyone else, I offer this statement of the vision:

"When a picture Of the finest sixth grade math teacher In the United States Appears on a box of Wheaties, My job here will be done."

Enough of skeptics! Too much time with them is wasteful, and there is precious little time and none to waste. It is time for action: I invite you to experience the transformation of the vision and to act by activating the unique resources you bring as an individual.

I like a sermon that ends with an expression of hope, and I will attempt such an ending here. My hope is that those alive today and those who arrive hereafter will share a love of education and will work passionately for its advancement. We need all the help we can get.

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