The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a widespread shift to online education around the world and in Hungary, too. Educational institutions from kindergartens to universities were forced to adapt rapidly to this new situation, when the space of education moved from classrooms to online video meetings; the regular methods and tools needed to be changed or modified. Nonetheless, we should keep in mind that online education itself was an already existing concept before the pandemic as part of digitalization as a current societal megatrend, however it was not widely used in educational institutions across different programs. By 2021, there are university students who have mostly or exclusively participated in higher education online. Online classes could be a new normal situation to these students instead of the pre-pandemic personal activities in physical classrooms, leading to altering the norms of participation. In our research, we collected answers to open-ended sentences from such students. As we wish to understand how students perceive the differences between online and offline education, we investigated the perceived advantages and disadvantages of online-only education, how this influenced their social networks, study efficiency and their whole experience in university education.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to argue for the sustained need for the physical workplace and real-life encounters in higher education even in the digital age despite being seemingly transformable into the virtual sphere as seen during the COVID-19 situation. Design/methodology/approach This study is based on a collaborative autoethnography by a group of seven higher educators with an overall 2,134 student encounters during the study’s time span. The authors then connect these practitioner observations with relevant COVID-19-related studies thereby adding to research on higher education as a workplace. Findings The data suggest that the physical workplace strongly bolsters the personal experience and effectiveness of higher education through contributing to its dynamics. Spaces predetermine the scope and levels of human interaction of teaching and learning. In a physical setting, all senses serve as mediators, whereas, online, only two senses are involved: vision and hearing. The two-dimensional screen becomes a mediator of communications. In the physical space, actors are free to adjust the working space, whereas the online working space is limited and defined by platforms. Practical implications Although higher education institutions may indeed fully substitute most practices formerly in a physical setting with online solutions, real-time encounters in the physical working space belong to its deeper raisons d'être. Originality/value This paper highlights the necessity of the physical workplace in higher education and describes the depriving potential of the exclusively online higher education teaching setting.
Since the era of industrial capitalism when location started playing an important role in attracting industry and trade and boosting the economy, the role of knowledge and a high level of skills has grown in post-industrial regional economic theory. What makes the heated debate around creativity and the contribution of Richard Florida's work particularly valuable is that it fosters an interdisciplinary discussion about the role of creativity, culture, talent, and diversity in urban and regional development. Despite the vividness and edginess of these debates at times, it seems that the related criticisms, based on a body of evidence, did not originally penetrate policymaker discourse, and only one-and-ahalf decades later were embraced when problems stemming from socioeconomic crises and the flaws of creative policymaking reared their head more explicitly. Florida's revelations, which were elevated into the popular arena of city-level policies and governance, did not contain much that was new. This paper tracks how the concept of the "creative class" has been tested, argued about, rejected and applied since then on a wide set of practices and experiences in the urban and regional framework.
Shared machine shops are designed for providing space for education, learning practices, however it is also being questioned if they are accessible and for whom, depending on their location, communication practices and the entry-point in knowledge. Nonetheless the narrative of innovation and creativeness being attached to these spaces, the shades, openness or even absence of innovation is of a scholarly quest. Moreover, their function of enabling designers-entrepreneurs with infrastructure, collaborative practices and expertise is at the forefront. This paper looks at the composition of hybrid business models behind the activity of a set of shared machine shops: a fablab, a makerspace, a hackerspace, and printervendor company and how it may be linked to the education and innovation practices performed by the members and visitors. In search for if and how they represent dots of change on the landscape of design, this paper examines the facilities and opportunities for young designers, students, and makers to engage with digital technologies in Budapest, in a context where public schools and universities lack the access to fablabs and maker laboratories.
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