A Corporate Education Mirror

It’s Wednesday morning in a hotel lobby on the campus of Duke University. With no working Internet in my room, I dressed, packed, and escaped to the lobby where they have very fine wireless service. I wish there had been a descent alternative for the lack of hot water in my room. 🙁

I am in the middle of a two-day roundtable with the Duke Corporate Education group, a firm that provides corporate education world wide. By all evidence they do this very well. They have invited education specialists, especially related to technology, from across North America and Europe (well, one Canadian and one Brit) from the corporate, university, and k-12 realms. Our goal is to explore ways that technology might be more interestingly and effectively implemented in corporate learning environments.

This meeting has been enlightening to me, especially as I have learned that corporate education faces many of the same problems that face public school. For instance, I hear terms like regulation and compliance very often, and that was a surprise.

Another item that has impressed itself on me is that everything in the corporate world is project-based. Now much of the actual education is directed toward content and skills. However, each time that the company is brought in to provide their service, it is to solve a problem or accomplish a specific goal.

More later!