Why isn't my course on the cloud?

OK, I know, you think I am jumping on the 'cloud media bandwagon' after Apple announced the iCloud yesterday, and all associated press coverage that generated - e.g. Apple iCloud: what the analysts say, How safe is life online?, A cloud gathers over our digital freedoms etc.

However, a lot companies have been using the 'cloud' for years, e.g. see Digital memories: There's a big cloud hanging over your hard drive, and I even touched on the subject of cloud computing back in January (see Do you speak my language: C is for Cloud Computing, Computer, C, client, cron job, compile, compress, cookie, code, command line interface), and in fact a number of the handy hints I gave in last weeks post - Why don't people get computers? Get your computer to work for you! - i.e. Dropbox and Evernote, are in fact cloud-based solutions.

Now, the thing is, in education we need to 'Look up, it's the future: Learning to love 'the cloud'' - like it or not, the cloud is coming our way. Even publishers may have to get 'on-board' with the idea (see Why publishers need to stick their heads in the clouds) and what is most telling is a recent survey (1st June 2011), with a sample size of 1,200 'T decision makers' spread in groups of 150 across small business, medium business, large business, federal government, state/local government, healthcare, higher education, and K-12 public school districts (see Cloud Computing Survey Shows Snapshot of Issues IT Leaders Face) showed that only 38% respondents had a cloud computing strategy, with 84% of education establishments using at least one form of cloud computing product (e.g. Gmail, Google Docs, Microsoft LiveMeeting or WebEx). Interestingly only 53% of respondents said they had a concern over cloud computing security (that number may go up if they read How safe is life online?).

In just over a week Google will release their Chromebook laptop. In July Apple will be releasing Mac OS X 10.7 'Lion' for the Mac, and a new version of iOS for the iPhone, the iPod Touch and the iPad in the Autumn. All these devises will then have one thing in common. They will all have been designed to use the cloud to share and synchronise data, and in the case of the Chromebook it will be a truly cloud based experience.

This all means that students will be have been exposed to 'cloud computing' long before they come to school/college/university, and they will be used to having their data synchronised, and easily available on a wide range of devices, hence, they will ask, and quite rightly - "Why isn't my course on the cloud?".

So, education needs to adapt. We need to start planning now.... We don't want to repeat the mistakes of the 1990s when computers started becoming ubiquitous in teaching and we thought eLearning just meant shoving a few class notes in a pdf online. We need start thinking and planning, and coming up with new and interesting ways to engage the students. I hate to say it, we need a paradigm shift!

If you have any thoughts on the use of cloud computing in education, then why not share them below?

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