Mark Montgomery, expert educational consultant, goes to Lynn University to discuss their decision to trade books for iPads. Students interested in getting into a tech-savvy college may want to consider Lynn.
TRANSCRIPT:
I’m on the campus of Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida, where they do things differently. This is a university, as the director of admissions told me, he said, “When other universities zig, we zag.” And one of the examples of that is what you see behind me, the library, and how they actually deliver reading materials to the students. This is an iPad university, this is an iTunes university. They have every single reading that the students require on the iPad, on a drive. So each class has its own file and all of the readings are on the iPad. So the student, in effect, carries their library in the palm of their hand.
A Library for Show
So when we went into the library, I got kind of a chuckle out of it because the tour guide was saying, “Well, here we have some books but they’re kind of just for show.” She said, “We have a renovation plan for the university, we’re going to renovate the library, and we’re going to get rid of the books. They’re really kind of a fire hazard anyway.” I’m laughing, having been a high school teacher and a college professor, I’m like, library? That’s the most important building on the campus!
But if you think about it, for the 21st century, it may not be. For a lot of students, the library may not be that important. If you can do all of your readings on the iPad, you can interact with the reading on the iPad, you can highlight on the iPad, you can print from the iPad if you need to, there is no reason to have a library full of hundreds of thousands of volumes.
Everything Technology
So Lynn University is embracing this future of the 21st century, and saying it’s all about technology, we’re teaching our students how to use this, we’re using it day to day in every single class that we offer here, we don’t need a library in the old-fashioned sense. Yes, many universities will need it, but we here at Lynn University, not so important. So zig versus zag. If you’re looking for the zag, think of Lynn.
