Alongside a cultural shift toward openness and transparency, two emerging technologies – blockchain and smart contracts – have the potential to impact learning dramatically. Learning on the Block: Could Smart Transactional Models Help Power Personalized Learning? is a deep dive into the smart transactional modelsd river of change from our most recent comprehensive forecast, The Future of Learning: Education in the Era of Partners in Code.
To help education stakeholders consider this potential, this paper presents four scenarios exploring:
- Whether blockchain and smart contracts might provide the technical foundation for a new architecture for education
- How emerging social conditions and cultural mindsets might motivate the adoption of these technologies.
This paper includes:
- An overview of the basics of blockchain and smart contracts
- An explanation of the current cultural shift from hierarchical institutions to more distributed coordination
- Four imaginative scenarios illustrating how blockchain could impact the future of learning
- A reading guide to help individuals and organizations evaluate the potential of smart transactional models.
