Technological innovations in education have been proven to be widely successful over the past decade, illustrated by the many platforms that match educators with students such as Coursera, Skillshare and the explosion of language teaching platforms. Blockchain technology is a novel general-purpose technology that has presented the potential for revolution in the way data can be maintained and transferred.
Over the past years, its potential has been experimentally applied in a myriad of industries and sectors, and education is among the areas for which the tech can provide real upgrades.
In the evolution of the blockchain space, education has thus far been largely overlooked. Which is why researchers Iuliana Chiuchisan, Cornel Turcu, and Cristina Turcu dove into the existing body of literature to assess current practices, opportunities and challenges of bringing blockchain solutions to the educational field, the findings of which have been presented in their paper “Blockchain and its Potential in Education”. The authors of the paper were concerned with two primary questions:
- What are the most promising blockchain solutions currently being developed for education?
- And what are the reported outcomes?
Advantages of Blockchain in Education
Generally, academic records of students and graduates such as diplomas, degrees and additional data are stored on the central database of the issuing educational institution. Because of this setup, students and graduates do not have access to their own documents. In the case of external parties such as employers, governments and other institutions requiring the validation of academic records, the process for this can be difficult and time-consuming. In a world where both students and the workforce are more mobile, this is costly. While it’s becoming more important to validate such records, various studies have provided evidence that a significant portion of resumes contains false information relating to individual’s academic track record, most notably highlighted by the Risk Advisory Group.
Blockchain technology enables record keeping and sharing of information among unrelated parties. Each party holds its own copy of the information which can be continuously updated. The technology provides a trusted, immutable, auditable and self-regulating system for record-keeping (Atzori, 2017) with an encrypted database that doesn’t require a controlling authority (Wright and De Filippi, 2015).
Hence, blockchain solutions can provide a trusted system for the storage and validation of academic credentials, accessible to anyone without the risk of the information being tampered with (Baba et al., 2018). Moreover, centralized information systems, which educational institutions currently use, are susceptible to data breaches, a problem that blockchain technology can solve (Efanov & Roschin, 2018).
Besides the increased data security blockchain enables, it also holds the capability to share data among unrelated parties, such that different educational providers and entities requiring validation of academic credentials, can utilize trusted authentication processes. Only universities have the authority to create and update data on the distributed ledger, meaning that no alterations can be made except by the issuing party. Once the data is submitted to the blockchain, interested third parties could easily assess this information.
Several more opportunities for blockchain technology in education have been suggested. The European Science and Knowledge Commission published a report on Blockchain and Education in which they note blockchain’s potential in certificate issuance, accreditation verification, lifelong learning passports, intellectual property and data management.
Other researchers, such as McArthur, (2018), consider blockchain’s potential to reorganize the higher education system and Tapscott and Tapscott, (2017) highlight the tech’s potential to revolutionize higher learning by establishing a trusted global network. For example, by employing blockchain-based systems in education, a peer-to-peer, global learning network through disintermediation could be established. This could entail a trusted system for educational information transparent for all participants.
Finally, the advantages of blockchain technology relating to automated and highly secure software processes have the potential to reduce administrative costs and bureaucracy for educational institutions McArthur, (2018).
Early Efforts
Several organizations have begun experimenting with blockchain solutions for the education system. For example, MIT, University of Texas Austin and the University of Nicosia started issuing diplomas on decentralized ledgers, and Sony has created a platform for a next-generation credential solution called Sony Global Education. Moreover, the Open University Knowledge Media Institute, in cooperation with British Telecommunications, is pioneering academic applications of blockchain technology with its Ethereum-based platform called OpenBlockChain (Lemoie, 2017). OpenBlockChain is experimenting with so-called open badges — digital certificates with embedded metadata about academic achievements.
Risks and Challenges
The authors of the paper also present challenges for blockchain solutions in education, which mostly relate to technology in general. A key challenge relates to Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance — GDPR was established as a response to a multitude of large scale data abuse cases and is comprised of robust legislation with regards to data privacy and autonomy (the “right to be forgotten” protection). Blockchain solutions must be GDPR compliant, and as Smolenski, (2017) indicates, “the blockchain represents the opportunity to not only fulfil but go beyond the promise of the European General Data Protection Regulation”. As Smolenski puts it, “the blockchain removes the need to trust a centralized authority in order to keep an accurate record of activity” and “it makes surveillance of activity extremely difficult”. However, the authors of the paper highlight compliance with GDPR and other regulations as a limitation of blockchain’s use, signalling the importance of accordance with legislation concerning data.
There are other legal challenges blockchain solutions must overcome, and these relate to the ownership of data and the assessment of the authenticity of data sources. This is despite the data being secure once it’s on the blockchain, it must be trusted that the party submitting the information to the blockchain is authorized to do so. Additionally, the authors put forward several other limitations, related to blockchain in general, which are the technology’s current transaction latency, limited storage capacity and 51% attacks.
Concluding Remarks
Based on the paper by Chiuchisan, Turcu & Turcu (2019), blockchain technology’s greatest potential in the educational field currently relates to solutions enabling sharing of student and graduate data with various relevant parties in a trusted manner. Such open data networks could provide a dramatic increase in processes that require the verification of academic credentials on a global level.
Moreover, the authors also signal the potential for higher level solutions that could establish a large scale, trusted learning networks that could change the face of education. However, before such solutions can be implemented, challenges related to legal compliance and the reliability of the blockchain system, the information on these systems and entities issuing the data to future education networks have to be overcome.
Even though the potential of blockchain technology in education is there and early platforms and applications are being implemented, further exploration and experimentation on both a practical and scholarly level is required.
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