What does 2020 hold for blockchain-driven innovation?
OSU kicked-off 2020 with a brand new corporate look at www.os.university — simpler, clearer, more functional website to deliver our core message to the key stakeholder groups.
Beyond the showcase, though, let us look into the subject matter. Are we about to witness a breakthrough in “Blockchain for Education” - an adoption beyond the wave of early innovators, or the broader market is still not ready to embrace its digital transformation? Is the educational use-case as strong as other disruptive applications of distributed technologies across industries? What else is there for aspiring innovators to tackle in 2020?
Here are a few opinions we hand-picked on the subject while reviewing OSU recent mentions in the specialized media. What is common about them is the fact that OS.University is highlighted by all three EdTech experts, providing their opinions, independently from one another.
Any transactional business can benefit from blockchain technology, no matter what the transacted asset is: money, documents, signatures, or even education credentials — it is all a matter of sharing trust. To achieve the mass adoption of blockchain, we believe that blockchain companies should work towards the usability of their solutions in 2020. The same way web-based products are built without users using them being fully aware of the HTTP protocol, users of blockchain-enabled products should not feel the blockchain drag force when using blockchain-enabled apps. — Read the full story here
Momchil Jambazov — Creating Technologist, Head of Design @ OSU
Ways universities are using Blockchain to cut costs include TEx, the University of Texas programin the development stages of ChainScript, which creates a portfolio for each incoming student to store credits, competencies, micro-credentials, degrees, etc. Similarly, The Open Source University project aims to “provide educational and career history verified by blockchain technology in a transparent and traceable way.” On top of this, it offers a “tokenized” market between businesses, academia and learners and uses algorithms to exclude the middleman. Lastly, students would no longer need to pay for their own transcript as Blockchain eliminates this charge. All documents and spreadsheets used by the admissions department are no longer dependent upon manual processes. Blockchain securely stores all of these records. Most, if not all, of these items will require technological innovation. Universities should consider accommodating and streamlining these processes and procedures using blockchain. Such implementations would allow for linkages within and between institutional verticals to be easily recognized and quantified for continuous quality improvement. More advanced blockchain implementations could be used to automate the award, recognition and transfer of credits, and store and verify a complete record of formal and non-formal achievements throughout lifelong learning. — Read the full story here
Melissa Layne — Associate Vice President of Research and Innovation, American Public University System
Blockchain has the potential and is already making strides towards significantly transforming and improving our everyday life. In the supply chain sector there are organizations such as Walmart, Tsinghua University, IBM, Jingdong (JD), VeChain, and Discovery IoT making very big progress on improving food supply chain and logistics. In the long run, this will impact most of the food we consume and products we use. In the education sector, organizations such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) Media Labs and Open Source University (OS.University) are combating and eliminating fake degrees and transcripts through a single-source of truth system leveraging blockchain technology. — Read the full story here
Aly Madhavji — Founder of the Blockchain Funders Fund
One thing is certain as long as this year’s innovation agenda is concerned. From the team who wrote the book on ‘Blockchain in Education’, comes an innovative platform, which provides learners from all ages, educators and businesses with a digital credentials wallet for discovery, validation and verification of achievements! Stay tuned for OSU DApp, version 2.0!
We will be happy to hear your opinion! Tell us what you think in the comments’ section or drop us an email at hello@os.university.
