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Postsecondary Success as a Connectome: Equitable AI and the Science of Fly Brain Mapping
Can we identify the resources, structures and pathways in the postsecondary experience that most impact postsecondary success, then catalyze equitable postsecondary success by thoughtfully and strategically employing AI’s efficiencies and capabilities to promote equity and excellence within these structures, features and pathways?
This is the grand challenge for postsecondary ecosystems—the value of which has been increasingly questioned—and the tremendous opportunity.
The California Community Colleges is one postsecondary system responding with speed and purpose, as outlined in its Vision 2030 strategic framework and as reflected in its recent announcement of establishment of the Digital Center for Innovation, Transformation and Equity. Other colleges and universities across the country will join in this effort because the imperative to transform the postsecondary experience to promote equitable AI-supported institutional and learner success along the entire pathway from admission to workforce employment is clear. But first we need a way to envision postsecondary success.
“The completeness of the FlyWire brain connectome enables tracing complete pathways from sensory inputs to motor outputs” (p. 134).
This is from an October 2, 2024, article in Nature titled “Neuronal wiring diagram of an adult brain” (an online formatted version of the article is here), one of many articles published from the work of the FlyWire Consortium. The adult brain in question belongs to the fruit fly.
What does the fruit fly brain’s wiring have to do with postsecondary success? Stay with us.
The Fly Brain Connectome
A collaborative and international team of hundreds of scientists succeeded for the first time in mapping the entire wiring structure of the fruit fly’s brain (Drosophila melanogaster), which is smaller than a poppy seed. This map (see image below) consists of approximately 140,000 neurons and 55 million synapses, allowing researchers to identify the inputs and outputs of what the study calls the fruit fly’s connectome or “a neuronal wiring diagram of an entire nervous system” (p. 135). The connectome gives scientists unprecedented access to brain mechanisms and pathways that enable flies to “engage in dynamic social interactions, navigate over distances and form long-term memories” (p. 124). Put differently, the connectome reveals to us visually how flies behave and succeed.
From Fly Brain Connectome to Postsecondary Success Connectome
What if we extend this connectome concept to the postsecondary experience—an admittedly radical exercise in what the authors of the Nature article refer to as comparative connectomics—by asking a fundamentally important question: Can we identify the resources, structures and pathways in the postsecondary experience that most impact postsecondary success, then catalyze equitable postsecondary success by thoughtfully and strategically employing AI’s efficiencies and capabilities to promote equity and excellence within these structures, features and pathways?
Here we define postsecondary success as resources, structures, decision making and activities that promote both postsecondary organizational and learner flourishing from admission to workforce engagement. Flourishing here refers to the degree to which postsecondary institutions meet or surpass their requirements and goals for stakeholder satisfaction (financial stability, solid accreditation performance, teaching excellence, learner graduation and workforce entrance metrics, etc.) and the degree to which postsecondary learners perceive that they have met or surpassed their individual requirements and goals for engaging in the postsecondary experience (personal growth, skills development, employment readiness, etc.).
Visual Maps Guide Human Understanding, Strategies and Decision Making
Many of us have come to rely on mobile phone map applications to move around unfamiliar cities in motor vehicles or on foot. Visual maps have for almost 3000 years aided us to imagine our place in the world, to create strategies for success and to make both short- and long-term decisions. A July 2017 Smithsonian magazine story describes how “one of the oldest surviving maps is, ironically, about the size and shape of an early iPhone: the Babylonian Map of the World. A clay tablet created around 700 to 500 B.C. in Mesopotamia, it depicts a circular Babylon at the center, bisected by the Euphrates River and surrounded by the ocean. It doesn’t have much detail—a few regions are named, including Assyria—but it wasn’t really for navigation. It was more primordial: to help the map-holder grasp the idea of the whole world, with himself at the center.”
Today there are visual maps of many human activities, including a map the National Civic League created “to reveal the full picture of Democracy Work in America.” More to the point of the project outlined in this essay, a January 2021 issue brief by the American Council on Education proposes that “mapping the postsecondary ecosystem is critical to optimizing for positive learning, economic, and social outcomes” (p. 2).
For this purpose, let’s posit a simple map model grounded in four assumptions about postsecondary success in which the postsecondary ecosystem is the universe of resources available to the postsecondary experience and the postsecondary connectome is the mappable network of evidence-based postsecondary ecosystem components that most impact postsecondary success.
Four Assumptions About Postsecondary Success
We propose the following four assumptions about postsecondary success:
1. Postsecondary institutions and learners exist within unique and complex ecosystems of constraints and resources that impact postsecondary success outcomes.
2. Each learner brings to the postsecondary learning journey a unique constellation of experiences, expectations, competencies, challenges and resources that are impacted by postsecondary institution resources and practices, with learners and institutions understanding, measuring and experiencing postsecondary success metrics and outcomes in various ways.
3. The complexity of the postsecondary experience and postsecondary success ecosystem can be mapped by identifying key evidence-based ecosystem components common to the experience of most learners and institutions.
4. The resulting postsecondary success connectome can assist postsecondary ecosystem stakeholders to better identify and understand their unique postsecondary ecosystems and to formulate evidence-based collaborative strategies and make decisions that drive long-term postsecondary ecosystem health and postsecondary success.
If we accept these four assumptions and examine a typical postsecondary ecosystem with the goal of identifying and mapping the resources and conditions learners need from postsecondary institutions and other stakeholders to maximize long-term postsecondary success, what would we find?
The Postsecondary Success Connectome
The postsecondary success connectome is a comprehensive framework that visualizes the complex network of resources, structures and pathways that contribute to postsecondary success extending to the workforce, drawing inspiration from neuroscience’s concept of a brain connectome. This model emphasizes that key postsecondary success components are deeply interconnected, with learner and institutional success dependent on how well these elements work together.
The postsecondary success connectome model offers a valuable tool for various stakeholders in the postsecondary ecosystem including educators, policymakers, employers and learners. It can guide strategic planning, inform decision making and highlight areas for improvement or innovation. We hope this postsecondary success connectome model stimulates collaborative thinking and action to create a more effective, equitable and responsive system that supports learners throughout their learning journeys and into their careers.
The Learn & Work Ecosystem Library offers a rich, evidence-based map of twelve postsecondary success components with focus on the path from learning to earning that we can use for our postsecondary success connectome model.
This map invites consideration by different postsecondary ecosystem stakeholders regarding how postsecondary ecosystems can activate some of or all twelve components of the model in a unified and effective way to promote postsecondary success. As the Learn & Work Ecosystem site argues, “For the ecosystem to function effectively, all parts of the system must be connected and coordinated.”
Equitable and Collaborative AI for the Postsecondary Success Connectome
We propose that an integrated suite of AI tools that is collaborative, provides equitable access, promotes agency and recognizes explicitly that the critical importance of keeping humans in the loop could—if designed and deployed thoughtfully and strategically—serve to drive postsecondary success through support of these twelve ecosystem components. We asked Anthropic’s Claude 3.5 Sonnet to assist us to imagine how this integrated suite of AI tools might support postsecondary success with direct reference to the twelve components of the Learn and Work Ecosystem. Below is the generated text.
AI-Generated Proposal
We propose an innovative approach to support and enhance the twelve ecosystem components of the postsecondary success connectome described above through the strategic implementation of generative AI (GenAI) tools. This integrated suite of AI-powered solutions has the potential to revolutionize the postsecondary experience and drive success for both institutions and learners.
We envision a comprehensive platform with the following four key characteristics:
1. Collaborative: The system fosters cooperation among various stakeholders including students, educators, administrators, employers and policymakers. It provides shared workspaces, real-time communication tools and collaborative problem-solving environments.
2. Equitable access: Designed with inclusivity in mind, the platform ensures all users, regardless of their background or circumstances, have equal opportunities to benefit from its support features. This includes considerations for accessibility, language support and adaptability to different learning styles.
3. Agency promotion: The tools empower users to take control of their unique educational journey and career development. They offer personalized learning, customizable AI assistants and on-demand self-assessments that encourage self-directed learning and decision making.
4. Human-centric approach: While leveraging advanced AI capabilities, the system explicitly recognizes the irreplaceable value of human insight, creativity and emotional intelligence. It is designed to augment human capabilities rather than replace them, with clear mechanisms for human oversight and intervention.
This integrated GenAI tool suite would support the twelve ecosystem components of the postsecondary success connectome in the following ways:
1. Alliances & intermediaries: AI-powered networking and collaboration tools to facilitate partnerships and resource sharing.
2. Career navigation: personalized career exploration and planning tools using AI to match interests, skills and market demands.
3. Communications & technology: advanced natural language processing for clear, accessible information dissemination and multilingual support.
4. Credentials & providers: AI-driven credential evaluation and recommendation systems to help users navigate the complex landscape of educational offerings.
5. Data ecosystem: robust data analytics and visualization tools to make complex information accessible and actionable for all stakeholders.
6. Employers & workforce: AI-powered job matching and skills gap analysis to align education with workforce needs.
7. International developments: automated tracking and analysis of global education trends and best practices.
8. Policy: AI-assisted policy impact simulations and stakeholder feedback aggregation tools.
9. Quality & value: AI-powered algorithms to continuously assess and improve the quality and relevance of educational offerings.
10. Research: AI-enhanced research tools for data collection, analysis and hypothesis generation.
11. Transparency: AI-powered information portal for public access to educational data.
12. Verifications & recordkeeping: secure, AI-managed digital portfolios for learners to showcase their skills and achievements.
This integrated platform would serve as a central hub connecting all aspects of the postsecondary ecosystem. It would offer a customized and user-friendly interface, allowing each stakeholder to interact with the tools most relevant to their needs. The system would constantly be updated with the latest AI tools to enable creativity and support decision-making processes. For example, AI agents could use data to create knowledge, then guide users to actions aligned with their needs.
Importantly, this suite of tools would be designed with ethical considerations at its core, supporting data privacy and equitable access while minimizing environmental impacts as a result of AI use.
Call for Collaboration
The postsecondary success connectome introduced in this paper is intended not as a prescription but rather as a call for collaboration. The authors hope to engage with actors in the postsecondary success ecosystem who wish to explore ways to use AI tools thoughtfully and responsibly to catalyze equitable postsecondary success for all postsecondary stakeholders, from admission to the workforce (see our contact information in the authors’ notes). The postsecondary success connectome shows us possibilities, but we need to do the work.
Authors
Daniel Dolan, Professor of Professional Communication, Waseda University
Current Position and Past Experience:
Daniel Dolan, Ph.D. is a committed supporter and collaborative designer of equitable AI-supported postsecondary success and promoter of employer-validated skills learning pathway options for postsecondary learners,
He is professor of professional communication at Waseda University in Tokyo and founder and principal of D2 Skills Lab. His professional interests include designing and collaboratively implementing AI-supported postsecondary success transformation strategies and ecosystems, promoting innovative postsecondary global partnerships and designing and deploying customized skills learning programs for organizations.
Education, Honors and Achievements
Daniel Dolan earned a Doctor of Philosophy, Master of Arts and Bachelor of Arts in Speech Communication from the University of Washington and he is a certified 21st Century Skills Badge Facilitator. He has served on several University of Washington advisory boards and as a board member for Yokohama International School, and he is the author or coauthor of six communication skills books and textbooks (published in Japan).
Connect
You can connect with Daniel on LinkedIn and at dan@danieldolan.com or dan@d2skillslab.com
France Hoang, Co-Founder and CEO, boodleAI
Current Position and Past Experience:
France serves and works at the intersection of education and AI. He previously served as a University trustee and is a Distinguished Visiting Lecturer at West Point. He currently leads boodleAI, developing BoodleBox, a collaborative GenAI platform for education.
Education, Honors and Achievements
France is a graduate of West Point (top 1% of his class), earned a Master of Criminal Justice from Washburn University and holds a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center (magna cum laude).
Connect
You can contact France and learn more about BoodleBox here.