Metaliteracy Across the Globe

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I found this week's topic of global education and metaliteracy to be quite interesting. Personally, Mr. Prinsloo's MOOC Talk presentation and his reading entitled "Modernity and its outcasts-the role of higher education" stood out to me the most this week.

During Mr. Prinsloo's MOOC Talk, he opens up his presentation by introducing himself to his audience, and by providing us with a few key facts about himself.  He makes it a point to say that he is not presenting a global view, but simply a glimpse into his own view of metaliteracy. However, I do not think that this point is valid. After this slide, Mr. Prinsloo spends the rest of the time speaking about a wide variety of metaliteracy topics that I really found myself to identify with and understand. Although he claims to not be making a case for the issue of metaliteracy across the globe, I really think that his presentation and ideas can definitely be utilized to make a case for the importance of a new kind of education that would be relevant to all parts of the world.

In every country, city or any other realm of the globe, there is always an area that is underprivileged. These areas usually contain people who do not have the ability to access education. A perfect example of this can be seen in Prinsloo's article, where these people are classified as "homo sacer." It is so unfair that if a person does not have the choice to access education, then they are seen as useless. Therefore, I think I can see a synthesis between Prinsloo's lecture and and his article. In his lecture, he speaks about the importance of "reading the world," and in his article, he states that there should be strides taken to "disrupt...schemas dictating the rules of belonging and worth."

In thinking about all of our metaliteracy topics up to this point, I think that everything comes back to the idea of the "alternative student." Just as we need to recognize that there are new institutions of learning, we also need to "read the world," and modernize our preconceived notions of what a student should be.

A student is not just a young person in a dorm room, or one who attends a physical institution. Unfortunately, there have been way too many times that I've seen someone's willingness to learn be invalidated by their age, economical/ social background, or by where they choose to obtain their education.

The alternative student is vital to Prinsloo's call for a new type of graduate and faculty. I think that any type of alternative student (including the ones that Prinsloo mentions in his article) has a better understanding of their (and others') world. At some point, education may not have been their primary focus, which I think makes them more receptive to new ideas and concepts, once they are interested in being educated. Therefore, I think that these people can also qualify to be the "new faculty." There is so much more to being wise than a couple of extra letters at the end of a name.  Experiences are what truly make us intelligent, and give us the authority to inform and educate others.