Banca de QUALIFICAÇÃO: CARLA ALEXANDRE BARBOZA DE SOUSA

Future scenarios for an online education: perspectives of innovation in higher education

Scenery of the future; Online education; Ead; Educational innovation.

The present research proposed to investigate the four main future scenarios of online education, focusing on higher education. It brings Morin's Theory of Complexity as an epistemological basis, since it is based on multidimensional aspects that seek to distinguish, link and accept the challenge of uncertainties. In this study, the definition of innovation used is from Christensen (2009), in which innovation meets pressing unmet needs, and can be complex, specifically situated and with the possibility of happening in multilevels (products, processes and services), with the objective of sustain a trajectory. For the educational field, we complement it with the OECD definition (2010) that innovation is any dynamic change aimed at adding value to the educational process and culminating in measurable results, whether in terms of stakeholder satisfaction or educational performance. The thesis traced a seam between the scenariozation methodology, already used by more than thirty sectors of society, the processes of innovation in education and the concepts of distance education and online education, so that we can look to the future as a field of research and as a locus of educational innovation. The present has been largely changed by the coronavirus pandemic and understanding how it also influences the future is one of its goals. The methodology used in the research is based on the method of Schwartz, Grumbach and the Transformative Scenarios and is described in 10 macro-steps (assembling a representative team of the system, structuring the observation, presenting the predetermined elements, identifying the driving forces , classify factors of importance and uncertainty, build future proposals, identify scenarios, narrativize scenarios, discover what can and should be done, write guidelines for quality online higher education). The results of this study intend to contribute with a plausible report of 4 (four) future scenarios on online higher education, the indication of guidelines for the implementation of more innovative online courses and a framework adapted to the construction of specific future scenarios for education.