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After three centuries, the second major transformation from the original Bologna institution is changing, but theory-induced blindness is forcing a major disruption rather than a gradual change. This conceptual paper aims to identify the pressures and the needed restructuring occurring to both the physical campus and the embodiment of the function of the faculty and the institution.

The university in its current form is economically unsustainable. It is an impractical structure for creating new knowledge and for transmitting such knowledge. It needs to respond to changes in education, to demands of those seeking or underwriting the purpose and particularly to the advances in the areas of information and communication technology and artificial intelligence systems.

Education, pre-kindergarten through adult, is becoming continuous and seamless across time and knowledge creation and acquisition. Universities, with exceptions, cannot stand alone as creators and adjudicators of valid knowledge either within the current idea of education or separate from knowledge creation outside of academia.

Those individuals within academia have a significant investment in the current system. Like many in other industries, the changes are producing changes and stress that will take time to respond, particularly as those who are now entering already will have the prerequisite capabilities to adapt and accelerate the change.

Education from PreK to Grey, internationally, has reached a tipping point. Although the area has a vast literature outlining the issues at hand, there is no consistent vision on how to get beyond the criticism and to propose a clear path forward, particularly in a global, interconnected world.

On the Horizon, a foresight academic journal, with a strong focus on education is committing the quarterly issues to encourage critical analysis and define paths to addressing the issues at hand. It is seeking: research supported, analysis, scenarios and other futures tools for visioning, and the use of multi-media vehicles for experiencing and demonstrating opportunities, including games/simulations, interactive vehicles and “maker” options.

The foresight literature offers a rich set of methodologies for exploring potential futures, weighing the effects and providing strategic options. Yet, few of these have been critically applied to the PreK to Grey arena of education, particularly in a globally connected society with new entrants to the field and the increasing capabilities of artificial intelligence.

The study in this issue/volume of On the Horizon provides a platform to focus educational change and resituate it in the larger international societal frame.

This paper aims to explore how the introduction of robots and artificial intelligence raises questions regarding the role of “work” not just in meeting societal material needs but challenges the idea of work as an underlying paradigm of human society, particularly as personal identity.

This paper takes the form of an editorial opinion piece.

“Work” is a defining characteristic of an individual. The entrance of robots and artificial intelligence could be a greater challenge to an individual’s sense of well-being and identity than only for filling traditional functions and basic needs of society.

The question is raised as to the psychological and social implications of the “immigration” of a new “culture” in the form of artificial intelligence and robotics beyond a local or regional basis.

The increasing presence of robots and artificial intelligence not only offers alternative ways for society to function but also sharpens the challenges that one culture faces when confronted by other communities who are able to fill traditional positions beyond the traditional one of “work”.

To introduce this “all review” issue, comprising a diverse mix of volumes reviewed by a broad spectrum of individuals.

This article calls into question the future viability of conventional print publishing in general, and the continued use of academic journals both for the dissemination of current research and as the primary means of assessing the work of academics for the purpose of promotion and tenure. It further suggests that the world of clicks and bricks is merging, and that there will be a competitive struggle to determine the value of various paths for knowledge dissemination.

The article suggests that, with the introduction of electronic transmission and storage of knowledge – cheaply, securely, interactively and readily accessible – the future market for, and use of, traditional academic journals needs serious reconsideration and repurposing.

The article provides a challenge to both The Academy and its co‐dependent publishing industry to openly address the techno‐economic realities confronting each, and suggests that much that is currently being done in response to the emerging internet world simply involves the superficial conversion of “bricks” to “clicks,” rather than an honest effort to deal with the transformational issues and opportunities at hand.

This essay aims to explore the changes that will occur in both the natural and social sciences in general and education in particular with the advent of the cloud, fast computers and sophisticated data analysis software coupled with artificial intelligence.

The paper looks at literature, particularly science fiction, and recent developments in technology.

With massive data and analytical capabilities existing, ubiquitously in the “cloud” coupled with low cost access via smart phones, tablets and similar technologies, the cost of knowledge acquisition will asymptotically approach zero and the movement of knowledge across geo‐political boundaries will profoundly affect all across the planet.

The paper reveals that the potential of the leveling of knowledge will change the relationships between the developed and developing countries.

This paper aims to outline the challenges that the current forces of technology change pose for the traditional K‐16 education system and to assess whether the rise of the social networking web 2.0 internet provides the opportunity and sufficient power to influence the change.

The paper is discusive and explores the key issues.

The paper finds that technological change is in motion throughout education, but the majority of efforts are simply transferring brick spaced learning into “click” or internet space which validates the possibilities of educational technologies, but scarcely realizes them. Real change will happen outside of the system.

There exists a strong possibility that the existing K‐16 system will fragment into a variety of overlapping pieces, including a divide between the “haves” and “have‐nots” and a fragmented curriculum.

This paper highlights some of the challenges that the current forces of technology change pose for the traditional K‐16 education system.

As knowledge is released from the bounds of libraries, as research becomes no longer confined to The academy, and education/certification is available, any time/any place, the university and the faculty must redefine themselves. Liberal studies, once the core, and currently eschewed in favor of science and technology, will be reborn in those institutions that can rise above the mundane and embrace an emerging “third culture”.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a short comment on the current US innovation concerns and a recent paper by Tom Abeles.

Extracts are given from the Business Trends Library showing the relationship of the advanced (post‐industrial) countries with the rest of the world. Insights are given into the rising importance of the multi‐national corporations.

The post‐industrial countries have overwhelming advantage over the rest of the world, with very different world development roles played by both sides. The multi‐national corporations act as the organs of transfer of technology to the less developed world.

The importance of how innovation and business development arises in the post industrials and how it is defused is shown.

Considers the role of universities in a changing environment and the deconstruction of the traditional Academy. Suggests that universities are now operating more like commercial enterprises; that at one time The Academy was supported by the institution, but now the intellectual element is just one aspect of the institution. Explores the notion of clicks and bricks.