[Hyperlink]_The Dividual School

“Every hyperlink is a point of departure and a destination.”

In the Hyperlink school of the future rooms will visually transform into any subject or topic necessary or desired. Students will teach the building how to be the appropriate school for them. The transmission of knowledge does not end at the student. It is rapidly remixed and retransmitted back into the network. As Lev Manovich writes, “If a traditional twentieth century model of cultural communication described movement of information in one direction from a source to a receiver, now the reception point is just a temporary station on information’s path.” (Remix and Remixability 2005). This school will act as a Hyperlink for information between students, instructors, and other schools around the world. The Hyperlink is integrated into the swarm of collected networks. Students communicate with each other. Students communicate with teachers. Students and teachers communicate with the building. The building communicated with other buildings.

As the archetype of “school” evolves, we must re-examine the way we define a school. Historically the word “school” referred   to an entire entity; the physical building with its position in space, along with the transmission of knowledge that takes place inside its boundaries. For the purpose of this essay the word “school” will instead refer to the networked virtual conglomeration of data overlaid upon the physical setting. The “building” and the “school” together create the augmented reality. They become the Hyperlink.

Today computers are widely used in the class room. They exist however as single interfaces which connect individuals to the global network of information. Each individual is connected to the web but disconnected visually from their peers and instructors. Imagine if that window to the network were wholly integrated into the environment as an augmented reality where everyone experiences the flow of information simultaneously in real time. The virtual becomes part of the haptic and special realm. Everyone in a class now can contribute to the immersive classroom environment which is no longer an individual entity that operates in limited contact with the global network, but a dividual part of the network of hyperlinked schools worldwide.