Over the past two decades, digital resources and practices have gradually expanded across higher education landscapes (Lamb et al., 2022). The COVID-19 pandemic significantly accelerated this transition, rapidly increasing the role of digital technology in educational spaces on a global scale (Broadbent et al., 2023). This shift demonstrated universities’ capacity to adapt to unprecedented circumstances with a level of agility previously unimagined (e.g., Goodyear, 2022; Lamb & Ross, 2021). It also stimulated the rise of hybridity in higher education (Lamb, Carvalho, et al., 2022; Lamb, Fawns, et al., 2024), thereby revealing its broader potential (Ortega-Arranz et al., 2024).
Although a considerable body of research has examined the rapid transitions in higher education during the pandemic (e.g., Aristovnik et al., 2020; Tulaskar & Turunen, 2022; Vollbrecht, 2020), little is known about the post-pandemic futures of higher education and the lasting implications of the educational arrangements developed in response (Broadbent et al., 2023). Globally, digitalisation has been discussed as “inevitable”, a fundamental aspect of this shift (Gourlay, 2021), including within Nordic universities (Laterza et al., 2020). According to Sá and Serpa (2020), this moment presents a pivotal opportunity to reform higher education to meet emerging educational needs – to give rise to renewal.
When (re)imagining the futures of higher education, multifaceted transformations are evident. One such transformation, shaped by the accumulated experiences of the pandemic, is the growing number of universities worldwide considering hybrid educational spaces as a strategic approach to expanding access to higher education (e.g., Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). This includes plans to open up courses and programmes to wider audiences in the coming years. In addition, there is a more practical motivation for adopting hybridity in educational arrangements, addressing the physical space constraints on campuses. As Ninnemann et al. (2020) observe, physical university campuses have limited resources and capacities, making indefinite expansion unfeasible. In other words, they cannot accommodate a continuous increase in student numbers, facilities, or activities without encountering constraints such as space, funding, and environmental impact (De Caro-Barek & Støckert, 2024).
Recently, the United Nations’ (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) report (see Global Sustainable Development Report, 2023; United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, 2023) has broadened its focus beyond socioeconomic, environmental, and technological developments to include higher education institutions and their role in advancing sustainability and societal development. This includes ensuring equal access to tertiary education, particularly from the perspective of lifelong learning (e.g., Håkansson Lindqvist et al., 2023;
The Nordic countries have long been recognised for their commitment to providing high-quality, tuition-free education at all levels of schooling. Higher education in these countries has traditionally prioritised equitable opportunities and access, ensuring that everyone can succeed on an equal footing (e.g., Bucholtz et al., 2020; Frønes et al., 2020). This commitment is evident in a continued focus on promoting fairness and inclusivity through both equity and equality (e.g., Frønes et al., 2020). It has included efforts to remove barriers that might prevent some students from participating in particular courses or academic programmes (Isopahkala-Bouret et al., 2018), including an emphasis on technology-enhanced education (e.g., Frønes et al., 2020; Laterza et al., 2020; Pinheiro et al., 2023). Hybridity and hybrid educational spaces align closely with these values, as they offer the potential to dismantle barriers to accessing higher education.
At the same time, higher education institutions in the Nordic countries have faced increasing pressure to become more entrepreneurial (Pinheiro & Stensaker, 2014) and to enhance their competitiveness in the globalised market, with a growing focus on cost efficiency, productivity, and quality (Kivistö et al., 2019; Lundin, 2024). This shift has led to significant changes, such as the introduction of tuition fees for international students (Lundin, 2024; Lundin & Geschwind, 2023). In this light, universities are increasingly aware that, in order to attract more and better students, digitalisation is inevitable and must be integrated across the entire educational process, including teaching materials and methods (Sá & Serpa, 2020). However, when opting for hybridity in higher education, it is essential to move beyond market-inspired educational offerings and prioritise the design of more inclusive hybrid spaces – where the aim is to bridge the gap between students attending in person and those participating remotely, fostering equitable learning experiences for all (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). That said, achieving this remains highly challenging.
Following Nørgård and Hilli (2022), in order to resist the dominance of market-inspired models in higher education, the focus should shift towards fostering competencies that extend beyond the immediate relevance of individual courses or programmes. This involves preparing students for the complex demands and uncertainties that characterise the contemporary world (Closs et al., 2022). In our increasingly interconnected society, where collaborative solutions are essential for addressing pressing global issues, it is necessary to gain deeper insights into how higher education spaces can be (re)designed to equip students with the capabilities, attitudes, and values required to work together on matters of significance and for the common good (Goodyear, 2022).
Taken together, the mandate of universities is evolving, with growing emphasis on sustainability and preparing students for uncertain futures. Moreover, the significant external shocks from the marketisation of higher education and the pandemic have also played a substantial role in accelerating this shift (e.g., Laterza et al., 2020). However, while the prominence of hybridity in higher education is widely acknowledged as a response to these challenges, current discourse often overemphasises the advantages of educational technology in (re)designing higher education teaching and learning (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). This somewhat narrow view limits the broader transformative potential of hybridity. To fully meet universities’ evolving, future-oriented sustainable mandate (De Caro-Barek & Støckert, 2024), a more nuanced understanding of hybridity is essential – one that goes beyond the short-term compromise solutions in teaching and learning seen in recent years (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). That is, to consider more broadly how the digital is entwined with human and material practices in postpandemic higher education teaching and learning (Markauskaite et al., 2023). This chapter contributes to that conversation
The chapter is organised as follows. It begins by outlining the theoretical perspective of hybrid educational spaces as fluid, followed by a discussion of sociomaterial sensitivities and new mobilities that can deepen our understanding of these spaces. It then explores the potential of speculative design in shaping hybrid educational arrangements in higher education and in imagining their “possible futures” within this context. The chapter concludes by revisiting the opportunities and challenges of hybrid spaces in higher education, both globally and in relation to Nordic higher education institutions.
2 Hybrid Educational Spaces in Higher Education: Hybrid as Fluid
While the significance of hybridity and hybrid educational formats has grown considerably, the field remains under-theorised (Nørgård, 2021). The term hybrid originates from biology, where it refers to offspring resulting from the combination of traits from different breeds, species, or genera (Gil et al., 2022). In higher education, hybrid and hybridity have been interpreted in various ways. Although still a relatively niche concept, Nørgård (2021) observes that the term is often applied too broadly to describe a wide array of teaching and learning practices.
Nevertheless, hybrid educational spaces introduce distinct conceptualisations, theories, and characteristics that differentiate them from other digital or online formats (e.g., Hilli et al., 2019; Lamb et al., 2025; Nørgård, 2021; Nørgård & Hilli, 2022). Gil et al. (2022) argue that hybridity goes beyond the notion of blending – a term often used synonymously. While blending typically involves integrating digital tools into physical settings or combining synchronous and asynchronous interaction, online elements are often positioned as supplementary to the core activity of onsite teaching (Lamb et al., 2025). In contrast, hybridity encompasses a more complex coexistence of diverse modalities. It includes the interplay of formal and informal learning, structured and unstructured environments, physical and digital artefacts and spaces, as well as evolving teacher – student dynamics (e.g., Nørgård & Hilli, 2022). In this sense, hybridity represents a richer theoretical and practical construct – one that embodies the merging and co-existence of multiple educational elements (Eyal & Gil, 2022).
Accordingly, moving beyond discussions of purely technical or pedagogical arrangements that often dominate the discourse, this chapter adopts a more philosophical stance – one less commonly taken in this context (e.g., Eyal & Gil, 2022; Gourlay, 2021, 2022; Pöysä et al., 2005). Within this view, hybrid refers
Likewise, this conceptualisation of fluidity also shifts our focus onto the student: it is the student’s choice that transcends boundaries, rather than one that is externally imposed (Eyal & Gil, 2022). However, it is important to acknowledge the risk of casually labelling students as so called digital natives and assuming they can effortlessly engage with, and transition between, different modalities of learning (e.g., Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). Accordingly, in order to more successfully curate learning in hybrid higher education contexts, there is a need to critically examine the complex interplay among individual perspectives, technologies, spaces, activities, and time (Jandrić et al., 2018).
3 New Mobilities and Sociomaterial Sensibility in Understanding Hybrid Educational Spaces in Higher Education
Despite the variety of definitions, capturing and understanding the relationship between physical and digital as hybrid educational encounters remains a challenge in higher education research (e.g., Gourlay, 2021, 2022). As Gourlay (2021) notes, educational policy and practice often uphold a rigid binary between these two modes: digital is perceived as existing independently of the physical, and digital interactions are not considered to involve the body or the act of being in person. However, contrary to this dominant view, it can be argued – drawing on sociomaterial and posthuman perspectives – that digital engagement, such as hybrid encounters in higher education, is fundamentally a set of material and embodied practices (e.g., Gourlay, 2021, 2022), involving mobility and “movement” (Bayne et al., 2014). Hayles (2002) writes: In its broadest sense, materiality emerges from the dynamic interplay between the richness of the physical world and human intelligence, which shapes this physicality to create meaning (p. 33).
According to Sørensen (2009), a posthumanist perspective positions humans not above materials, but among them. Here, while materials may be used by humans, they can equally act upon humans – shaping and reshaping educational practices to become not solely human-centred but sociomaterial. From this standpoint, the question shifts from whether a technology meets the goals of actors – often an insufficient approach for understanding the complexity of hybrid arrangements in higher education learning – to examining what
Building on this, Gourlay (2021) poses the question of how the university can be “located” when the significance of materiality in digital engagement is acknowledged. Accordingly, the concept of new mobilities (e.g., Bayne et al., 2014; Scheller & Urry, 2006; Sprangler & Adriansen, 2019; Urry, 2007) provides insights into the intricate relationships between people and spaces connected through movement. Mobilities – or immobilities – in various forms, depend on a combination of material elements, including moorings such as physical campuses and the online world (Brooks & Waters, 2018). In this view, movement and travel are understood as active processes involving material components, rather than simply the absence between two fixed points. Moreover, this approach can offer valuable insights into hybridity in university settings – for example, in terms of how students, when interacting remotely, translate the space of the university into distance (Bayne et al., 2014). Hybrid learning requires us to think newly about higher education spaces and the various ways students are mobilised within them, as remote learning pushes students beyond the spatial securities (Mol & Law, 1994) of the physical campus.
In conclusion, as Lamb et al. (2022) point out, a sociomaterial sensibility discourages reducing educational spaces to their physical attributes or placing undue emphasis solely on teaching and learning practices. Instead, this perspective views educational spaces as contingent upon a complex and dynamic assemblage of diverse human and non-human actors (Fenwick, 2015). In educational contexts, different levels of materiality can be considered, including human bodies, other living organisms, objects, spaces, places, and the natural and built environments they encompass (e.g., Fox & Alldred, 2019). In addition, abstract concepts such as imagination, memory, and thought – while not inherently “material” – are also valued for their capacity to produce material effects. A sociomaterial approach thus recognises that a variety of actors – human and non-human alike – actively shape learning and social processes in education.
4 Speculative Design for “Possible Futures” of Hybrid Higher Education Arrangements
Curating inclusive student experiences and designing educational spaces that support sustainable and resilient hybrid arrangements can benefit significantly from a speculative design approach (e.g., Ross, 2017, 2023; Bayne & Ross, 2024).
Speculative design introduces a “sphere of not-yetness” (Ross, 2017, 2023) into co-design processes (Lowyck & Pöysä, 2001), shifting the emphasis from merely identifying “what works” to fostering more imaginative and transformative forms of problem-solving (Ross, 2017). In the context of digital education, engaging with not-yetness involves acknowledging and embracing complexity, uncertainty, and risk as inherent to emerging technologies and their associated practices. While speculative design has moved beyond its roots in niche art and design domains, its application in education remains relatively limited, though gradually expanding (Encinas et al., 2023).
When critically engaging with digital education futures through speculative accounts, Ross (2023), drawing on Michael (2021), distinguishes between speculative fabulation and speculative fabrication. Practices of speculative fabulation typically employ storytelling methods – such as social science fiction and speculative fiction (e.g., Bayne & Ross, 2024; Macgilchrist et al., 2019; Suoranta et al., 2022) – often in the form of short fictional sketches, scenarios, or vignettes (e.g., Selwyn et al., 2020). According to Ross (2023), this approach enables participants to explore dilemmas and neglected areas often overlooked in dominant socio-technical imaginaries. As a recent example, Bayne and Ross (2024) explore how speculative fabulation can reimagine the futures of higher education beyond deterministic or dystopian narratives. Through four scenarios (Extinction-era Universities, AI Academy, Enhanced Enhancement, and Justice-driven Innovation), accompanied by microfictions, provoke critical reflection on themes such as AI, climate change, surveillance, enhancement technologies, and decolonisation.
In contrast, speculative fabrication focuses on speculative (material or digital) artefacts – objects-to-think-with – designed to prompt participant engagement and speculative production (Ross, 2023). These artefacts serve as generative catalysts, encouraging diverse participants to contribute their experiences, voices, and insights. Through designing and interacting with such objects, participants are able to grapple with inventive and ambiguous problems (see e.g., Gallagher & Breines, 2020; Vartiainen et al., 2024). However, the
Goodyear (2022) advocates a speculative approach to the co-design of higher education spaces, and drawing on Fitzpatrick (2019), to emphasises that fostering sustainable futures in curriculum and pedagogy requires greater emphasis on collaboration and “careful listening”. This approach marks a departure from traditional models of direct instruction, positioning teaching as a co-design process in which multiple stakeholders actively shape educational experiences (e.g., Goodyear, 2015, 2020). Central to this vision is the use of conceptual tools that help connect immediate, practical decisions with long-term aspirations and preferred futures. However, Goodyear (2022) acknowledges the intellectual challenge of bridging micro-level decisions with macro-level goals, particularly in collaborative settings. In higher education, this complexity often arises in balancing creativity and criticality, and in efforts to move beyond narrowly specialised courses towards broader, more inclusive engagement (Encinas et al., 2023). In this context, as Laterza et al. (2020) and Scholkmann (2023) observe, the Nordic model of publicly funded higher education is especially promising, as it enables experimentation with innovative teaching practices, free from market-driven pressures or fears of declining enrolments – constraints that frequently affect institutions in less publicly supported systems.
5 Concluding Discussion
In the post-pandemic era, higher education institutions worldwide are debating the futures of hybrid educational offerings, even if campus-based teaching resumes as the default mode in many countries (De Caro-Barek & Støckert, 2024), including in the Nordic context (Pinheiro et al., 2023). Within this shifting landscape, discourse has turned towards the need for more adaptable teaching and learning practices, with greater possibilities to negotiate educational spaces based on individual needs (Taalas et al., 2022). Consequently, discussions about hybrid educational spaces have emerged (e.g., Guo & Mahat, 2023; Eyal & Gil, 2022; Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023; Nørgård, 2021; Nørgård & Hilli, 2022; Raes et al., 2020). In this chapter, hybrid refers to a rich, multifaceted, and fluid concept, extending far beyond the simple blending of physical
However, at the institutional and policy levels, while the pandemic accelerated a shift towards the adoption of hybrid educational offerings, such practices have traditionally been limited to isolated initiatives rather than strategically embedded across institutions (e.g., Ali, 2024; Hill & Smith, 2023). Given universities’ growing commitment to flexibility, inclusivity, and accessibility in education (e.g., Hill & Smith, 2023), a deeper understanding of the factors that enable or constrain the thoughtful integration of on-campus and online learning is essential for informed decision-making and adequate resource allocation (e.g., Ali, 2024). According to Hill and Smith (2023), university leaders emphasise the importance of strategic leadership, effective governance, professional development for teaching staff, and sustained technical and pedagogical support as prerequisites for institution-wide transformation. In the context of hybrid cross-campus environments, De Caro-Barek and Støckert (2024) introduce symmetry as a central organising principle, referring to the equitable distribution of resources such as time, funding, infrastructure, and politically aligned strategies. As they point out, ensuring consistent and equitable learning experiences across campuses requires institutions to define, align, and manage these multiple layers of symmetry. As the rapid mobilisation to scale up digital learning during the pandemic demonstrated, barriers to adoption can be overcome through strong institutional commitment and targeted investment in change agendas grounded in strategy, structure, and support (Hill & Smith, 2023).
Moreover, hybridity is not about reducing costs or simplifying processes – it entails creating a new kind of learning experience, one that is both technologically and pedagogically complex (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023). In the Nordic countries, higher education institutions typically benefit from robust digital infrastructures, which supported a relatively smooth transition to online and remote teaching during the pandemic (Pinheiro et al., 2023). Despite their growing prominence, it is worth remembering that hybrid educational spaces are neither neutral nor universally experienced. Their form and function are
Furthermore, when considering the futures of educational offerings in higher education, even though the technologies for combining on-campus and online learning are already in place, the challenge lies in aligning digital technologies with appropriate pedagogical approaches. This has left teachers uncertain about how to successfully engage students in both settings (e.g., Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023; Pinheiro et al., 2023; Raes et al., 2020). Despite the widespread use and support of technology throughout the pandemic, designing for and teaching in hybrid mode continues to present challenges. For example, hybridity of teaching can increase teachers’ orchestration load, particularly when designing and setting up collaborative activities using sophisticated technologies (e.g., Ortega-Arranz et al., 2024). Accordingly, careful consideration is needed from both a learning design and institutional support perspective (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023).
While teachers’ roles have evolved due to the rapid digitalisation of teaching – towards what Dron (2022, p. 161) refers to as the “distributed teacher” – IT staff, in their roles as digital experts, have become increasingly visible and influential within universities, providing critical support to academics in digital teaching (Pinheiro et al., 2023). As Pinheiro et al. (2023) observe, in this way, digital transformations are also reshaping traditional academic roles and authority dynamics within universities.
To create an inclusive hybrid educational environment, a key consideration is to bring online and in-person students together without favouring one group over the other, whether consciously or unconsciously. This can be achieved by accommodating the needs of both groups through varied learning activities and modes of interaction. Designing a range of activities that promote different forms of engagement and intentionally fostering connections between students across modalities are effective strategies for making hybrid spaces more inclusive (Mineshima-Lowe et al., 2023).
Bayne et al. (2014) argue that, in digital education, the university should not be viewed as a static “container”. Instead, it should be understood as an “enactment” (Edwards et al., 2011), in which various human and non-human elements are brought together to generate specific activities at particular times and locations. Overall, when students and teachers come together for a course, they are present in multiple spaces where digital, physical, and social elements are deeply intertwined and mutually influential (Carvalho et al., 2016). As such,
To create improved opportunities and spaces for learning, imaginative and forward-thinking educational efforts are necessary (Goodyear, 2022). Goodyear draws on the work of Geoff Mulgan (2020), who reminds us that the social sciences have a long tradition of exploring better futures – a tradition that has been partially overshadowed by an emphasis on critique. Like many, Mulgan views the COVID-19 pandemic as a catalyst for re-evaluating what is changeable and what is worth changing.
Applying a speculative co-design approach to imagining the futures of higher education offers a promising path towards achieving these goals. In this way, the futures are being reimagined not only by academic staff, administrators or policymakers, but also by students. Student voice and choice extend beyond merely selecting from different assignment options; they involve fostering a genuine sense of ownership over their learning (Penrod, 2023). This includes providing hybrid learning experiences that are not only accessible but also designed with inclusivity and equity in mind (Frønes et al., 2020). Such an approach calls for students, teachers, and other stakeholders to collaborate in developing a shared vision for the futures of higher education and to work collectively towards realising that vision. Additionally, given the current higher education landscape, Bayne and Ross (2024) highlight how the increasingly complex, technologised, and environmentally and politically unstable nature of the future can cause discussions about higher education to become quickly dominated by dystopian narratives and a sense of hopelessness. Rather than attempting to predict specific outcomes, speculative methods can instead open up space for creative, critical, and imaginative conversations that foster active and fundamental hope – to shape more equitable and sustainable futures of higher education learning (Bayne & Ross, 2024; see also Ross, 2023).
To conclude, digital transformations have now become integral to all aspects of higher education and, through emerging hybridity, have brought about profound changes to universities and academic work more broadly (e.g., Pekkola et al., 2020, 2022). While digital technologies are already woven into many aspects of teaching and learning, it follows that teachers’ roles have also become “hybrid”, with their knowledge and capabilities distributed across these technologies. In considering the emerging hybridity of educational spaces and the futures of higher education, it is therefore important to focus not only on students but also on the evolving roles and capabilities of (future) teachers. As Markauskaite et al. (2023, p. 182) aptly observe, these are capabilities for teaching in universities that do not exist yet.
This work was supported by the Research Council of Finland under Grant #358924.
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