XplanaZine

• Congress has agreed on a budget for 2008. The budget contains $59.4 billion in funding for the U.S. Department of Education (ED), though an across-the-board recision of 1.75 percent (applied equally to all domestic programs) will leave actual spending at $58.4 billion. Under the new budget deal, federal funding for educational technology remains the same, at $272 million—though the recision will bring actual spending levels down to $267 million, thus marking the fifth time in the last six years that federal ed-tech funding has been reduced. Still, supporters of school technology say the 2008 federal budget could have been worse. — eSchool News

• DATATRAK International, Inc., a technology and services company focused on global eClinical solutions for the clinical trials industry, reported that it has launched a new initiative involving a continuous series of educational and innovative webcasts. — CNN Money

 (Creative Commons)

• OneWorld UK in collaboration with Education as a Vaccine against AIDS (EVA) launched “Learning about Living”, an e-learning tool based on the Nigerian Family Life and HIV/AIDS Education (FLHE) school curriculum. — Digital Opportunity Channel

• Delaware Center for Educational Technology is among 29 nonprofit groups in Delaware that received nearly $240,000 from the Verizon Foundation this year. — CNN Money

• The nonprofit One Laptop Per Child Project struggles with slow orders and competition from commercial vendors like Intel. Read about the history and progression of this project here. — PC World

 (Creative Commons)