Tag Archive for 'higher education'

Schools and Programs in the News - November 7, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on November 7, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: Kaplan Higher Education, Concord Law School, Hamilton College, Career Education Corp, American InterContinental University, One Laptop per Child, Gallaudet University, University of Massachusetts

Kaplan Higher Education has announced it will merge with Concord Law School to create the first law school program that may be completed entirely online. — University Degree Finder

Hamilton College in Mason City, Iowa, is now a part of Kaplan University. The change will allow the school to offer a wider selection of programs and more online courses. — KIMT

Shares of Career Education Corp. rose the most in five months Thursday after an accrediting association panel said no corrective action should be taken on student records and recruiting concerns at the company’s American InterContinental University campuses. The company has battled a shareholder revolt, along with investigations and lawsuits over its admissions, financial aid and job placement practices. — Chicago Tribute

Uruguay is the first country to place an official order for child-friendly laptops from the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) initiative, and Peru looks set to follow. — SciDev Net

Students at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC, the only liberal arts university in the world for the deaf and hard of hearing, are benefiting from lecture capture software that includes closed captioning.  — Campus Technology

Fueled by a $650,000 development grant from the Sloan Foundation received last January to help expand access to the University of Massachusetts through blended learning innovations, UMassOnline announced that in addition to five inaugural course offerings launched last month, an additional round of five more certificate, degree or professional development courses will join the portfolio this January. — PR Inside

Online Education in the News – October 30, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 30, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: eLearners.com, online education trends, popular online degree schools

Six out of ten Americans say that if they had to go back to school at some point, they’d be interested in doing it online, according to new research released by eLearners.com, the leading resource that specializes in connecting people with online education. What’s more interesting is that even the younger generation is more compelled to go online, with 80% of young adults ages 18 - 24 indicating they would be interested in the online route if they wanted to take more courses or get a degree in the future. — Finance Visor

Distance learning is up by double-digit margins for most local schools over the late 1990s, when online learning programs began. Programs are expanding in both scope and reach: Some schools boast international students. This article looks at online education trends at several universities in Michigan. — Crain’s Detroit Business

Many colleges and universities of the world offer various online degree programs. This means that the competition is now stiff in these schools and the business in online education is enjoyed by school owners nowadays. This article discusses some of the most popular online degree schools and their programs. — Online Degree Blog

Schools and Programs in the News – October 30, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 30, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: Lincoln Financial Foundation, Illinois Valley Community College, Vocational and technology institute in Ghana, HP 2008 Technology for Teaching Grant, high-tech search tools, Wikipedia, Voorhees College, Marshall University, West Virginia University,

Lincoln Financial Foundation is stepping forward to support Philadelphia’s struggling school system, awarding more than $900,000 to nonprofit organizations that are providing critical academic support in the city. These education and workforce development grants come just months after the Lincoln Financial Foundation augmented arts education opportunities in the city by giving nearly $600,000 to agencies that bring artists into the schools, provide free and reduced-priced tickets to performances, or offer in-school or after-school arts programs to underserved children in the city. — CNN

Illinois Valley Community College student organization Students in a Free Enterprise is contributing to an international educational project by collecting used, working computers to ship to Guatemala. The college’s SIFE students are partnering with a grass roots Guatemalan organization of community directors — ASDIC — to bring computers to 13 rural mountain communities. — My Web Times

A Vocational and technology institute was on Thursday commissioned at Agona Duakwa in the Central Region of Ghana to provide the opportunity for unemployed youth and school dropouts in the Agona District to acquire appropriate skills and technology to earn income and reduce poverty. The Institute is affiliated to the National Coordinating Committee on Technical and Vocational Educational and Training (NACVET) and other bodies that seek to enhance the vocational and technological skills of the youth. — AllAfrica.com

HP has opened up its 2008 Technology for Teaching Grant program, offering $6 million to K-12 and higher education institutions in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. The initiative is aimed at efforts to improve education through the use of innovative uses of technology in the classroom, increase the number of underrepresented students on a path toward high-tech careers, and enhance student success in math, science and engineering. — Campus Technology

It appears that some colleges may be trying to improve their ratings and future donation potential by literally “buying” their students, armed with high-tech search tools for test-score application information, target zip codes, neighborhood demographics and socioeconomic data. In this article, a National Merit student reflects on her experience getting bombarded with college offers. — Bloomberg

Wikipedia: time-saver for students, bane of professors everywhere. Or is it? Martha Groom, a professor at the University of Washington at Bothell’s Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences program, assigned Wikipedia projects as a core curriculum component. Readers’ comments show that she is not alone. — Inside Higher Ed

Voorhees College in South Carolina has completed a multi-phase deployment of new voice and data solution to enable distance learning, increase bandwidth, and add emergency communications services. The college partnered with CDW-G for planning and implementation, with systems provided by Verizon and Sprint. — Campus Technology

Online classes can serve as a recruiting tool for universities. Marshall University and West Virginia University, West Virginia’s two biggest universities, reflect on growing enrollment trends for the past decade as related to online education. — Charleston Daily Mail

Illinois Valley Community College’s adult education program, in association with the Richard A. Mautino Memorial Public Library in Spring Valley and the Peru and La Salle public libraries through a state-supported library outreach, will sponsor an online GED study program. The GED-i online program is designed to prepare students to take the GED test. — MyWebTimes

Conferences in the News – October 29, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 29, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: Malaysia Higher Education Exhibition and Seminar , Global Education and Training Exhibition (GETEX) in Bahrain, and Intel World Ahead Program - Education Workshop

The Malaysia Higher Education Exhibition and Seminar which opened here Sunday hopes to enhance awareness on the educational opportunities in Malaysia among students in the Middle East, said Prof Datuk Dr Hassan Said, the director-general of Higher Education Department in the Ministry of Higher Education. He said that Malaysia has established a solid reputation as a premier destination catering to a diverse international student community. — Bernama

GETEX, the education and training exhibition launched in Bahrain, is committed to return in November next year on popular demand. More than 500 people turned up for a session on the opening day of Global Education and Training Exhibition, to check out opportunities at the three-day event, which has been marketing higher education at its shows in the UAE for 19 years.– Gulf Daily News

Educators, students and pedagogues today attended the Intel World Ahead Program - Education Workshop designed to promote the innovative and effective use of ICT in education. The workshop, held at the Dead Sea Marriott Resort & Spa on October 27th, presented a framework for analyzing policies in ICT, pedagogy, curriculum, assessment, teacher training, and school organization. — Newswire

Schools and Programs in the News – October 29, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 29, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: public education, Brooklyn Tech, STEM and the National Science Foundation, online student statistics in Minnesota, Gatlin Education Services, Hodges University, California R-I School District and NETS

Donald Nielsen takes a critical look at the problems incurred by public education and offers solutions. “I believe public schools are the most important institutions in our society. Being educated is essential for a productive life and it is also essential for the preservation of our democracy. Failing to educate our children puts our very way of life in jeopardy. Today, as a nation, we are failing to adequately educate a majority of our children.” — The Seattle Times

Teachers at Brooklyn Tech — the largest math and science themed school in the city — are getting schooled in, well, technology. The school’s alumni recently installed a state-of-the-art technology center to bring the school’s 200-plus teachers up to speed on the latest technological advances — from the elementary (e-mail) to more-advanced techniques, like the use of so-called “SMART boards,” which allow teachers to project digital images onto enormous touch-sensitive whiteboards at the front of the classroom (cool!). — The Brooklyn Paper

In an effort to explore methods for encouraging females to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), the National Science Foundation has awarded the National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity (NAPE) Education Foundation an extension services grant. The grant comes through the Research on Gender in Science and Engineering Program and was awarded to implement NAPE’s five-year STEM Equity Pipeline project. –Campus Technology

Growing numbers of online students and high school students taking college courses helped boost enrollment at the 32 Minnesota State Colleges and Universities by 4.5 percent over the last year, officials said as they released enrollment figures. This fall, the state college and university system has 180,848 students, an increase of 7,832 students from last fall’s enrollment of 173,016. Last year, enrollment increased by 1.3 percent. — DL-Online

Online education providing work force skills and certification training has come to a pair of local colleges, making it more convenient than ever for region residents to get the type of education they are looking for from the convenience of their computer. The online courses are provided by Gatlin Education Services, a provider of online certificate training programs to community colleges, universities and accredited career-colleges worldwide. — NWI Times

Hodges University provides online degrees to students who have never set foot on American soil. Alen Savatic, 34, is midway through a master’s degree program. He lives in Sarajevo, in the country of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Hodges also has an online international student from Germany, and a British student will start virtual classes in January. — News-Press

In the era of constant upward changes in technology, California R-I School District has constantly made an effort to keep up with the trends and more recently the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) for students. — California Democrat

IT News – October 29, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 29, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: the administrative computing market, Apple, information security on campus, Adobe, and Microsoft Research

With the administrative computing market reaching $2.0 billion by 2010, growth drivers include increased use of data by administrators in institutional decision-making, use of CRM-type tools for enrollment management development, and into 2008-2010, introduction of new SOA architectures. The increasing amount of data being collected, stored, analyzed, and accessed through institutional performance measurement initiatives is driving the value of ERP-, SIS-, and CRM-type systems. — Campus Technology

Most businesses won’t turn down cash. Not Apple. In fact your cash is no good when it comes to buying a new iPhone at an Apple or AT&T Wireless store. Apple announced this weekend it will no longer accept cash for iPhone purchases and now limits sales of the phone to two per person. The new policy is an effort to discourage unauthorized resale of the iPhone. — PC World

Colleges and universities have done little over the last three years to improve information security. Hindered by lack of staff resources and funding, security efforts remain largely unchanged, while incidents of breaches–including the theft of personal information from within and without–continue to plague campuses. And, what’s more, the integration of physical and IT security is still a reality in only a small minority of schools. For these reasons and more, higher education institutions received, on the whole, a C average in the 2007 CDW-G Higher Education IT Security Report Card, the latest annual study from CDW-G and O’Keeffe & Co., which measures responses from higher education IT professionals to gauge the state of security on college campuses. — Campus Technology

Adobe announced its intention to release Flex Builder 2 free for students and faculty at education institutions. Flex Builder, which retails for $499, is an integrated development environment for the Flex framework, which powers cross-platform rich Internet applications on the Web. — Campus Technology

John Rice blogs how new Microsoft technology would be great for interactive educational games. Follow the links to a post about an interview of members of Microsoft Research UK’s multi-touch team. The researchers on the video are Shahram Izadi, Alex Butler, and Steve Hodges. — Mathematics Education Blog

Awards in the News – October 26, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 26, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: The Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) award recipient, the Western Maricopa Coalition (WESTMARC) “Best of the West” university, and Coastal Business, Education and Technology Alliance (BETAS) 2007 Technology Awards winners

Michelle Pacansky-Brock, fulltime Professor of Art History, wins the along wins The Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) award. The Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) awards program, which recognizes outstanding achievements in Asynchronous Learning Networks (ALN), celebrates the creative spirit that improves the quality of online learning and program development. — Roseville & Rocklin Today

Arizona State University’s College of Teacher Education and Leadership has received “Best of the West” recognition from the Western Maricopa Coalition (WESTMARC) for its innovative partnership with Teach For America, a nationally renowned organization that enlists top-level teacher prospects in the effort to eliminate educational inequality. — ASU News

Winners of the Coastal Business, Education and Technology Alliance (BETAS) 2007 Technology Awards were announced to a sold-out audience Thursday during a special gala event at Savannah Station. — Savannah Now

IT News – October 26, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 26, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: Facebook, Microsoft, HP, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

With its $240 million equity investment announced Wednesday, along with a commitment to expand its pre-existing relationship as exclusive third-party representative for advertising on Facebook, Microsoft has cemented its connection to the company Silicon Valley is obsessed with. — CNN

In 2008, HP will award nearly $7 million in cash and equipment to K-12 schools in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, and to colleges and universities throughout North America (Canada, Puerto Rico, and the U.S.). The HP Technology for Teaching Grant Initiative is designed to support the innovative use of mobile technology in K-16 education, and to help identify K-12 public schools and two- and four-year colleges and universities that HP might support with future grants. – HP

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced today $8.3 million in grants to help public libraries in 10 states provide quality access to computers and the Internet. — All American Patriots

Microsoft has rolled its Office Live Workspace technology into Live@edu, the company’s portal, communications, and collaboration suite for higher education. — Campus Technology

Schools and Programs in the News – October 25, 2007

Published by Erica Nielsen on October 25, 2007 in In the News. 0 Comments

Updates on: Capella University , Ocean County College, Ivy Tech Community College, and JSerra Catholic High School

Capella University, an accredited fully online university based in Minneapolis, has announced four new specializations: Gerontology, Early Childhood Education, Homeland Security and Security Management. — Business Wire

At Ocean County College on the coast of New Jersey, an outsourcing partnership has resulted in a popular and growing selection of online courses. — Campus Technology

Ivy Tech Community College in Indiana this month received a $3.1 million grant from the state’s North Central Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development (WIRED) initiative. The grant will be used to enhance STEM education in K-12, higher education, and businesses and will train an estimated 44,000 people in North Central Indiana over the next five years. — T.H.E. Journal

JSerra Catholic High School has deployed WiFi arrays across its Southern California campus. Xirrus deployed its arrays at the school to support the school’s laptop program and online educational tools. — T.H.E. Journal

Less Contact, Less Effort, Less Learning

Published by Erica Nielsen on September 10, 2007 in Online Learning. 0 Comments

Architecture student Kim was a senior who needed to take three upper-level courses in her major and one elective to complete her degree. She consulted with some of her friends to find out what they thought was the least challenging elective. The word in the dorm was that the school’s “Beatles” online course promised an easy A.

“The instructor sends you his lecture notes, and you just have to look at them when you’re doing the quiz. You’re not supposed to use any materials, but everyone does it.”

“You never have to go to class, and the only days you need to worry about are the three quiz days. You take the quiz from home.”

“My roommate helped me do the quizzes last semester. I would print out an extra set of lecture notes, and she’d take the odd number questions.”

The “Beatles” course was exactly what Kim was looking for. She enrolled. That semester, she spent no more than six hours of her life memorizing her instructor’s notes and regurgitating that information for the online 30-question multiple choice quizzes. She printed out lecture notes for herself and her roommate, who had agreed to help due to the 45-minute time limit.

Professor Rogers who taught the popular online “Beatles” course had decided to impose the rigid time limit after entire classes were passing with A’s. He had originally allocated a full regular class time of an hour and fifteen minutes for each quiz. Although Rogers made his students sign an honor code of conduct (via email) that they would not use notes during the quizzes, he quickly learned this was happening through course evaluation comments from more honorable students.

By the time Rogers realized there was a problem, his open-enrollment course had gained such popularity that over 300 students were enrolling in it each semester. He felt overwhelmed. How could he possibly monitor the ethical behavior of each student? He consulted with Chair Rodriguez of the Music Department. Rodriguez knew little about online education, and proposed that lessening the time to 45 minutes might be the solution, as it would encourage students to study more before each quiz. The result was an increased percentage of roommates and friends in the game of tag-team quizzing.

The fact of the matter is that when Professor Rogers tried to force learning upon students, those who did not wish to learn the materials found a solution, albeit unethical, to pass the class with flying colors. Students who followed the rules and spent time learning the materials, and took the quizzes without any notes or help from friends, routinely received lower quiz scores than those who cheated.

The main problem was that Professor Rogers did not cultivate an engaging learning environment. He believed that everyone who enrolled in his course genuinely wanted to learn about The Beatles. He assumed all students were self-driven learners. He did not take time to explore opportunities for online teacher-student and student-student interactions.

Online discussions and group activities are a critical component of e-learning, just as attendance, participation, and group projects are commonplace in the traditional classroom setting. It is important to remember that students’ interest and involvement in a given subject can be greatly influenced by positive interpersonal communication, even if they’ve come to the course in pursuit of an easy A. Many professors are still new to online education, and it is important for them to understand the variety and flexibility of resources at their fingertips in order to maximize teaching and learning.