Techno-News Blog

by Ari Levy, CNBC

Cryptocurrencies use cryptography to secure transactions and track the transfer of digital money. “A lot of people are attracted to the huge valuations in these currencies,” said Dan Boneh, co-director of the Stanford Computer Security Lab and a professor of cryptography. Boneh said that security and cryptography represent the second-most popular subject in the university’s computer science department, behind only machine learning.  Across the country in Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon’s Vipul Goyal is using Boneh’s interactive online textbook for a class called Special Topics in Cryptography that the school is offering for the first time this year. About 20 students, mostly PhD candidates, are taking the class, which focuses on blockchain and cryptocurrencies. The trend is not just limited to these two universities: the University of California at Berkeley launched a class last year called the Cryptocurrency Decal, and in 2015 the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab established the Digital Currency Initiative.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/30/crypto-classes-popular-at-stanford-cmu-thanks-to-bitcoin-craze.html

By Olena Reid, US News

Many times I’ve heard someone say that online degrees aren’t as legitimate or rigorous as on-campus programs. But that mostly comes from those who have never experienced an online course, whether in a structured program or a single class. I want to debunk this notion that online education is always easier than in-person studies. Generally, when we think of an “easier” degree program, we may think of one that takes less time and effort and doesn’t hold students to high standards. Consider these three facts about online degree programs to see how far that is from the truth.

https://www.usnews.com/education/online-learning-lessons/articles/2017-10-30/debunk-the-myth-that-online-degrees-are-always-easier

by NMC Horizon Project

Digital Literacy in Higher Education, Part II: An NMC Horizon Project Strategic Brief is a follow-up to the 2016 strategic brief, supported by Adobe, which explored an increasingly pressing challenge for United States higher education institutions: advancing digital literacy among students and faculty. This second edition aims to examine digital literacy through a global and discipline-specific lens to reveal new contexts that are shaping the way learners create, discover, and critically assess digital content. The NMC’s research examines the current landscape of digital literacy frameworks to illuminate its multiple dimensions — technical, psychological, and interpersonal — around which students’ ability to produce new content generates a sense of empowerment.

https://www.nmc.org/publication/digital-literacy-part-ii-an-nmc-horizon-project-strategic-brief/

by China Daily

On a weekend morning in Beijing, Youyou, 7, clicked an app on her iPad, greeted her teacher in the United States, and started her one-on-one online English lesson at home. Having two lessons a week－each lasting about 20 minutes－the first-grade primary school student had been studying this way for almost three months. Her mother, Amy Chang, who had sat with Youyou during all her the lessons, was particularly happy with her performance this time. “She’s getting more used to the teaching approach, mastering the knowledge faster and interacting better with the teacher from afar,” said Chang, who pays about 200 yuan ($30) per online lesson.

https://technology.inquirer.net/68567/china-online-classes-kids-gaining-popularity

by Seamus Conwell, CNBC

Financial professionals are taking online financial technology (fintech) courses to fend off competition and stay ahead of disruption. The boost in uptake is due in part to a feeling among those in the industry that financial technology has reached a turning point in its evolution. A report from Citigroup in 2016 caused widespread debate when it estimated that between 2 million and 6 million jobs would be lost in banking across the U.S. and Europe over the next 10 years. That was attributed to both automation and artificial intelligence (AI), innovation and the rise of more efficient and less cost-intensive challenger banks.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/30/financial-pros-flock-to-online-fintech-courses.html

BY LILY O’NEILL, Missourian
Beginning next week, professors will have more incentive to offer free or low-cost textbooks. As part of a University of Missouri System initiative on educational resources that are free to access online, the four campuses will be launching an incentive grant program next week. This is intended to encourage faculty members to incorporate more of these resources in their courses. With the rising cost of college textbooks, UM System President Mun Choi announced the initiative last spring. Scott Curtis, who’s on the system’s Affordable & Open Educational Resources Taskforce, said he hopes the lower costs of textbooks will help students academically.

https://www.columbiamissourian.com/news/higher_education/um-system-encourages-faculty-to-use-more-open-educational-resources/article_b602a3dc-b9d3-11e7-adfb-2f83e6711418.html

BY GENEVRA WALTERS, NICOLE DEVRIES, AND JAMIE HARBIN, eSchool News
Three educators explain how they include career readiness in their 21st-century learning initiatives. Many of you are familiar with the four C’s of the 21st-century learning framework: collaboration, communication, critical thinking, and creativity. But step back for a second and remember why you teach students in the first place–so they can be successful adults who contribute to society and thrive while pursuing a fulfilling career. This is why we add to our list of 21st-century learning skills a fifth C: career readiness. Career readiness can be engrained into the teaching and learning landscape in many ways. Educators across the nation are latching on to project-based learning (PBL) as an effective teaching method for building 21st-century skills. Career-focused PBL gives students the freedom to explore a variety of careers from the comfort of their classroom.

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2017/10/25/future-5th-c-career-readiness/

By David Raths, Campus Technologies

Before 2009, the IT leadership team at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, KS, was stuck in a vicious cycle of falling behind on technology infrastructure replacements, squeaking by with patches and maintenance on older systems. Without a dedicated funding stream, IT floundered — and faculty, staff and students had low expectations of what technology could bring to the campus. Something as simple as video streaming in the classroom was difficult because of poor network infrastructure. Flash forward to 2017: An ongoing and sustainable infrastructure rebuild, including working with cloud and hosted vendors, is reshaping the culture within the IT group and the perception of IT on campus. How has the department made this transition and had such a great impact?

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/10/26/getting-beyond-the-vicious-cycle-of-outdated-it.aspx

by WRAL

Online college courses offer convenience and flexibility, but they also come with challenges. Wake Technical Community College looked at some of its most popular classes in 2015 and noticed students were not doing as well in the online classes as they were in the traditional “seated” classes. In 2015, 67 percent of students in traditional classes earned an “A”, “B” or “C” grade, while only 58 percent of students in online classes earned the same grades.  One of the things we found out is students, even young students, who had grown up as digital natives aren’t as well prepared for taking online classes as you may think,” said Wake Tech Senior Vice President of Effectiveness and Innovation Bryan Ryan.

http://www.wral.com/wake-tech-works-to-improve-success-gap-between-seated-online-classes/17058000/

by eMarketer Daily

A September 2017 survey of young adult internet users in select countries painted an interesting—and yet unsurprising—picture of their typical day-to-day interactions. The study from LivePerson, a provider of cloud-based mobile and online business messaging solutions, surveyed 4,013 internet users ages 18 to 34 in six countries: Australia, Germany, France, Japan, the UK and the US.  In the US and the UK, nearly three-quarters of respondents said they were more likely to communicate digitally—whether via email, SMS or social media—rather than in person.

https://www.emarketer.com/Article/Spoiler-Alert-Millennials-Prefer-Digital-All-Communications/1016677

by Jeff Butts, Mac Observer
Programming can be a very rewarding endeavor, but most people don’t know how to get started. With so many options available, most of which quite frankly suck, folks need to know which educational coding apps are worth the space they take up on their iOS devices. The Terminal Tinkerer is coming to the rescue with my top five apps for learning to code.

https://www.macobserver.com/tips/quick-tip/learning-to-code-fun-easy-5-apps/

by Mark Hall, Forbes

For many young adults, the process of transitioning into the corporate workforce can be met with a number of difficult challenges. Gaining role-specific education is not easy, particularly if you are trying to avoid being part of the $1.3 trillion student debt crisis. Convincing a great company to hire you without having a track record of success is no simple task either. Landing a highly competitive job without having either a university degree or prior work experience used to be practically impossible, until now. Three Silicon Valley companies are improving how emerging professionals become job-ready by filling the practical skills gap felt by so many workforce newcomers. Coursera, Udacity and Udemy are three alternative education platforms, known as massive open online courses (MOOCs), on a mission to redefine workplace readiness and industry-specific education.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/markhall/2017/10/27/three-silicon-valley-companies-bridging-the-gap-between-education-and-workplace-readiness/

by EDUCAUSE

In 2017, our annual student technology survey coincides with our biennial faculty technology survey, giving us the opportunity to directly compare the technology attitudes, experiences, and preferences of these two groups. Although there is considerable overlap in student and faculty opinions about technology, the differences highlighted here reflect their respective roles and present the actionable opportunities for IT leaders. Tens of thousands of respondents participated in the EDUCAUSE student and faculty studies to shape the higher education IT community’s understanding of higher education technology use in 2017.

https://library.educause.edu/~/media/files/library/2017/9/studentst2017infog.pdf

by JACKIE MADER, Hechinger Report
A report released last month by EducationSuperHighway, a nonprofit focused on improving internet access, found Mississippi has made progress in providing all students access to high-speed internet service. Although Mississippi is still ranked among the bottom five of all states when it comes to connectivity, more than 158,000 students have gained access to high-speed internet since 2015. The improvement comes as many districts are expanding or launching programs that give students access to a digital device each day. At the same time, some schools are using or seeking out technology to increase course offerings and improve access to subjects that have been given the short shrift in an era of standardized testing. Here’s a look at a few efforts to use technology to improve opportunity for students.

http://hechingerreport.org/mississippi-schools-use-online-resources-technology-expand-course-offerings/

By Deirdre Fernandes, Boston Globe

This is the life of a virtual adjunct professor: Teaching is done online, students and instructors are connected by e-mail, and a laptop with a camera is as essential as a textbook. “My office door is always open,” said Bloom, who is currently teaching for George Washington University and preparing to start a course for Ohio University in the coming weeks. In the past, she has also worked for Salem State University. “I’m only an e-mail away,” she said. The portion of online courses taught by adjunct faculty — part-time professors who don’t receive benefits and aren’t on the tenure track — is increasingly significant, said Andrew Magda, manager for market research at Learning House Inc., an education technology company.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/10/23/adjuncts-help-colleges-expand-their-online-programs/UyW2yEnAMIpV3S0DIaUbiN/story.html

by Richard W. Walker, EdScoop

College students increasingly want more online technology in their learning environments, but many faculty members are wary of incorporating blended learning into their courses, according to the Educause Center for Analysis and Research’s (ECAR) 2017 separately published companion surveys of student and faculty trends in the use of information technology. “The best things in life are free, but students want technology. And they want their instructors to use more of it in their courses,” the ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology 2017 reported. “Resistance is futile. Students’ preferences for courses that assimilate both face-to-face instructional components with technological features of the online environment continue to gain momentum across higher education.”

http://edscoop.com/college-students-want-more-technology-ecar-survey

by SHIVALI BEST, Daily Mail

The idea of a headband you can wear to make you smarter may sound like a device from the latest science fiction blockbuster. But experts have revealed such a device in reality – and claim it could increase learning by 40 per cent. And it may not be long before you can get your hands on one, with the designers predicting its use will be common in just five to ten years. The device, which is described as ‘non-invasive transcranial direct current stimulation’ (tDCS) was designed by researchers from HRL Laboratories and McGill University in Montreal, with funding from the Defense Advance Research Project Agency (DARPA). The device applies a current to an area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex. This causes changes in connectivity between different brain areas, and increases learning.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5008179/Darpa-reveals-device-increases-learning-40.html

By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal

People researching education technology and learning science — cyberlearning — populate the landscape. A new report from the Center for Innovative Research in Cyberlearning has undertaken the ambitious project of sifting through what those researchers are exploring to uncover the major trends and help us understand where education — pre-K-12 and post-secondary — may be headed over the next decade or two. According to “Cyberlearning Community Report: The State of Cyberlearning and the Future of Learning with Technology,” this work stretches beyond research on whether 1-to-1 programs work or if gaming can accelerate improved learning outcomes. Among the questions those hundreds of research projects are attempting to answer are these: How will students “use their bodies and minds to learn what will be important in the 21st century, such as collaboration, scientific argumentation, mathematical reasoning, computational thinking, creative expression, design thinking and civic engagement?”

https://thejournal.com/articles/2017/10/23/cyberlearning-research-report-peeks-into-future-of-ed-tech.aspx