Techno-News Blog

by Hallie Busta, Education Dive
Land grant and other large research universities are taking on the mantle of workforce development and fostering entrepreneurship — long the domain of community colleges and vocational programs — and that federal government partnerships are essential to doing so, the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities explained in a policy position paper released Wednesday. The paper discusses five areas that universities and federal policymakers must address to ensure higher education institutions are meeting workforce needs. Those include supporting rural communities, establishing American leadership in advanced manufacturing, and bolstering innovation and entrepreneurship within institutions. The high-level recommendations are intended as a reference point for progress achieved by partnerships to date as well as a jumping-off point for future collaborations.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/workforce-development-entrepreneurship-are-growing-priorities-for-public-r/531685/

By Catalin Cimpanu, ZDnet
After celebrating Chrome’s ten-year anniversary on Sunday, Google released today version 69 of the Chrome browser, one of the most feature-rich versions in recent years. With today’s release, Chrome now joins Mozilla and Microsoft as browser makers who completely redesigned their browsers. Firefox went through two major UI updates with the Aurora and Quantum releases, Microsoft replaced Internet Explorer with the lighter Edge, and, today, Google gave Chrome its first major facelift since its release in 2008. This new user interface is easy to spot because it uses a predominantly white color tone along with rounded tabs, a big shift from Chrome’s regular grayish UI with angled tabs.

https://www.zdnet.com/article/chrome-69-released-with-new-ui-and-random-password-generator/

by Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology

Lumen Learning has created an online resource to help proponents of open educational resources make the case for OER use on campus. The OER Champion Playbook offers a collection of ideas, tips and tools for building effective OER initiatives. The content spans five categories: Making the Case for OER; Measuring Impact with OER; Building Awareness & Enthusiasm; Supporting Faculty through Change; and Sustaining Change & Impact. Each category provides a variety of suggested activities, each with links to additional information, worksheets, examples and more.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/09/04/new-resource-offers-ideas-for-advocating-oer-adoption.aspx

by Business Standard
Teachers play a vital role in the process of learning as they impart education and encourage students towards reaching their ambition. The disruption in the education sector and living in an age where digital learning has impacted almost everyone around us. Virtual Tutors have gained popularity due to its effective teaching methods where a student is not bound to time or location. These methods have been very fruitful for this digitally influenced generation as it creates a platform where a student can interact, learn and grow along with the learners from different parts of the world.

https://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ani/platforms-that-support-as-virtual-tutors-in-new-age-education-system-118090300598_1.html

By Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology

Imagine the process of going into a restaurant and ordering food. Simultaneously, you could be glancing through the menu while also listening to and speaking with the waiter or your companions. When you’re in a place where people are speaking a different language, the complexity of those activities increases multifold. A project taking place at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) hopes to understand how the use of an immersive environment and artificial intelligence can help students practice foreign language skills and increase their confidence when speaking. The researchers are using simulated experiences to test out their ideas. The Cognitive Immersive Room, or “situation room,” allows students to feel as though they’re in restaurant in China, a garden or a Tai Chi class. While immersed in the environment, they practice speaking Mandarin with an AI chat agent powered by IBM Watson. The immersive classroom was developed by the Cognitive and Immersive Systems Lab, a research collaboration between IBM Research and RPI. The space taps several technologies: speech-to-text, natural language understanding and computer vision.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/08/29/students-get-immersive-ai-boost-to-learn-mandarin.aspx

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

We have come a long way from chalkboards and gradebooks. When you take a look at today’s modern classroom, you will find edtech taking over – Smartboards and mobile devices are becoming commonplace in the classroom. And, now, teachers are embracing another form of technology: the digital assistant. We are using digital assistants, such as Siri and Alexa, in our daily lives, so why not use them in the classroom? Just as they help us navigate our lives with reminders and directions, they can help our students navigate lessons. Still unconvinced? Here are seven reasons to use a digital assistant in your classroom:

7 Reasons to Use a Digital Assistant (like Alexa) in Your Classroom

by Tom Vander Ark, Forbes
Juha Mikkola, co-founder of Wyncode Academy, a coding school, said some developers are being paid double the going rate for their blockchain experience. “It’s not just tech companies that need this talent, it’s real-estate, non-profits, and banks,” Mikkola said. Leading university computer science programs have been quick to respond. According to new research, 42 percent of the top 50 universities in the world offer at least one course on cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. MIT offers a six-week online blockchain certificate program (in partnership with 2U). Oxford offers a similar six-week certificate program (also powered by 2U).

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomvanderark/2018/09/01/learning-blockchain/#1e107701b04f

by Anant Agarwal, Forbes

Today, there’s a new shift happening in our digital and service-focused economy: rapid skills transformation. The job market is changing so rapidly that the skills needed to perform these jobs transform every few years, intensifying pressure on workers to learn continually and, in some cases, transition entirely into new and emerging fields. EdX recently conducted a survey of 1,000 consumers aged 25-44 and found that 29% of respondents had completely changed fields since starting their first job post-college. Strikingly, only about 20% of those surveyed said that the education from their college major still applied to their current field. The career fluidity illustrated by this survey is a far cry from factory workers who’d spend decades at the same station.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/anantagarwal/2018/08/29/how-is-the-skills-transformation-impacting-modern-work/#75273d6c25ff

BY STACEY PUSEY, eSchool News

The program, which is taught by Seton Hall law students, targets students in fifth and sixth grade, typically the age when they get their first cell phone. It’s a time when parents feel like they are losing control of their kids, yet the kids still have the capability to learn good technology habits. Since students are getting phones at younger and younger ages, they don’t have the cognitive ability to understand the ramifications of their actions and need parental guidance. Thus, the program has both a student curriculum and parent talk. Parents need to learn what privacy really means in the digital world and how their tech usage affects their children. The program focuses on collaboration and helping students and parents discuss good technology habits together.

This cool new program helps kids develop better tech habits

by James Paterson, Education Dive

Enrollment experts caution: Don’t make assumptions. Adult learners typically bring a wider variety of concerns and struggles — as well as strengths and skills — than do traditional prospects. Thomas Gibbons, dean of the School of Continuing Studies at Northwestern University, said colleges must develop deliberate efforts to better understand adult learners and their concerns. Wayne Smutz, dean of the Extension program at the University of California, Los Angeles, said colleges need to show these students — perhaps even more so than traditional students — how they can pay for their education and how their investment will pay off.  “Time is a critical resource for adult learners,” he said. “Having to stand in line, being put on hold on the telephone for extended periods of time, and other delays or confusing messages are critical problems for adults. Universities need to find ways to have expedited services.”

https://www.educationdive.com/news/higher-ed-administrators-can-better-serve-adult-learners-heres-how/530932/

by Tripti Rai, LifeHack

Being a perfect communicator comes with time and experience after being in a series of difficult situations. Everyone of us, no matter which geographical area we belong to, more often than not, face similar issues in our career that tend to shape us as either a good communicator or a bad one. Lack of communication skills is one of the most misunderstood terms. It is rarely about the language proficiency or how much you fumble when you talk. It is more about how we voice out and react to an unfavorable situation that stands in front of us. Knowing how to react in a situation helps gives us the confidence that ultimately shapes us as good communicators and even leaders. In this article, we will be looking at the different situations that we come across everyday, which helps define us as good communicators or bad ones. Along with every situation, we have mentioned a link to the course/website you can visit to better the situation at hand and come out as an expert communicator.

https://www.lifehack.org/785450/online-learning-sites

By Trudy Doleman, APUS

Just as you hit your stride finding the right balance between study times, work, family and personal time — something happens. It could be a 24-hour illness, an increase in your workload, a death in the family or even an unexpected deployment to a part of the world with spotty Internet connectivity at best. Any number of factors have the potential to cause you to miss at least one of your weekly class deadlines. Before you know it, one missed assignment grows into several missed assignments and you have fallen way behind in your class. What are your options? Is it possible to recover and complete the class? Yes, it is possible to recover and there are several options available to you.

How to Get Back on Track in Your Class after Falling Behind

by Kevin Carey, Washington Monthly

A few universities are using predictive analytics to boost student success. Are they outliers—or the wave of the future? USF and a small but growing number of colleges and universities are at the forefront of using information technology and advanced statistical analysis to see students in whole new ways. By sifting through vast stores of information that have accumulated in various administrative and educational data systems, they are discovering patterns about students that they never knew about before—why some succeed while others fail, and what can be done to help them. As a result, they’re starting to crack the stubborn, widespread problem of high college dropout rates, and point toward a future where besieged public institutions can continue to thrive.

https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/september-october-2018/why-more-colleges-should-treat-students-like-numbers/

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

The days of teachers writing on the whiteboards behind them are quickly becoming a thing of the past because technologically advanced schools are using learning glass to deliver lectures. Lectures are not usually the most exciting delivery method for instruction, but the traditional lecture method can be improved exponentially with a learning glass. Learning glass allows for dramatic illumination of ideas in lectures. The latest in presentation board technology consists of two sheets of glass framed by LED lights. Fluorescent marker ink attracts and refracts the LED light. The instructor stands behind the glass to illustrate essential points in lectures.

Using a Learning Glass to Deliver Exciting Lectures

By Nicol Turner-Lee, Brookings

Digital exclusion comes with costs. Rural residents are at risk of being marginalized in an information-rich economy where digital transactions and commercial sharing services are becoming more relevant. Already facing diminished life chances, people with lower incomes, people of color, the elderly, and foreign-born migrants in rural areas run the risk of being on the wrong side of the digital divide that further exacerbates their economic, social, and political marginalization.

https://www.brookings.edu/longform/closing-the-digital-and-economic-divides-in-rural-america/

By Dennis Pierce, Alice Hathaway, THE Journal
Artificial intelligence could have a profound impact on learning, but it also raises key questions. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are no longer fantastical prospects seen only in science fiction. Products like Amazon Echo and Siri have brought AI into many homes, and experts say it’s only a matter of time before the technology has a profound impact in education, as well. Already, there are interactive tutors and adaptive learning programs that use AI to personalize instruction for students, and AI is also helping to simplify some administrative tasks. But Kelly Calhoun Williams, an education analyst for the technology research firm Gartner Inc., cautions there is a clear gap between the promise of AI and the reality of AI.

“That’s to be expected, given the complexity of the technology,” she said.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/08/29/the-promise-of-ai-for-education.aspx

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

If there is one institution in America that is resistant to change, it just might be higher education.  It’s surely a challenge to reimagine and transform higher education, but there are several emerging trends in edtech that might positively impact what happens on America’s college campuses—and beyond. First, the maker movement is poised to impact higher education in a big way…. Second, with online classes increasing at a rapid rate, it’s time to rethink learning management systems…. Third, LMS (Learning Management Systems) aren’t the only issues with online classes that need to be addressed.

Reimagining and Transforming Educational Learning Environments in Higher Education

by Bill Bergman, eCampus News
For educators who find today’s classrooms eerily quiet with students hiding behind their laptops, I recommend taking a break next summer from international travel or the usual research activities. Consider teaching a course online and joining students in their digital world. There is no better way to understand how college students communicate and relate to one another than to spend a summer session with them online.

The best way to get close to students? Teach a course online

by Mark Lieberman, Inside Higher Ed
Faculty members often worry that making digital courses accessible to all students will be too time-consuming or expensive — but some of their colleagues want to convince them otherwise. Faculty champions can be inspired as much by individual experiences with students as by their engagement with the broad topic of inclusion. Dustin De Felice, assistant professor and director of the master’s program in foreign language teaching at Michigan State, felt wounded after a student complained late in the semester that she couldn’t take online quizzes because she suffered from extreme vertigo when staring at screens for more than a few minutes. The student ended up failing the class and struggling the next semester as well, De Felice said. Now De Felice encourages colleagues to invite him to discuss pathways to accessibility. He gets fewer takers than he’d like, but he always eagerly agrees when asked. He brings two different copies of the same syllabus — one that’s been run through an electronic disability checker, and another that hasn’t. He lets a screen reader interpret both to show attendees the difference.

https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2018/08/29/faculty-champions-accessibility-shed-doubts-about-investing-time

By Cynthia Silva, TED-Ed Blog

All over the world, there’s growing consensus that our education systems are broken. Here are 5 TED Talks from educators who want to transform how students are taught:

http://blog.ed.ted.com/2018/07/03/5-game-changing-ted-talks-about-education/

By Greg Toppo, Inside Higher Ed

The details are laid out in documents obtained via a records request to the U.S. Department of Education by the Century Foundation, which said the requirements make Purdue University Global “perhaps the first and only public institution to strip students of their legal rights.” The Century Foundation is well-known for challenging for-profit colleges’ policies. In a statement, Tim Doty, a Purdue spokesperson, said Purdue Global “does have an arbitration agreement that it inherited from Kaplan. Whether it continues to employ this policy is ultimately up to the Purdue Board of Trustees which has complete control over Purdue Global, and has the final say as to which policies it retains, and which it alters.

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2018/08/29/purdue-global-demands-students-waive-right-sue