Educational Technology

By Lexi Lieberman, Study Breaks

The controversial issue of whether or not students should be allowed to use laptops in class has had many outspoken people on both sides. Proponents of laptop use in class definitely have a compelling case. First, they argue, students can look up facts while in class, and if they find something of interest, they can share what they’ve just found online with the class or the professor. They can also use the internet or online dictionaries to verify what they may not hear correctly in lecture, such as a date of a battle or the spelling of a world leader’s name. This helps both the student and his or her peers learn better.

https://studybreaks.com/2017/09/13/should-you-be-allowed-to-use-your-laptop-in-class/

By Campus Technology
The National Security Agency (NSA) has once again launched its coding challenge, which presents an opportunity for college students to flex their coding skills and tackle national cybersecurity issues. The 2017 NSA Codebreaker Challenge sets up a fictional storyline in which unusual network activity has been detected within a large supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system that controls critical infrastructure for multiple cities. Through a series of six tasks, students must assess which systems are compromised and neutralize the threat.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/09/18/nsa-opens-annual-codebreaker-challenge-for-students.aspx

By Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology

Users today are more likely to recognize a phishing attack than they were a year ago, according to new data from Wombat Security Technologies. In the 2017 Beyond the Phish Report, the security awareness and training company analyzed the results of more than 70 million questions answered by end users who completed its assessments and training modules, covering a variety of information security topics. The users came from a range of industries, including healthcare, retail, manufacturing and education. Across all industries, users performed better this year on questions around identifying phishing attacks, answering incorrectly only 24 percent of the time on average, compared to 28 percent in 2016.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/09/19/users-getting-better-at-identifying-phishing-attacks.aspx

By Ashley A. Smith, Inside Higher Ed
A regional accreditor recently denied an Arizona community college’s bid to increase its online degree offerings, with a decision that highlights challenges colleges may face when seeking to expand their online presence. Scottsdale Community College had sought to add 48 new online certificate and degree programs. The college, which is a part of the Maricopa Community College District, had proposed gradually beginning to offer the degrees, beginning this fall and continuing through 2020. After conducting a review, the Higher Learning Commission gave the college an acceptable rating in each category for online course delivery. However, the accreditor also identified several problems, mostly revolving around inconsistency in the way Scottsdale offered its existing online programs to students. As a result, it rejected the college’s request to add the new credentials.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/09/15/accreditor-denies-arizona-community-colleges-bid-expand-online

by SEB STARCEVIC, Junkee

More and more universities are upgrading their offerings to include classes, units and whole degrees that can be completed from home – or wherever there’s internet access. As someone who has studied remotely for the better part of two years, take it from me that this arrangement has its benefits. But it’s also not for everyone.

http://junkee.com/5-things-need-know-choosing-study-online/123453

by Chloe Ortega, KRCR

The Chico Unified School District is giving students from 6th to 12th grade the option to take classes online.  Students can choose from two different online academies: The Viking Academy or The Panther Academy.  The online courses cover all classes. Students can choose to take them all online if they want to.  The school district said that they tested the program last year and found it to be successful, so they are expanding it this year.

http://www.krcrtv.com/news/local/butte/the-chico-unified-school-district-provides-online-classes/621027780

By Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology

A lack of widely available broadband is correlated to a smaller percentage of residents with college degrees or certificates. That’s the suggestion of a presentation made recently in Florida to the Higher Education Coordinating Council. The gap will hold back the state from achieving its goal of having 55 percent of its working-age population obtain a degree or professional certificate by 2025, according to Ed Moore, president of Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida. Moore’s organization has 30 non-profit institutions that deliver undergraduate, graduate, first-time professional and continuing education programs throughout the state, many of which are online.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/09/15/link-between-low-broadband-access-and-lower-degree-achievement-noted-in-florida.aspx

BY SATESH BIDAISEE, eSchool News
University increases the percentage of student retention by more than five times over the course of one year by utilizing social components in their MOOC. How do you prefer to shop? Where do you receive your news or entertainment? What medium do you use to communicate? Furthermore, can you function in your professional and/or personal life without “being online”? The suspicion is that your answers to the aforementioned questions demonstrate the inextricable linkage between all facets of our lives and the online environment. It therefore stands to reason that the online setting is relevant, applicable and essential for our education. The traditional brick and mortar physical classroom is engaging the click online platform with increasing access and availability at a local and global scale.

https://www.ecampusnews.com/curriculum/7-ways-increase-mooc-retention/

by the FBI

Internet Challenge—a free, educational program for children that teaches cyber safety—has been redesigned for the 2017-2018 school year, with new graphics and updated content. The new SOS program, created for students in third through eighth grades, covers age-appropriate topics, such as cyberbullying, passwords, malware, social media, and more. The program also provides teachers with a curriculum that meets state and federal Internet safety mandates. While taking the course, participating students “surf” their way through a variety of Internet safety challenges at each grade level, with characters guiding them through the games. The latest version of SOS allows the program to work on more devices, including tablets. The content has also been refreshed to address current cyber safety challenges, and the island-theme graphics have been updated.

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/new-safe-online-surfing-internet-challenge

by Jeff Rose, Fortune

Have you ever wondered how regular folks work up the gumption and courage to follow their dreams? Joseph Michael, a regular dad from Missouri, offers a story of redemption nearly anyone can relate to. While the entrepreneur once lived paycheck-to-paycheck, he eventually taught himself how to use popular writing software Scrivener. From there, Michael created a course to help others learn to use the tricky program to help their own writing careers. Since his early success as @ScrivenerCoach, Joseph Michael has taken the online course creation world by storm – offering courses to help fledgling writers and entrepreneurs figure out how to start the businesses of their dreams. And now, he’s living the kind of life he always wished for.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jrose/2017/09/12/how-to-make-over-100000-per-year-creating-online-courses/

by Matthew Lync, tech Edvocate

You’re about to make a huge commitment to the technology partner that will help you manage your digital learning environment, and you want to make sure that you’ve chosen the right provider for the job. If you’re not particularly well-versed about learning management systems, your search for the perfect provider can seem overwhelming. Finding the right learning management partner doesn’t have to be an ordeal.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/7-questions-ask-choosing-lms/

by Kenneth Cooper, Temple News

At the beginning of Fall 2017, some students voiced their frustration about the transition from Blackboard to Canvas on social media and among each other. With about 60 percent of the courses still being taught using Blackboard and the other 40 percent now being taught using Canvas, many students are currently using both learning management systems to navigate their courses this semester. Juggling between the two systems is leaving many students confused. Although some students are confused by the switch, Canvas has received an “overwhelmingly positive” response across campus.

http://temple-news.com/news/students-stuck-canvas-blackboard/

by Matthew Lynch, tech Edvocate

Even during lean times, school districts have been eager to invest in technology in the classroom, opening up all kinds of opportunity for edtech companies. But this market is unpredictable and influenced by many unseen factors. A major factor in the rise and fall of edtech companies is shifting educational policies. On a national and regional level, such policies have influenced the edtech market profoundly.  Here are a few examples which demonstrate this influence.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/education-policy-shapes-edtech-market/

BY THOMAS ARNETT, eSchool News
The future of learning technology is not replacing teachers, but amplifying their ability to meet the learning needs of their students. A recent chart from Bloomberg on the future of artificial intelligence and employment lends evidence to a point I have been making for years: teachers will not be replaced by machines. The chart compares a wide array of professions based on required education levels, average annual wages, and likelihood of automation. Sure enough, elementary and secondary teachers are among the most educated yet least paid professionals; and their likelihood of automation: practically zero. Yet the debate about machines replacing teachers rages on. Recent opinion pieces claim that teacher obsolescence is inevitable and something we should embrace. Fortunately, a recent article in the Economist gets the narrative right, pointing out that “the potential for edtech will be realized only if teachers embrace it.”

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2017/09/12/change-teacher-vs-tech-narrative/

BY LAURA ASCIONE, eSchool News
AR’s potential to increase classroom engagement is expanding. By now, most educators are familiar with augmented reality (AR) and its application in the classroom. And as it grows in popularity, its potential in the classroom grows, too. Augmented reality overlays digital information on top of an existing environment, and the AR device market is expected to reach more than $659 million by 2018, according to an infographic that analyzes AR’s potential for the classroom. Fun fact: One of the first commercial applications of AR technology was the yellow first down line that started appearing in televised NFL games in the late 1990s. Google glass and heads-up displays in car windshields are probably the most well-known consumer AR products, but the technology is used in other industries, such as marketing, health care, tourism and public safety.

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2017/09/12/uses-k-12-classroom-ar/

BY LAURA ASCIONE, eSchool News
Annual report documents how different ed-tech trends and challenges shape K-12 education Coding as a literacy and the rise of STEAM learning are two key trends driving K-12 technology adoption for the next 1-2 years, according to the latest New Media Consortium and CoSN Horizon Report. The report is organized into 6 key trends, 6 significant challenges, and 6 developments in edtech that are going to impact K-12 teaching, learning and creative inquiry. Overall, the report series tracks the five-year impact that innovative practices and new technologies have on K-12 education.

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2017/09/13/edtech-k12-technology/

By Joshua Bolkan, Campus Technology
Nearly four in five, 77 percent, of education institutions are unprepared for IT risks, according to a new survey from Netwrix. Respondents told researchers that employees are the biggest threat to system availability and security at the same rate, 77 percent and 79 percent said that they do not use any software for information security or risk management.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/09/08/most-ed-institutions-unprepared-for-data-risks.aspx

By Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology

Any faculty member who has looked out at a sea of open laptops in class can tell you that the devices are the go-to technology for college and university students today. In fact, 57 percent of respondents in our 2017 Teaching with Technology Survey, which asked faculty to dish on their experiences with technology in the classroom, singled out laptops as the No. 1 favorite computing device used by their students. Mobile phones came in second, cited by 33 percent of respondents.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/09/06/faculty-say-laptops-mobile-phones-are-most-popular-student-devices.aspx

BY MELANIE MORGAN, eSchool News
A kindergarten teacher working on a military base shares her best practices for connecting with ELL students and their parents. As more and more ELL students enter the U.S. public school system, teachers are facing the twofold challenge of communicating not only with these students, but with their families as well. After all, non-English-speaking families have the same desires as native English speakers to know how their child is doing academically, emotionally, and socially.

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2017/09/11/build-community-ell-school/

By Joshua Bolkan, THE Journal

Shipments of wearable devices continued to improve in the second quarter of 2017, showing a 10.3 percent improvement over the same period last year, according to a new report from International Data Corp. (IDC). The quarter saw 26.3 million shipments and was also the first period in which basic wearables — those that do not run third-party apps — saw a decline with negative 0.9 percent growth year over year. Smartwatches, on the other hand, saw strong growth at 60.9 percent. “The transition towards more intelligent and feature-filled wearables is in full swing,” said Jitesh Ubrani senior research analyst for IDC Mobile Device Trackers, in a prepared statement.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2017/09/01/smartwatches-overtake-fitness-trackers.aspx

By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal

According to the report, most of the international students attending high school in this country ultimately expect to enroll in higher education here as well and view their U.S. studies as a leg up on gaining acceptance to the colleges and universities they want to attend. The thinking among families of international students is that the experiences they have of learning in U.S. classrooms, the immersion they receive in English-language instruction and the adjustment they get to American life prior to college “can ease the transition of international students moving from U.S. high schools to higher education.” The largest group of students holding F-1 visas — 78 percent — come from one area of the globe: East Asia. In particular, students from China dominate, making up 58 percent of all international high school students, followed by a smaller number coming from South Korea (7 percent).

https://thejournal.com/articles/2017/09/05/international-high-school-students-represent-post-secondary-opportunity.aspx