Educational Technology

By Danny Palmer, ZD Net

Operation by Bitdefender, the Romanian Police,DIICOT and Europol provides decryption keys for one of the most aggressive forms of ransomware seen this year. Victims of one the newest – and most unusual – families of ransomware could now be able to recover their files without giving into the demands of criminals because decryption tools have been released for free. A GandCrab ransomware decryption tool has been released as part of the No More Ransom initiative, following a combined operation by Bitdefender, the Romanian Police, the Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) and Europol.

http://www.zdnet.com/article/hit-by-ransomware-this-new-free-decryption-tool-for-gandcrab-might-help/

by Jordan Novet, CNBC

A file that Apple updated on its website last month provides the first acknowledgment that it’s relying on Google’s public cloud for data storage for its iCloud services. The disclosure is fresh evidence that Google’s cloud has been picking up usage as it looks to catch up with Amazon and Microsoft in the cloud infrastructure business. Some media outlets reported on Google’s iCloud win in 2016, but Apple never provided confirmation.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/26/apple-confirms-it-uses-google-cloud-for-icloud.html

by Jill Barshay, Hechinger Report

Data released from the statistics division of the U.S. Department of Education earlier this month points out that a college education can still be a lever of social mobility. Even college graduates whose parents had never attended any college at all were still working at the same rates and earning the same salaries, on average, as their peers with better-educated parents.  Consider students who graduated from college with a four-year bachelor’s degree during the 2007-08 academic year. Five years later, in 2012, the majority of these young college graduates had full-time jobs. For those whose parents had never attended any college, often referred to as “first-generation” students, 57 percent were working full time and earning $45,000 a year, on average. For those who had at least one parent who had attended some college, 58 percent were working full time and earning $43,000.

http://hechingerreport.org/new-research-offers-hope-first-generation-college-grads/

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Students who graduate from high school nowadays will be entering a workforce that is different from generations past. Because of this, schools must prepare these students for the digital workforce of today and tomorrow. How do school districts accomplish this? What should they be teaching students? Don’t worry; I have you covered. This article describes those digital literacy skills paramount to success in any career.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/schools-prepare-next-generation-enter-digital-workforce/

by Natalie Bruzda, Nevada Review- Journal

WGU has been educating students in online classrooms since 1998, when the internet was still in its infancy. Even more revolutionary at the time, however, was the school’s competency-based approach to learning.  But Spencer Stewart, chancellor of WGU Nevada — one of eight WGU state affiliates, with WGU Ohio coming on-line this spring — said interest in competency-based education is growing. “What’s fascinating to me is that on a national level, competency-based education is starting to get more and more traction,” Stewart said. “With the Higher Education Act being debated and discussed in Congress, a good portion of that is dedicated to new ways of teaching and learning. WGU really serves as the pioneer in this space.”

Nevada university eyes student success in online schooling

BY MATTHEW LYNCH, Tech Edvocate

One of the hardest tasks that a principal has to perform is hiring teachers. I know that this may seem a bit far-fetched, but when you hire a new teacher, it is hard to determine if you are getting a star or a dud. This happens because teacher education programs don’t do an excellent job of consistently graduating good teachers. That’s why the task of hiring quality “future-ready” teachers is so difficult. We decided to make this task a little easier by developing a list of 5 questions that principals should ask when attempting to hire “future ready” educators. Let us know what you think.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/5-questions-principals-ask-hiring-future-ready-teachers/

by Sue Ann Rybak, Chestnut Hill Local

The Philadelphia School Reform Commission (SRC) voted Feb. 15 to give roughly $20 million to outside vendors for virtual classes and data collection rather than allocating those funds to address and fix infrastructure-related environmental hazards district wide and hiring experienced certified teachers, counselors and librarians.

SRC votes to spend $20 million for online learning

by Matthew Lynch, tech Edvocate

If you are looking for an easy learning management system for your classroom, then consider Google Classroom. As Google explains, “Classroom is a free web service for schools, non-profits, and anyone with a personal Google Account. Classroom makes it easy for learners and instructors to connect—inside and outside of schools.” This free platform makes it easy to store files, go paperless, and work with students throughout the learning process. Here is what you need to know to use Google Classroom.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/use-google-classroom/

by BusinessWire

The results of the ISHA Online Learning Program have far exceeded original expectations, and have helped provide humanitarians the skills needed to provide assistance to communities across Syria. Results to date include:

13,050 learners in five key countries, including Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey
4,912 learners in Syria
99,150 online course registrations
21,126 online course completions
ISHA will continue to provide support for all learners using DisasterReady, and will source new content, as well as explore opportunities to collaborate on new content development projects pending funding availability.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180223005064/en/DisasterReady.org-Releases-Results-Online-Learning-Program-Addresses

BY BILLY KOBIN, Sacramento Bee

Seeking to help disadvantaged students, the University of California announced an expansion Wednesday of its online learning program that provides high school students with free access to courses required for admission into state universities. The UC Scout program will now offer 65 online classes and 26 Advanced Placement classes. The expansion of the program, which seeks to close ethnic and racial achievement gaps in California, was made possible with $4 million in the 2016-17 state budget, according to a news release.

http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article201387489.html

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Being an education leader has always be hard. But in the digital age, the stakes have been increased. So how can digital leaders best this gargantuan challenge? Here are my tips for being the best education leader that you can be in this digital age.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/9-tips-education-leader-digital-age/

By Joel Hruska, Extreme Tech

For 13 years, smartphones have been a massive success story. Year after year, we’ve seen companies rolling out new products at a variety of price points and market positions. From 2004 to Q3 2017, smartphone sales grew year-on-year, even through the Great Recession. Q4 2017 put at least a temporary end to that trend. Gartner reports smartphone sales fell 5.8 percent in Q4 2017 compared with Q4 2016. It’s tempting to write this off as ordinary variance, but when the market has shown no such variation in the past 51 quarters, it’s harder to hand-wave the figure. It’s especially more difficult because, in theory, we should still be seeing robust growth given that there are huge untapped markets for devices across India and China.

https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/264482-global-sales-smartphones-fallen-first-time-ever

by Rebecca Blanchette, Carnegie Com

As higher ed institutions assess their website’s accessibility, images are a big factor for both ADA compliance and SEO. When it comes to ADA compliance on your website, images are a huge factor that must be addressed to ensure accessibility. Not only that, but making your images accessible can also make them more visible in search engines. In some ways, SEO and ADA compliance for your website actually go hand-in-hand. When a screen reader hits an image on a web page, it reads aloud that image’s alt tag or text. If you’re familiar with SEO at all, think of this as the meta description for your image. If your image does not have alt text, then the screen reader will pass it by, meaning that your site is not accessible to all users.

https://www.carnegiecomm.com/blog/are-your-college-or-universitys-website-images-ada-compliant/

BY LAURA ASCIONE, eCampus News

Women in STEM jobs are more likely to experience hostile work environments, including discrimination and sexual harassment, according to a new nationally-representative Pew Research Center study. Research in the study reveals that gender “is perceived as more of an impediment than an advantage to career success.” Women in three particular groups are more likely to see workplace inequities: women who are employed in STEM settings where men outnumber women, women who work in computer jobs, and women who hold postgraduate degrees.

Do women in STEM experience hostile work environments?

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

The ‘flipped classroom’ is a phenomenon that college professors often use to vary and to enhance their students’ learning experience. It involves asking students to engage with content such as a video or an online article before the class, rather than (as is traditionally the case) introducing these learning materials in the class itself, and then using the class solely as discussion time for analyzing these digital materials. Flipping the classroom is often also known as blended learning as it blends class based and home-based learning, and online and offline learning materials. It is called flipped learning because it flips the traditional structure of the class. Did you know that this teaching tool can also be used to promote good quality faculty development? Here are three ways to flip faculty development in higher education.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/flip-faculty-development-higher-education/

By David Nagel, THE Journal

Minecraft: Education Edition has received a new resource pack designed to let students learn chemistry within the game itself. Resources also include new lessons and activities, a teacher lab book, a downloadable world and community support. The Chemistry Resource Pack includes a range of features for teachers and students to explore science within the game, including an Element Constructor, which allows users “to create elements based on their atomic structure with sliders to choose the number of protons, neutrons and electrons. By using the Element Constructor, you can create 118 elements from the Periodic Table as well as over 400 stable isotopes,” according to the developer.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/02/21/minecraft-chemistry-update-goes-live.aspx

by Standard Digital

Our phones can easily mimic a classroom. You can watch videos, listen to podcasts, read slides and comment on lectures in real time. The following three apps combine all these experiences to deliver a real-world portable classroom that enables you to sharpen your skills on the go, giving you that ever-elusive edge in tackling business challenges.

https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/article/2001270570/three-apps-that-bring-the-classroom-to-your-smartphone

by Dom Galeon, Futurism

Cybersecurity has become one of today’s more pressing issues, and it’s likely to get worse in the future. That’s why the secretary-general of the U.N. is now calling for nations to come up with clearer rules to protect civilians from hacking. Cyber warfare could simply end up becoming a race for a better technology. Guterres’ plea becomes all the more urgent when viewed with an eye for the future: “I am absolutely convinced that, differently from the great battles of the past, which opened with a barrage of artillery or aerial bombardment, the next war will begin with a massive cyber attack to destroy military capacity… and paralyze basic infrastructure,” the U.N. Secretary-General warned.

https://futurism.com/cyber-warfare-rules-protect-ourselves/

By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal
A group of private and public organizations said that, for less than $20 billion, every unserved rural school, library, health provider and community college in the country that doesn’t already have high-capacity broadband could get it and share it out. In a new study, the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband (SHLB) Coalition proposed that high-speed internet be fed to these “anchor institutions,” which could then act as “middle-mile” providers to distribute the service to surrounding users through a mix of wired and wireless technologies.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/02/20/cost-to-connect-rural-america-19-billion-or-less.aspx

By Patti Zarling, Education Dive
By identifying job market needs and creating micro programs around skills required for middle-skill jobs, colleges and universities could help middle-skilled workers increase their earning potential, while at the same time creating a lucrative new revenue stream for the institution, says Matt Sigelman, CEO of Burning Glass Technologies in a recent Q&A with evolllution.com.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/colleges-should-create-programs-for-middle-skilled-workers/

by Shilpa Phadnis, Times of India

AI is the new electricity and it has made significant advances to transform industries. There’s still a lot of work humans can do in the foreseeable future and we don’t seem to find enough people in some areas. We can’t find enough healthcare workers, teachers or wind turbine technicians in the US. Our educational system globally has not been historically great in reskilling for newer job roles. We need a new social contract to do that. For India, lack of an incumbent structure might be an advantage, where it can use digital education to leapfrog.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/people/andrew-ng-interview/articleshow/62995821.cms