Educational Technology

January 31, 2019

AI Crushes Crypto As Top Job For Tech Workers, AngelList Reports

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:40 am

Elisabeth Brier, Forbes

Artificial Intelligence has supplanted blockchain and cryptocurrency as the startup industry tech workers are most interested in joining, according to a new report from AngelList, a U.S.-based platform that connects startups with investors. Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence was the top industry coveted in 2018 by the 8 million job seekers registered on the platform’s job board, AngelList Talent, the company announced Thursday.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/elisabethbrier/2019/01/17/ai-crushes-crypto-as-top-job-for-tech-workers-angellist-reports/#94908f844e90

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How to Keep Digital Tools from Gathering Dust

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:35 am

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

If you visit the classroom of a veteran teacher, you are likely to see some materials languishing in obscurity. Whether it is math manipulatives or old posters, the detritus of lessons past has a tendency to accumulate. The lack of physical footprint of digital tools may make their neglect less obvious, but it is still a problem. Here are several ideas for helping to keep digital tools from gathering virtual dust.

https://www.thetechedvocate.org/how-to-keep-digital-tools-from-gathering-dust/

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Law school offers new fellowship to expand online courses

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:32 am

By Alec Rich, GW Hatchet
The law school debuted a new fellowship this month focusing on the law behind government contracts. The fellow, who will be a visiting associate professor of law, will help expand the government procurement law program’s online offerings. Officials are hoping to fill the position this spring to help develop new online courses and engage in research and writing, law school officials said. Karen Thornton, the director of the government procurement law program, said the law school administration is funding the fellowship and will recommend the final candidate to the University. The fellow will receive an annual stipend of $55,000 plus benefits, according to a law school release.

https://www.gwhatchet.com/2019/01/17/law-school-offers-new-fellowship-to-expand-online-courses/

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January 30, 2019

4 fresh approaches to coding in the classroom

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:40 am

BY TANNER HIGGIN, eSchool News

Coding is one of the most crowded categories in edtech. And while there are a ton of great tools for students of any ability level, many of these tools have hit on the same formula. So whether you’re prepping for Hour of Code or looking to launch a coding unit or curriculum in your classroom, lab, or library, it’s tough to find the right solution or even determine what separates one from another. Thankfully, there are a few developers out there breaking the mold and doing something different. These developers are not just iterating on the tried-and-true coding formula but exploring new frontiers that offer students new ways to learn—from VR and hardware hacking to on-the-go learning to courses and curriculum that blend technical skills with “soft” skills.

https://www.eschoolnews.com/2019/01/18/4-fresh-approaches-to-coding-in-the-classroom/

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Sometimes the Best Tech is No Tech

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:36 am

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

The story is told that, in the early days of space exploration, NASA spent millions to develop a pen that could write in zero gravity. Until they achieved this impressive feat, they used a simple pencil. That story might or might not be apocryphal, but it illustrates an important point: sometimes the best tech for the job is no tech. Most educational stakeholders are old enough to remember the days when every single software program and platform that they used had to be purchased at top dollar. In light of this memory, free apps and websites can seem like an unimaginable resource. And they can be. But they aren’t always. After all, the resource itself might be free, but every resource requires professional development time, instructional time, and an opportunity cost, not to mention time spent choosing, implementing, and evaluating the resource. This means that the price tag is still quite high, even if the resource itself is free. This price tag—even for free edtech—means that if instructional needs are currently being met, there is no need to change things for that area in the face of the anticipated costs.

https://www.thetechedvocate.org/sometimes-the-best-tech-is-no-tech/

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January 29, 2019

No escape as ‘snow day’ becomes ‘e-learning day’

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:39 am

By Matt Pickles, BBC News

For school students, it means the chance of benefiting from the long-standing tradition of the “snow day”, when schools are forced to close and students get an unexpected day off.  It’s a familiar theme from American film and TV shows, with children getting the good news and then running outside for some seasonal snowman-building and snowball throwing, against a montage of Eighties pop music. But the tradition is now over for pupils in US states such as South Carolina, Nevada, Georgia and Indiana.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46871555

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How to Use Tech to Develop Lifelong Learners

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:35 am

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Students may not be aware of the kinds of resources that are available to them online—and for free–that they can use to continue to learn beyond the walls of their classroom. They may also be unaware of the best practices for selecting, vetting, and completing learning experiences that are mediated by edtech. When teachers give them opportunities to practice these important skills, students will gain valuable practice in the skills that they will need in order to become lifelong learners. For example, teachers can have students select and complete a project related to the curriculum from a website such as Instructables. This way, students will be familiar with the process and more comfortable using it on their own.

https://www.thetechedvocate.org/how-to-use-tech-to-develop-lifelong-learners/

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Verizon Promises to #ReverseTheFee on Remind After Educators’ Outcry

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:30 am

By Emily Tate, EdSurge

After an outcry from educators on social media, along with countless phone calls to Verizon customer service, the telecommunications company says it will not enforce the 11-fold fee increase that was slated to hit Remind, a messaging service used widely by teachers and parents in the U.S., come February. On Monday, Remind notified its users, 7 million of whom are Verizon Wireless customers, that with the new fee hike, it would no longer be able to absorb the cost of its users sending text messages on its platform. Remind users weren’t going down without a fight. Thousands of them posted on Twitter with the hashtags #ReverseTheFee and #NotSpam. The latter refers to Verizon’s justification for these fees as a way to help the telecommunications company curb spam messages, which Remind inadvertently got clumped into.

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-01-16-verizon-promises-to-reversethefee-on-remind-after-educators-outcry

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Giving a nudge: How digital alerts can keep students on track

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:30 am

By Natalie Schwartz, Education Dive
Colleges are using student data to craft custom text messages and other prompts to boost retention, but experts warn they can backfire. Nudges, when done right, are proving up to that task. Nudging is a concept that has gained traction in higher ed ever since the 2008 release of the book “Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness” brought the subject to the public’s attention. Put simply, nudges are interventions that steer someone toward a better decision without taking away their choice. In higher ed, they take the form of messages delivered through texts, emails or the learning management system that warn a student if they’ve fallen off track, alert them to important deadlines and make them aware of campus resources. Student data comes into play by helping colleges figure out who needs what kind of information most.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/giving-a-nudge-how-digital-alerts-can-keep-students-on-track/545993/

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January 28, 2019

These 10 hard and soft skills will be key in 2019

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:39 am

BY LAURA ASCIONE, MANAGING EDITOR, eCampus News
A new LinkedIn analysis offers a look at the hard and soft skills managers desire most in employees. It’s not always easy to measure soft skills, but more and more, they’re proving crucial in an increasingly competitive workforce facing a shortage of highly-qualified workers, according to new data from LinkedIn.  A large majority (89 percent) of professionals feel their skills are more important than their job titles, according to 2018 LinkedIn research that paints a picture of the changing workforce and the skills that will help workers achieve the most success. Additional LinkedIn Learning research notes that the combination of a short shelf life of skills, combined with a tightening labor market, leads to skills gaps.

https://www.ecampusnews.com/2019/01/17/these-10-hard-and-soft-skills-will-be-key-in-2019/

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America’s colleges struggle to envision the future of diversity on campus

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:35 am

Laura Pappano, Hechinger Report
America’s colleges struggle to define, let alone achieve, diverse campuses in today’s identity-centric and socioeconomically divided climate.  “It’s hard to argue that race and ethnicity is not important, but it is not the only form of diversity,” said Marvin Krislov, president of Pace University. Colleges, he said, require “people of different viewpoints: religious diversity, urban, rural, economic, public school, private school.”

https://hechingerreport.org/whither-diversity/

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Experts Debate Merits of AI in Education

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:27 am

By Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology

Will artificial intelligence make most people better off over the next decade, or will it redefine what free will means or what a human being is? A new report by the Pew Research Center has weighed in on the topic by conferring with some 979 experts, who have, in summary, predicted that networked AI “will amplify human effectiveness but also threaten human autonomy, agency and capabilities.” the experts were asked whether AI and related technology will by the year 2030 enhance human capacities or allow them to deteriorate, the majority (63 percent) said most people will be better off.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/12/20/experts-debate-merits-of-ai-in-education.aspx

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January 27, 2019

How new developments in automation, machine deception, hardware, and more will shape AI.

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:39 am

By Ben Lorica, O’Reilly

Democratizing access to large training data will level the playing field. Because many of the models we rely on—including deep learning and reinforcement learning— are data hungry, the anticipated winners in the field of AI have been huge companies or countries with access to massive amounts of data. But services for generating labeled datasets (specifically companies that rely on human labelers) are beginning to use machine learning tools to help their human workers scale and improve their accuracy. And in certain domains, new tools like generative adversarial networks (GAN) and simulation platforms are able to provide realistic synthetic data, which can be used to train machine learning models. Finally, a new crop of secure and privacy-preserving technologies that facilitate sharing of data across organizations are helping companies take advantage of data they didn’t generate. Together, these developments will help smaller organizations compete using machine learning and AI.

https://www.oreilly.com/ideas/9-ai-trends-on-our-radar

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Survey: Online, Blended Dominate Today’s Learning Environments

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:35 am

By Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology
In our latest Teaching with Technology Survey, the vast majority of faculty members said they teach in either a fully online or blended format.  In a recent survey, nearly nine in 10 faculty members (87 percent) at colleges and universities across the country said they are using either fully online or a mix of online and face-to-face instruction in their courses. That leaves just 13 percent who are still teaching exclusively face-to-face. These findings come out of Campus Technology’s 2018 Teaching with Technology Survey, which asked higher education faculty about their work with online and blended courses and their plans for exploring those modes in the future. The blended model was the most common among our respondents, at 76 percent, up from 73 percent in 2017.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2019/01/16/survey-online-blended-dominate-todays-learning-environments.aspx

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Survey: Employers Want ‘Soft Skills’ From Graduates

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:30 am

By Jeremy Bauer-Wolf, Inside Higher Ed
Employers want college graduates who have “soft skills,” such as being a good listener or thinking critically, but they have difficulty finding such candidates, according to a new report. The survey was conducted online in September by Morning Consult for Cengage, an educational technology and services company, among more than 500 hiring managers and 150 more human resources professionals. More than 1,500 current and former college students from two- and four-year institutions were also surveyed. The companies found that the most in-demand talent among employers was listening skills — 74 percent of employers indicated this was a skill they valued. This was followed by attention to detail (70 percent) and effective communication (69 percent).

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2019/01/17/survey-employers-want-soft-skills-graduates

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January 26, 2019

3 Tips for Choosing an Online Law Program

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:40 am

By Daniel Waldman, US News

Recent developments are likely to result in more online J.D. programs. Traditionally, the American Bar Association limited the number of distance education credits applied toward earning a J.D. to 15. Given that law schools typically require 85-90 credits to graduate, one could not obtain a J.D. from an ABA-accredited institution entirely online. Practically speaking, online law programs were left open to students in the few states – most notably California – whose bar associations did not require graduation from an accredited school. Last year, however, the ABA relaxed its standards for online education. The number of online credits allowed to be taken remotely has increased to a third of the graduation requirement, including 10 in the first year of the program.

https://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/law-admissions-lowdown/articles/2019-01-15/3-tips-for-choosing-an-online-law-program

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Pacific University Press’ Latest Publications Highlight Growing OER Movement

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:34 am

Joe Lang Pacific U

Pacific University Press is quietly fostering the open educational resources movement (OER), one that could very well reshape higher education. Consistent with the university’s mission to advance scholarship and discovery, the Press recently published an open-access textbook available for free download and use by instructors and students everywhere, as well as a primer for academic librarians who wish to promote the use of OER on their campuses. In October, the press published the first textbook in its three-year history, An Introduction to Technical Theatre, by Pacific professor and award-winning set designer Tal Sanders. Published under the Press’ Tualatin Books imprint, the book draws on Sanders’ extensive experience and is appropriate for both high school and college-level theatre courses.

https://www.pacificu.edu/about/media/pacific-university-press%E2%80%99-latest-publications-highlight-growing-oer-movement

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How the Blockchain Ushers in a New Form of Trust

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:29 am

Kevin Werbach, Knowledge@Wharton

Blockchain is one of the biggest buzzwords in technology today. But confusion exists about what it is exactly: The blockchain is often mentioned in the same breath as bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but it encompasses far more than that. Kevin Werbach, Wharton professor of legal studies and business ethics and a blockchain expert, has written a book that explains this technology with great depth and precision. Because really, blockchain is a fusion of law, business, technology, economics — all these different areas where I have some expertise, and where I think there are really potentially huge opportunities to create new kinds of organizations and new kinds of [businesses].

http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/werbach-blockchain/

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January 25, 2019

5 Important Augmented And Virtual Reality Trends For 2019 Everyone Should Read

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:40 am

Bernard Marr, Forbes

Alongside AI and automation, virtual reality (VR) and its closely related cousin augmented reality (AR) have been touted for several years now as technologies likely to have a profoundly transformative effect on the way we live and work.  Over the next year, both VR and AR applications will become increasingly sophisticated, as devices get more powerful and capable of creating higher quality visuals. Our understanding of how humans can usefully navigate and interact within virtual or augmented environments will also evolve, leading to the creation of more “natural” methods of interacting and exploring virtual space.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2019/01/14/5-important-augmented-and-virtual-reality-trends-for-2019-everyone-should-read/#1534e16522e7

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How To Pivot To An Awesome Tech Job After Having Kids

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:28 am

Manon DeFelice, Forbes

What is your best career move after a parenting gap? You can become a mom who codes. Just ask Vidya Thandra Satyanarayana, who learned sought-after tech skills through the online learning platform Udacity—while raising a toddler. Satyanarayana stepped out of the workforce about 10 years ago after moving to the U.S. from India, where she had previously worked in auditing and accounting. Her non-IT background—as well as a long wait for a work visa and the arrival of a new baby in 2014—did not stop her from pursuing a dream to learn data science.

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/manondefelice/2019/01/15/how-to-pivot-to-an-awesome-tech-job-after-having-kids/#19e01a1a65b2

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As OER Grows Up, Advocates Stress More Than Just Low Cost

Filed under: Educational Technology — admin @ 12:28 am

By Jeffrey R. Young and Sydney Johnson, EdSurge

Open educational resources hit a turning point in 2018. For the first time ever, the federal government put forward funds to support initiatives around open educational resources, and recent studies show that faculty attitudes towards using and adapting these openly-licensed learning materials are steadily improving. But fans of OER are increasingly facing a problem. While OER started off as free online textbooks, it still costs money to produce these materials, and professors often need guidance finding which ones are high quality.

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-01-15-as-oer-grows-up-advocates-stress-more-than-just-low-cost

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