Educational Technology

John Byrne, Forbes

Graduating M.B.A. students this year have had no trouble landing very good jobs.  Yet, for the second consecutive year, even the highest ranked business schools in the U.S. are beginning to report significant declines in M.B.A. applications . Last year, the top ten business schools combined saw a drop of about 3,400 M.B.A. applicants, a 5.9% falloff to 53,907 candidates versus 57,311 a year earlier (see Acceptance Rates At The Top 50 Business Schools). The University of Michigan Ross School of Business experienced the worst drop, an 8.5% decline from 3,485 to 3,188 apps. Harvard fell 4.5%, UC-Berkeley Haas 7.5%, Wharton 6.7%, Stanford 4.6%, and Booth 8.2%.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/poetsandquants/2019/08/20/its-official-the-mba-degree-is-in-crisis/#7ff235452df7

By Sara Friedman, THE Journal
Google is making improvements to its college search feature to provide students with more detailed information on their college options. The tool now offers data on two-year colleges and certificate- and associate-level programs at four-year institutions. In June 2018, Google added the ability to allow users to search for data on four-year institutions and get information on college acceptance and graduation rates, costs, SAT scores and rankings. The update to the college search feature adds more detailed information tailored to students at two-year institutions, such as in-state tuition rates and the total cost of books and housing.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2019/08/20/google-adds-data-to-college-search.aspx

by Dhawal Shah, Class-Central
Each year Class Central publishes a ranking of The Top Free Online Courses of All Time, based on thousands of reviews written by learners. We first published the ranking in 2016, and have updated it every year since. In 2019, we increased the number of courses in the list from 50 to 100, drawing on more than 60,000 learner reviews.

https://www.classcentral.com/collection/top-free-online-courses

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

“Technology can amplify great teaching but great technology cannot replace poor teaching,” Andreas Schleicher, Director of the organization’s Directorate for Education and Skills said, and added the reality in schools “lags considerably behind the promise of technology”. The OECD report found that despite the pervasiveness of information and communication technologies (ICT) in our daily lives, these technologies have not yet been as widely adopted in formal education. And where they are used in the classroom, their impact on student performance is mixed, at best, writes Schleicher.

https://www.thetechedvocate.org/edtech-cant-replace-poor-instruction/

By Quentin Fottrell, Market Watch
Software developers, physical therapists and physician assistants crop up frequently among the highest-paid and fastest-growing jobs in every U.S. state, according to a new analysis by CareerBuilder. The site analyzed government data to project the careers most likely to be lucrative and in demand. Most of these jobs require some level of college education. Software developers typically require a bachelor’s degree and computer-coding skills such as Java, JavaScript, SQL, C Sharp, Cascading Style Sheets and NET Framework. They had a median pay of $105,590 per year or $50.77 per hour last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics; it says there’s a higher than average outlook for job growth (up 24% nationwide between 2016 and 2026).

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-the-no-1-highest-paid-and-fastest-growing-job-in-every-us-state-2019-08-20

EDUCAUSE

Digital badges are validated indicators of skills or competencies, often representing the completion of a microcredential. Badges typically represent competencies not shown on a transcript, including learning from internships, volunteer work, and other co-curricular activities. Increasingly, badges conform to the Open Badges standard, and many are stackable, meaning that they can be credited toward an advanced badge, a certificate, or a degree.

https://library.educause.edu/resources/2019/7/7-things-you-should-know-about-digital-badges

By Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology

This year coding bootcamps are expected to graduate more than 23,000 developers, an overall growth rate of 705 percent since 2013, according to a recent report by Course Report, and an increase of 49 percent over 2018. (As a point of reference, in 2018 there were about 93,000 undergraduate computer science majors graduating from American universities.)

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2019/08/19/bootcamp-business-up-49-year-over-year.aspx

BY KIM PARKER, Pew Research Center

A new Pew Research Center survey finds that only half of American adults think colleges and universities are having a positive effect on the way things are going in the country these days. About four-in-ten (38%) say they are having a negative impact – up from 26% in 2012. The share of Americans saying colleges and universities have a negative effect has increased by 12 percentage points since 2012. The increase in negative views has come almost entirely from Republicans and independents who lean Republican. From 2015 to 2019, the share saying colleges have a negative effect on the country went from 37% to 59% among this group. Over that same period, the views of Democrats and independents who lean Democratic have remained largely stable and overwhelmingly positive.

https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/essay/the-growing-partisan-divide-in-views-of-higher-education/

Louise, Yamamoto, UH News

Instructional designers at Kapiʻolani Community College have won a top award from Campus Technology. The Teaching Online Preparation Program (TOPP) was recently recognized with a 2019 Campus Technology Impact Award. TOPP was a response to online students expressing frustration over the lack of consistency in design, navigation, interaction and use of technology across classes. The program allows faculty participants to experience, empathize with and become an online student while creating their own online or hybrid course.

https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2019/08/15/kapiolani-topp-award/