Educational Technology

BY LAURA ASCIONE, eSchool News
A survey reveals that younger STEM workers had greater STEM exposure in early elementary school.  More than half of today’s adult workers (62 percent) say they were never exposed to STEM-related studies and career possibilities in elementary school, according to a survey from littleBits and YouGov. The findings support other research indicating that early exposure to STEM courses helps students stick with these studies even as the material becomes more challenging in high school and college. U.S. workers with 1-2 years of STEM workforce experience say they had the highest exposure to STEM concepts in elementary school–46 percent of adults in this group experienced a science- or math-related track in school, and 53 percent of this group are working in a job that either entirely or heavily involves STEM.

Early STEM exposure is key for the future of the workforce

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

You may be familiar with the idea of student-centered learning. The core idea is simple: student engagement and student learning outcomes are superior if the focus of instruction is on the student rather than on the teacher. While all sorts of instructional methods and approaches can fit under the banner of student-centered learning, they all have one thing in common: they emphasize the needs of each individual student. Student-centered learning approaches have shown impressive results, most likely because they increase student engagement in the learning process. While the idea of student-centered learning has made strong inroads in the education community, there is one area to which it is not normally applied. That area is the design of the learning environment. Usually, that topic is the sole domain of the teacher. But is that approach really justified? After all, the physical environment of the classroom not only has a strong psychological impact on students, but their ability—or inability—to contribute to its design impacts how they perceive the classroom environment.

Have Your Students Help You Design the Learning Environment

Lisa Rice, Ohio University
Instructional design staff meet with a faculty member to review a sample figure on a large television screen.
Associate Educational Technologist Ross Tamburro (left) reviews a multimedia learning object with biomedical informatics instructor Kimerly Powell and Associate Instructional Designer Steven Nagel.
When Kimerly Powell, faculty in The Ohio State University’s College of Medicine (link is external), was tapped to design and lead an online course in biomedical informatics, she enlisted the help of Marjorie Kelley, a consultant with online teaching and course design experience. The two collaborated with staff from The Office of Distance Education and eLearning (ODEE), leveraging their own experience and the latest in online education standards. Together, they created an online course that engaged students in ways they’d never before envisioned.

https://odee.osu.edu/news/2018/09/25/better-together-creating-highly-engaging-online-class

By Hallie Busta, Education Dive

The director of the Esports Lab at the University of Nevada Las Vegas details strategies for teaching students the emerging business model and how other colleges can, too.  At 30,000-square-feet, it’s small stakes by Vegas standards, but the Esports Arena at the Luxor shows an industry on the rise. Visitors, many of whom are locals, pay to play at more than 100 PCs and consoles set in rows and clusters throughout the two-level space. They all frame the main event: a raised stage on which players will face off in any number of video games — including popular titles Fortnite, League of Legends and Overwatch — all while their characters’ movements and their own game faces are projected on the 50-foot LED video wall behind them.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/game-on-how-unlv-is-teaching-students-the-esports-business/533440/

PRAVIN VISAKAN , Daily Bruin

Bruins don’t have an easy time getting ahold of textbooks, with long lines in the Ackerman Student Union bookstore and per-quarter price tags. Textbooks take up money and time in terms of hunting for used book deals or waiting in lines. These issues are only getting worse. According to a 2014 report by The Economist, textbook prices are only getting higher, at three times the rate of inflation since 1970. Class sizes are also climbing, with an increase of enrolled undergraduates at UCLA of more than 4,000 students in the last eight years. The demand for textbooks will likely stay high, and physical distribution of textbooks will likely remain impacted. In other words, acquiring textbooks will only get more difficult. Luckily, you won’t have to fish your grandpa’s old textbook out of the attic. The university has an option that could ease students’ cost and accessibility woes: digital textbooks.

http://dailybruin.com/2018/09/27/ucla-must-support-students-by-providing-more-accessible-options-for-textbooks/

by Wendy McMahon, EdTech

As personalized learning continues to gain momentum across the U.S., more states, districts and schools are moving toward a competency-based education system that focuses on individualized learning and classroom equity. But what exactly is a competency-based education system, and what role does technology play in the design and support of this system? In a recent webinar from the International Association for K–12 Online Learning, titled “Designing for Equity: Leveraging Competency-Based Education to Ensure All Students Succeed,” education consultant Katherine Casey explains the key ways a competency-based system differs from a traditional system.

https://edtechmagazine.com/k12/article/2018/09/use-personalized-learning-tools-boost-classroom-equity

by Packtpub
Blockchain is reshaping the world as we know it. And we are not talking metaphorically because the new technology is really influencing everything from online security and data management to governance and smart contracting. Statistical reports support these claims. According to the study, the blockchain universe grows by over 40% annually, while almost 70% of banks are already experimenting with this technology. IT experts at the Editing AussieWritings.com Services claim that the potential in this field is almost limitless: “Blockchain offers a myriad of practical possibilities, so you definitely want to get acquainted with it more thoroughly.”

9 recommended blockchain online courses

By Hallie Busta, Education Dive
Two senior U.S. Education Department officials told journalists Monday at an event in Las Vegas that the federal agency under Secretary Betsy DeVos wants to make more and better data available to students considering college, while continuing to prioritize the kind of deregulation that has characterized the current administration’s approach to higher ed governance.  “We do not think it’s the role of the federal government to make this decision [of whether a specific college is worth attending] on behalf of students,” said Diane Auer Jones, the department’s top higher ed official, adding that federal student aid, state authorizing bodies and accreditors will continue to be the primary sources of accountability for the industry. She said that in recent years, regulations “have driven [colleges] to a one-size-fits-all model” and that streamlining and clarifying the rules could give institutions that want to explore new learning models the space to do so.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/ed-department-officials-say-their-focus-is-on-better-college-data-less-reg/533153/

JILLIAN KLEIN, Higher Learning Advocates

Whether it is in the news and television commercials or cropping up in proposed legislative and regulatory changes, “competency-based education” continues to dominate the conversation around innovation in higher education. And for good reason; there are hundreds of forward-thinking institutions that are offering CBE programs. Many of these programs are offered via the credit hour, while some are offered via direct assessment, which measures progress through the demonstration of competencies instead of the accumulation of credit hours. Either way, these programs are designed to be professionally-relevant, aligned to learning outcomes that employers expect, and often allow students to move at a personalized pace.

Giving Momentum to the Competency-Based Education Movement

AMY ELLIOTT BRAGG, Crains Business Detroit

Rumman Chowdhury wants us to stop thinking about “The Terminator” when we think about artificial intelligence. The technology is already here — we see it in our social media feeds, in the Alexas on our countertops, in the autonomous vehicles that are test-cruising our streets. And sometimes it reflects less than the best of our society, as when a program used to sentence criminals based on their likelihood of reoffending turned out to be racially discriminatory. Chowdhury is a senior principal at Accenture, where she consults on artificial intelligence solutions for businesses and leads the company’s strategic growth initiative on responsible artificial intelligence.

https://www.crainsdetroit.com/technology/why-will-robots-take-our-jobs-wrong-question-ask-about-ai

By CANDY NEAL, the Herald
Attracting and retaining skilled workers may be done more efficiently if employers are willing to help their workers obtain those skills. That was the message Pete Yonkman, president and CEO of the Cook Group and Cook Medical in Bloomington, shared Wednesday afternoon. The late Bill Cook, founder of the Cook Group and Cook Medical, was quoted as saying, “The best thing you can do for someone is to give them a job…. But now, you need skills,” Yonkman said. “So the best thing you can do for someone is to give them an education and a job.”

https://duboiscountyherald.com/b/business-education-partnerships-key-for-workforce

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Growth is essential to becoming an excellent leader in education. This growth is indispensable when it comes to major areas, like technology, especially because the information is always changing. You should be working hard to grow continuously into a more tech-savvy leader for the school. Unfortunately, many people aren’t sure where to start when it comes to becoming more educated on technology. They wind up falling behind because they didn’t prioritize learning all they could about the technology in their buildings. If you want to keep growing in your field, here are a few simple ways that you can continue to develop as a more tech-savvy education leader.

How to Continuously Grow as a Tech-Savvy Education Leader

By Sara Friedman, THE Journal

Teachers are more likely to utilize new teaching practices that are more manageable based on their circumstances, according a new report from the Christensen Institute that focuses on the behavior of teachers and the situations in which they are willing to use new educational tools. The researchers came up with four distinct categories on how teachers decided to move forward with making instructional changes:

Help me lead the way in improving my school.
Help me engage and challenge more of my students in a way that’s manageable.
Help me replace a broken instructional model so I can reach a new student.
Help me not fall behind on my school’s new initiative.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/09/12/finding-what-works-in-educational-innovation.aspx

BY NADER QAIMARI, eSchool News
Long gone are the days when librarians were simply the “keeper of books. ” Whether a principal, superintendent, head of technology, or head of curriculum, there is likely a gem of a resource among your staff who could push your Future Ready agenda forward. Long gone are the days when librarians were simply the “keeper of books,” and the administrators who have grown to realize this have found it much easier to accomplish their strategic vision by mobilizing this dedicated and knowledgeable part of their staff. Here’s how many are doing it.

10 ways administrators should be collaborating with their librarians

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Of course, students still need to learn basic skills and those are not always quite as inherently interesting as a virtual walk through Rome. But digital learning experiences can still help boost student performance. For example, CK12 offers a wide range of open educational resources. They cover most science and math subjects as well as a few areas in the humanities. They offer customizable textbooks, videos, animations, and practice problems. These tools make it possible to personalize instruction for each student—at no cost.

How to Boost Academic Achievement with Digital Learning Experiences

by John O’Brien, EDUCAUSE Review

Simply put, college and university leaders must do everything in their power to ensure that students finish what they start. Small wonder, then, that student success has been near the top of the EDUCAUSE annual Top 10 IT Issues lists since 2013. Technologies developed in the last decade and powered by new analytics capabilities and increasingly large amounts of data immediately available on students’ progress have given institutions new options to intervene and help students before it’s too late. Pioneering colleges and universities have begun actively using these capabilities to improve their students’ rates of retention and completion.

https://er.educause.edu/blogs/2018/9/making-the-case-for-student-success-technology

By Jeffrey R. Young, EdSurge

A public university in North Carolina has teamed up with six community colleges to offer a program that promises students they will pay no more than $10,000 out of pocket for their four-year degree. Participating students will attend a two-year college in the state to get their Associate’s degree, then transfer to an online program at Fayetteville State University to finish their bachelor’s. The students will continue to have access to mentors and resources at the local community college to help them stay on track.

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2018-09-20-one-hbcu-hopes-its-10-000-degree-pathway-will-win-over-students-considering-for-profit-alternatives

by Antony Awaida, EDUCAUSE Review

Faced with an infrastructure approaching end-of-life and the prospect of a costly upgrade, NYU kicked off the process by gathering requirements from all stakeholders. The requirements were then placed under four rubrics: (1) Must Have, (2) Should Have, (3) Could Have, and (4) Nice to Have. In addition to the technical requirements, NYU decided to run a pilot and proactively seek feedback from the user community. Further, the university incentivized students to provide feedback by entering respondents into a raffle to win an iPad.

https://er.educause.edu/blogs/sponsored/2018/9/nyu-cuts-costs-and-improves-service-by-moving-its-virtual-lab-to-the-cloud

BY LAURA ASCIONE, eSchool News
Most teachers rely on data to personalize learning and understand student performance–and parents overwhelmingly support its use, according to a poll from the Data Quality Campaign. The poll, which is DQC’s third parent poll and first teacher poll, finds that 95 percent of teachers use academic and nonacademic data, such as attendance and classroom behavior, to understand student performance. Eighty-nine percent say they depend on data to help them personalize learning for students’ unique needs. More than 8 in 10 teachers say they value the different ways data can help them become more effective teachers, such as using it to identify learning goals, knowing what concepts students learn, and planning and enhancing instruction reflective of the results.

Teachers struggle to find time to use data, study says

By Sara Friedman, THE Journal
When it comes to preparing students for the future, two-thirds of parents endorse the idea of digital tools in the classroom, but 51 percent of parents are concerned that technology varies too much from teacher to teacher, class to class or subject to subject, according to a new report. These findings come from the Project Tomorrow’s 2017 Speak Up Research Project for Digital Learning, which surveyed 340,927 students, 34,833 teachers and 23,159 parents. The report was released at a Sept. 12 Congressional briefing where students, teachers and administrators spoke about how they use technology in their classrooms. The survey was conducted between October 2017 and January 2018.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/09/13/equity-problems-with-technology-persist-despite-adoption-gains.aspx

By Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology
Should cell phones be permitted in class? In a recent survey of faculty members at colleges and universities across the country, feelings on the subject were mixed. While 26 percent of respondents said they do allow students to use mobile phones in the classroom, about the same number — 25 percent — said they do not. Half of respondents allow limited use of the devices.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/09/19/survey-1-in-4-professors-ban-mobile-phone-use-in-class.aspx