Online Learning Update

By Tim Mandell, Richmond Register

Technology, especially the Internet, has made it easier to take a college class from a different campus across state or even from the comfort of one’s own home. The Distance and Online Learning program at Eastern Kentucky University continues to grow as more and more students are able to enroll in classes without having to be on campus or give up their full-time jobs. During the 2008-09 school year, more than 18,500 course enrollments through distance education at EKU, which is a 40-percent increase from the previous year, according to EKU’s website.

http://richmondregister.com/localnews/x2009598337/Online-classes-popular-at-EKU

by Kaye Spector, The Plain Dealer

A Kent State University assistant professor hopes that online courses and part-time educators can help ease the nursing shortage. There are more students who want to be nurses than there are enough qualified nursing instructors to teach them. A Kent State University nursing professor has a plan to help fix that. Susan Taft, an associate professor at KSU’s College of Nursing, says there is a large, untapped pool of nurses with master’s degrees who would like to teach, but don’t for various reasons: they want to be at home with their young children, they are disabled, or they live too far away from a school.

http://www.cleveland.com/healthfit/index.ssf/2010/08/online_courses_part-time_educa.html

By Laura Raines, Atlanta Journal Constitution

“Online learning has come a long way,” said Jean Pickus, RN, MSN, regional director of academic affairs and program chair for nursing and health care programs at the University of Phoenix. Barry Williams, Special Sandra Scott, a nurse in the oncology unit at WellStar Cobb Hospital in Austell, is studying for her bachelor’s degree through the University of Phoenix. “When I first started teaching nursing programs online 15 years ago, there was no high-speed Internet service; it was all dial-up,” she said. “Students couldn’t travel because no hotel had Internet access. “Now people can take classes anywhere, and most colleges and universities offer some component of their education online. It’s no longer the exception, but the rule.”

http://www.ajc.com/jobs/the-value-of-online-602401.html

By Denise Smith Amos, Cincinnati Enquirer

It’s a new day for social networking in schools, experts say. Schools until recently were cracking down on most uses of online social networks during the school day. This fall, more schools in the Cincinnati region are channeling YouTube, Facebook and other social sites to market themselves to potential students, parents and taxpayers. And more teachers are Tweeting, Skyping, blogging and “wiki-ing” with students for educational purposes that can span the world.

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100828/NEWS0102/8290332/Schools-get-on-Web-2-0-bandwagon

by Google Wave Developer blog

Since the announcement that we will discontinue development of Google Wave as a standalone product, many people have asked us about the future of the open source code and Wave federation protocol. After spending some time on figuring out our next steps, we’d like to share the plan for our contributions over the coming months. We will expand upon the 200K lines of code we’ve already open sourced (detailed at waveprotocol.org) to flesh out the existing example Wave server and web client into a more complete application or “Wave in a Box.”

http://googlewavedev.blogspot.com/2010/09/wave-open-source-next-steps-wave-in-box.html

By Alex Wilhelm, the Next Web

Apple’s iPad is a monster hit, making it a product that Apple wants to ensure is as available as possible. Throughout the early days of its life, production lag and delays were the name of the iPad ordering game. No more. The time required between ordering and iPad and having it be shipped to you has dropped to a mere 24 hours. This stems from Apple ramping up production for iPads to a shocking 2 million a month.

http://thenextweb.com/apple/2010/09/03/apple-building-2-million-ipads-monthly/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheNextWeb+%28The+Next+Web+Top+Stories%29

By Marc Parry, The Chronicle of Higher Ed

In his work as a professor, Stephen Downes used to feel that he was helping those who least needed it. His students at places like the University of Alberta already had a leg up in life and could afford the tuition. So when a colleague suggested they co-teach an online class in learning theory at the University of Manitoba, in 2008, Mr. Downes welcomed the chance to expand that privileged club. The idea: Why not invite the rest of world to join the 25 students who were taking the course for credit? Over 2,300 people showed up. They didn’t get credit, but they didn’t get a bill, either. In an experiment that could point to a more open future for e-learning, Mr. Downes and George Siemens attracted about 1,200 noncredit participants last year. They expect another big turnout the next class, in January.

http://chronicle.com/article/Open-Teaching-When-the/124170/

by Nanette Asimov, San Francisco Chronicle

With the Internet emerging as the world’s largest classroom, debate over the value of an online university education has never run hotter. The University of California hopes to develop a top-tier cyber bachelor’s degree program, while some faculty worry that doing that would diminish UC’s quality. Some schools, like the University of Massachusetts, offer some degree courses online. Others, like the for-profit University of Phoenix, offer all degree courses online.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/08/28/BAQ91F0TFS.DTL

By Brandon Butler, Worcester Business Journal

Since its founding in the early 1980s, the Princeton Review Co. of Framingham has been best known for helping students prepare for standardized tests like the SATs. But with a string of annual losses in its recent history, the company has made a handful of major moves, including jumping into a whole new industry in hopes of righting the ship. The company has dropped unprofitable portions of its business, has nearly doubled its size by buying up an online degree company named Penn Foster Education Group, and has inked a partnership with the AFL-CIO that could yield millions of new customers. “It’s not an exaggeration to say that buying Penn Foster and developing the relationship with the National Labor College has completely changed the focus of the company moving forward in the coming years,” said James Maher, who tracks publicly-traded education companies for the San Francisco investment firm ThinkEquity. “It’s not the same Review anymore.”

http://www.wbjournal.com/news47169.html

By Elaine Wilson, infoZine

-The Defense Department’s newest high school is devoid of walls or windows, but yet has opened its “doors” this year to students scattered around the globe. The Department of Defense Education Activity’s virtual high school is an accredited distance-learning program for military students, whether they’re geographically separated, transitioning between schools or just dealing with a scheduling conflict. “It’s a wonderful opportunity to close gaps and enhance students’ educational experience in a 21st century environment,” Marilee Fitzgerald, the activity’s acting director, said. “I think it opens up possibilities for learning that we have yet to understand, yet to explore.” The virtual school offers students 48 online courses in a wide range of disciplinary areas, including foreign language, math, science, social studies, language arts and physical education, as well as 15 advanced placement courses.

http://www.infozine.com/news/stories/op/storiesView/sid/43192/

by P. Christine Smith, Sun Journal

With enrollment numbers nearly three times greater than the same semester of last year, Craven County Schools students are apparently spreading the word about distance learning advantages. The programs, now in the fourth year, offer middle and high school students expanded class offerings and the chance to earn college credit. The two programs, called N.C. Virtual Public School and Learn and Earn, work individually or hand-in-hand, said Tonya Gent, the district’s distance learning coordinator. “It allows them to take their high school classes earlier, then they can go over to college and take online classes or face-to-face classes and graduate on time,” Gent said.

http://www.newbernsj.com/news/programs-90139-school-year.html

By RACHEL GROSS, New York Times blog The Choice

The University of California will debut just 20 to 30 courses this semester, most of them large lecture classes like Biology I. For the U.C., financial necessity may truly be the mother of innovation. But it’s also “the obvious next step” in making higher education more globally accessible and affordable, said Daniel Greenstein, the system’s vice provost for academic planning, programs and coordination. While other online programs exist at other large research universities, he said no one has successfully created a program at the scale and quality that the university has as its goal. “The University of Illinois (at) Springfield is not Berkeley,” Mr. Greenstein said in an e-mail, before adding, “I am not an elitist snob.”

http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/college-online-virtually-the-same/

by The Oregonian Editorial Board

When Oregon kids are clicking with virtual schools the state shouldn’t be focused on limiting access It is, of course, essential that Oregon ensure the rigor and quality of online charter schools and demand financial and academic transparency from the private vendors operating these “virtual schools.” But once the state is convinced that online students are receiving a quality education, why should it prevent other families from making the same choice? The Oregon Board of Education recently spent several hours kicking this question around before concluding that parents should be allowed to choose online schools — but only up to a point. A majority of board members supported parent choice only if there was a cap on how many students could leave an individual school district. In other words, parent choice for some, but not necessarily all.

http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2010/08/choosing_online_schools.html

By Azam Ahmed, Chicago Tribune

Clinton Parker, a senior at Julian High School, worked quietly at his computer in August as the clicks of mice from more than a dozen students punctured the air of an otherwise silent computer lab. A teacher zipped through the classroom, assisting students as they worked their way through online classes that they had either failed during the school year or needed to pass to catch up with classmates. By the time summer school had ended, Parker was among the more than 4,000 city schools students who earned credits taking online courses. What would have taken another year of school — much of which Parker readily admits he would have skipped — took just a few months, and he received his diploma.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/education/ct-met-virtual-education-20100829,0,6659525.story

By Wilson, Mobile Computing News

The Internet’s greatest achievement is without doubt how it has democratised information and learning. Knowledge one previously could not acquire without spending hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds is now available ‘for free’ with a simple Google Search. But this unstructured approach to online education and knowledge acquisition was a bit hit-and-miss, particularly if you wanted to delve deeply into a specific knowledge vertical. This spurred on services like Academic Earth and iTunes U, which provide full online education video courses recorded at the most prestigious universities in the world for free. And the latter of the two, iTunes U, has just announced that it has crossed the 300 million downloads threshold – a quite remarkable feat in any way you spin it.

http://www.mobile-computing-news.co.uk/industry-news/6655/online-education-gets-serious-as-itunes-u-sees-300-million-downloads.html

by News Observer Editorial

It is an astonishing number. At Wake Technical Community College there are 13,505 registrations for virtual classes. Online education, once viewed skeptically in higher education, is clearly the wave of the future, and particularly when that future is uncertain because of a troubled economy. People who have jobs but want better ones can, by enrolling in online classes, keep working and keep up with schoolwork. And the classes are better. More teachers are trained to teach online, the technology is more sophisticated and the demand is driving constant improvement. Wake Tech, responsible for classes taught not just at its home campus but in other locations as well, can say at this point that the online campus is its largest satellite.

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/08/23/637902/the-online-way.html

by Steve Kolowich, Inside Higher Ed

Online learning is often heralded as a way to make college an option for people who would not otherwise have the money or mobility to access it. But for blind students, online learning can present more obstacles than opportunities — especially as e-learning materials become more technologically sophisticated. “When faculty or course developers hear about a new tool being introduced at a distance education conference, they want to bring it home and try it out,” says Kelly Hermann, chair of the Online Education Special Interest Group at the Association on Higher Education and Disability, or AHEAD. “But what they fail to recognize is where that new tool might create barriers to accessibility.”

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/08/23/accessibility

By Steven Craig, Red, White and Blue Press

Online college courses and degree programs have been used by many unemployed men and women in order to either earn their college degree or obtain further training so that they may either find new employment opportunities or advance at their current place of employment. While the job market has been quite unwelcoming over the past months, many men and women who are unemployed or underemployed have had a great amount of difficulty finding a job. Yet, there had been unemployed men and women who have used online college courses and degree programs in order to either further their education or earn a degree that will allow them better opportunities when seeking employment or advancement at their current job.

http://www.rwbpress.com/2010/08/23/online-college-classes-and-degree-programs-online-educational-opportunities-help-unemployed/

By MEGAN BOEHNKE, iStock Analyst

Hundreds of students taking one of the University of Tennessee’s most popular courses, remedial algebra, arrived last week to the first day of class — in their dorm rooms. For the first time the university will deliver half of its Math 119 sections, which enroll about 1,000 students each fall, online. “It’s a challenging course for us because in some sense, it’s barely at the college level,” said Chuck Collins, a math professor in charge of the course. “We’ve been putting a lot of resources into it without a lot of success … when it comes to matching students with their ability and doing it in a cost-effective way.”

http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews/articleid/4431913

by Andrew Pantazi, University of Florida Alligator

The old Online Learning is out at UF, and Sakai is in. Sakai, an open-source course management system, is run by a community of universities, including the University of Michigan, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Cambridge University. It was chosen to replace UF’s previous system, WebCT Vista 8, because Blackboard, which runs WebCT, said it would stop supporting the program by October 2012. Already, there were plenty of problems with WebCT, according to Doug Johnson, the manager for UF’s e-Learning Support Services, such as issues with discussion boards and e-mails.

http://www.alligator.org/news/campus/article_3c99debc-af3a-11df-b0fb-001cc4c002e0.html

by Rob Manning, OPB News

Oregon’s schools have at least two really big problems heading into the new school year: a graduation rate of only 66 percent, and a budget crisis of historic proportions. Some education officials say you can address both problems with one fix: getting more students to take classes online. Rob Manning reports on a new statewide online option.

http://news.opb.org/article/11581-could-online-classes-help-ease-oregons-education-problems/