Online Learning Update

by eCampusNews

New infographic illustrates latest trends shaping the future of higher education and online learning. According to recent data, online enrollments are growing faster than overall higher education; and today’s “typical” college freshman is no longer a rising high school senior–two trends that are shaping the future of learning, say researchers. Rising tuition costs and an evolving workforce are two other major factors driving change in online learning in higher education, according to research released by the Online Learning Consortium (OLC). In a new infographic, the OLC examines the impact of the internet and changing “consumer” behavior on higher education.

http://www.ecampusnews.com/top-news/factors-online-learning-532/

By Aiden Wolfe, Edudemic

No, net neutrality won’t suddenly give consumers more choice for high speed Internet, nor will it put an end to the polarizing debate over the role of government. What it will do, however, is ensure the web remains an uncorrupted medium for commercial innovation, self expression and the pursuit of knowledge. Thankfully, as plagued by partisan bickering and bureaucratic inefficiency as our political system may be, America’s heart usually ends up in the right place. Let’s hope this time that place continues to be free, open and fair.

http://www.edudemic.com/net-neutrality-huge-victory-education/

By Brian Fagioli, Beta News

Microsoft is partnering with edX to offer courses taught by its employees and experts. The best part? Most of them are free! “Taught by Microsoft experts, these first courses focused on in-demand skills feature interactive coding, assessments, and exercises, and are now open for enrollment. Anders Hejlsberg, technical fellow at Microsoft, will co-teach Introduction to TypeScript; with Introduction to Bootstrap, students will learn a popular front-end web development framework; Programming with C# will help learners gain expertise in a widely used programming language for .NET; additional courses in fast-growing technologies such as cloud computing, data platforms, and Office 365 are also available on edx.org. Students can enroll in Microsoft courses for free or obtain a verified certificate for a fee. Enrollment is open, with courses beginning at the end of March”, says edX.

http://betanews.com/2015/03/11/microsoft-is-taking-you-back-to-school-free-online-courses-through-edx/

By Terri Williams, US News

Online education is becoming commonplace. About 5.3 million U.S. students took at least one online course in fall 2013, according to a recent study. Yet, while online education is growing in popularity, myths and misconceptions abound. Linked below, experts separate the fact from fiction.

http://www.usnews.com/education/online-education/articles/2015/03/09/7-myths-about-online-education

By AINSLEY O’CONNELL, Fast Company

Earning a Yale degree will no longer require moving to New Haven, Connecticut, thanks to an online program for would-be physicians’ assistants that the university plans to launch early next year. The graduate program, developed in partnership with software-as-a-service provider 2U, will grant Master of Medical Science degrees exactly equivalent to those of on-campus students. “This is a Yale degree,” Lucas Swineford, who oversees the university’s digital strategy, told The Wall Street Journal. Online education, he said, is “coming of age.” Students will complete the vast majority of their coursework through 2U’s cloud-based platform, with some in-person training at a local medical center.

http://www.fastcompany.com/3043476/fast-feed/now-you-can-earn-a-yale-degree-from-the-comfort-of-your-living-room

By Paul Fain, Inside Higher Ed

After spending roughly half a billion dollars on the college completion agenda during the last seven years, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is ready to be more assertive about what it thinks should happen in four key areas of higher education policy. The foundation lays out what an official there calls its “strategy reboot” in a newly released document. It describes a focus on data and information, finance and financial aid, college readiness, and innovation and scale.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/03/11/gates-foundation-announces-four-priority-policy-areas-college-completion-data-system

BY LISA LEFF, Associated Press

Gov. Jerry Brown has made a habit of criticizing California’s public colleges and universities for what he sees as a failure to adapt to the 21st century. Now he is putting the state’s money where his mouth is. The governor has pledged $50 million to reward campuses with creative and cost-effective approaches to getting more students to earn degrees in less time. A seven-member committee chaired by Brown’s finance director is scheduled to name the winners of the California Awards for Innovation in Higher Education later this month.

http://www.fresnobee.com/2015/03/08/4415990_california-offers-50-million-carrot.html?rh=1

by Danielle Kutchel, the Age

Swinburne University has designed an online course to give families practical strategies to cope with a child with autism. More than 10,000 participants have registered for a new, free online six-week course beginning in April, which has been designed by Swinburne University to provide practical help to families with a child on the autism spectrum. Autism spectrum disorder is a lifelong condition affecting about 1 per cent of children who typically have preoccupations, aversions, obsessions and difficulties with social interaction. But, despite the disorder’s frequency and the challenges it poses to parents, carers and teachers, much online information is about diagnosis and emotional support rather than practical help. Now, a team at Swinburne University has stepped in to move away from “the theory of autism” to provide a free, practical online six-week course designed to give parents and carers strategies to help their child – and the family.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/education/parents-flock-to-free-online-course-on-autism-20150308-13vcc9.html

By Meris Stansbury, eCampus News

Researchers at Brown and Columbia attempt to determine not just costs associated with MOOC production, but faculty time, marketing, and IT development…and if it’s all worth it. Is a MOOC worth anywhere between $39,000 to $325,000 in development and delivery costs to your college or university? How do you know? For colleges and universities already on alert thanks to uncontrollable costs associated with higher ed, the decision whether or not to spend hundreds of thousands on MOOCs should be an intimidating one.

http://www.ecampusnews.com/top-news/calculate-costs-moocs-878/

By Dennis Pierce, Campus Technology

ECU is one of three North Carolina universities taking part in a grant-funded project called College STAR, which aims to support students with learning disabilities. These challenges might include dyslexia, dyscalculia and problems with focusing or memory recall, among others. One way College STAR supports these students is by training faculty and instructional designers in the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a framework for creating flexible learning environments that can accommodate a wide variety of learning styles. The project’s goal is to “help our universities be more welcoming places for students with learning differences,” said Sarah Williams, principal investigator.

http://campustechnology.com/articles/2015/03/04/course-design-that-meets-more-learners-needs.aspx

by Kevin Carey, NY Times

In the long run, MOOCs will most likely be seen as a crucial step forward in the reformation of higher education. But their true impact won’t be felt until students and learners of all kinds have access to digital credentials that are also built for the modern world. Then they’ll be able to acquire skills and get jobs for a fraction of what colleges cost today.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/upshot/true-reform-in-higher-education-when-online-degrees-are-seen-as-official.html

by Casey Fabris, Chronicle of Higher Ed

Paul LeBlanc, president of Southern New Hampshire University, will take a three-month leave of absence to join the Department of Education as a senior adviser to the under secretary of education, Ted Mitchell. Mr. LeBlanc will be involved with the department’s innovation agenda, specifically its experiments with competency-based education and with establishing new accreditation methods for innovative programs. Southern New Hampshire University has been at the forefront of competency-based education with its College for America program, which was the first competency-based degree program approved by the department to award student aid based on the direct assessment of student learning.

http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/southern-new-hampshire-president-to-advise-education-dept-on-competency-based-learning/55973

by Daniel Terdiman, Venture Beat

Last year, online education provider Udacity launched its Nanodegree program. In partnership with AT&T, the initiative’s goal is to help people develop focused vocational specialties in a short period of time. Now, Udacity, created by Google X founder Sebastian Thrun, has started an iOS developer Nanodegree. “This Nanodegree program will teach you the skills required to become an iOS developer,” Udacity writes on its site. “It’s an exciting occupation, as writing apps for the iPhone and iPad opens a world of opportunity. Developing for iOS … allows you to connect users around the world in interesting and innovative ways. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that iOS developers are in-demand and lucratively paid.”

http://venturebeat.com/2015/03/05/udacity-launches-nanodegree-program-for-ios-developers/

by Ron Bethke, eCampus News

Colleges and universities weary of the barriers currently associated with the credit hour may find an alternative CBE solution within a new framework. The adoption of competency-based programs has become increasingly appealing to higher education institutions, as CBE, done right, could provide better learning opportunity’s for today’s students and their bank accounts. A new report released by Tyton Partners in partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, titled “Evidence of Learning: The Case for an Integrated Competency Management System” proposes an integrated and transparent competency management framework.

http://www.ecampusnews.com/top-news/competency-framework-help-240/

By LINDSAY GELLMAN, Wall Street Journal

Acing an online course could lead to a Wharton degree. The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School last month unveiled a new series of courses, dubbed the Business Foundations specialization series, through online-education platform Coursera. The business school said it would waive the application fee to one of its graduate business programs for each of the online program’s top 50 performers in a given year. Wharton also said it would offer up to five $20,000 scholarships to admitted M.B.A. students “who have excelled in completion” of the series in the previous 12 months.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/whartons-new-online-courses-include-incentives-1425515596

By Amaka Abayomi, Vanguard

Globally, online learning is on the rise. According to a 2013 report by the Babson Survey Research Group, over 6.7 million post-secondary students were enrolled in, at least, one online class in 2011, compared to only 1.6 million in 2002, and higher-education institutions continue to refine and enhance their online curriculum. Myth #1: Employers don’t value online degrees/certificates :  It is falsely believed that employers don’t value online degrees or certificates but the truth is that they do value and are often bound to respect accredited online degrees or certifications. Most respected companies really appreciate their employees taking the initiative of earning degrees online.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/03/online-education-myths-busted/

By Tara García Mathewson, Education Dive

A new report from Evolve, an IT services company selling cloud space, shows education institutions are more likely to lose critical data than their peer organizations in the business, government, and nonprofit sectors — and more likely to lose it forever. Respondents cited budget constraints for their poor outcomes, according to Campus Technology, and only 42% of respondents thought they had enough money in their disaster recovery budgets. That’s in contrast to 63% of respondents, who thought so in the for-profit realm.

http://www.educationdive.com/news/education-institutions-lag-in-data-protection/371507/

by Fresh Air, NPR

The University of Everywhere is the university that I think my children and future generations will attend when they go to college. … They will look very different in some ways, although not in other ways, from the colleges that I went to and that many of us have become familiar with. This will be driven by advances in information technology: So whereas historically you went to college in a specific place and only studied with the other people who could afford to go [to] that place, in the future we’re going to study with people all over the world, interconnected over global learning networks and in organizations that in some cases aren’t colleges as we know them today, but rather 21st-century learning organizations that take advantage of all of the educational tools that are rapidly becoming available to offer great college experiences for much less money.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/2015/03/03/390167950/prepare-for-the-end-of-college-heres-what-free-higher-ed-looks-like

by Udemy

Udemy,the platform for learning and teaching online, today announced that its corporate training division, Udemy for Business, has achieved significant momentum, signing on key customers including Esri, Lyft and Mixpanel. In the past year, Udemy for Business quadrupled its customer count, as more companies realize the critical need to provide their employees with access to skills training to stay up-to-speed and competitive. At the start of 2014 Lyft had about 80 employees, and now Lyft employs over 400 people. They needed a tool to provide their expanding workforce with learning opportunities to support their dynamic and evolving roles.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/udemy-solidifies-leadership-position-in-online-training-for-companies-signs-esri-lyft-and-mixpanel-300044391.html

by Julie Hare, the Australian

Pooja Sanka went to an all-girls school, lived a traditional life that didn’t involve socialising with boys, and when she started studying computer science at the Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur she was one of three women in a class of 50 men. The inevitable shyness didn’t make in-class interaction easy. But Ms Sanka has used the experience to create a free online social-interaction platform, ­Piazza, aimed at science, technology, engineering and maths students globally to get them talking and interacting, and getting their professor involved in using it as a teaching tool. “I was deeply inspired to solve the problems for other shy women and enable them to learn better in their science and maths classes,” Ms Sanka said.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher-education/piazza-offers-free-online-learning-platform-to-help-the-shy/story-e6frgcjx-1227246804101

By Anna Patricia Valerio, Devex

edX offers university-level MOOCs, and CEO Anant Agarwal said it currently has more than 3.5 million students, 40 percent of whom come from developing countries. While Agarwal believes MOOCs won’t replace traditional on-campus teaching, he said these courses can be an alternative form of schooling for those who do not have access to education. “Certainly for students who already have access to teachers and access to learning, online learning can improve the quality of their education by creating models in which we combine the best of online learning and the best of in-person learning,” edX’s chief executive told Devex. “That is why I like to say that online learning is like a rising tide that lifts all boats — it’ll increase access for those who don’t have access, and will improve learning for those who do.” Still, that may be easier said than done. Poorer countries, after all, have a weaker digital infrastructure to support the bandwidth needed to even view MOOCs.

https://www.devex.com/news/moocs-to-the-rescue-85589