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Online Learning News and Research
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Saturday, August 14, 2004
The Importance of Policies in E-Learning Instruction - Shirley Waterhouse and Rodney O. Rogers, Educause Quarterly
Most professionals interested in the use of technology in education understand the importance of an e-learning course site, whether the course is taught totally online or in a hybrid environment where the instructor has some face-to-face contact with students. On a typical course site, an instructor posts announcements, a course syllabus, class notes and presentations, and related learning materials for easy access by students. In addition, some instructors use the course site to facilitate forums and chats, to receive and return student assignments, to administer online quizzes and tests, and to maintain an online gradebook. However, how many instructors have thoroughly considered the importance of posting policy documents on a course Web site? Our experience as teachers and e-learning mentors reveals that this important component of a course site is frequently underdeveloped or even missing entirely. Moreover, we have not found references to the subject of course policies in the e-learning literature. (0) comments
Pepperell nurse honored as online education pioneer - Don Erikssonk, Pepperell Free Press
Rachel Boersma, PhD(c), MS, RN, CARN, a resident of Nashua Road, is one of 17 professors from Massachusetts state and community colleges who were recently recognized as e-learning pioneers at the first annual Massachusetts Colleges Online (MCO) E-Learning Conference at Bridgewater State College.Courses taught by these professors were selected from more than 700 available through MCO, a consortium of the nine state and 15 community colleges in Massachusetts that deliver online education. (0) comments
'Time bomb' warning over student numbers - FIONA MACGREGOR, Edinburgh News
University chiefs in Scotland have been warned they are "sitting on a population time bomb". Fears that the nation’s falling population will lead to a drop in student numbers have been raised by a leading academic....Professor John Field, director of Stirling University’s Division of Academic Innovation and Continuing Education, said: "Assuming that half of all 17-year-olds enter higher education, the fall over the next 20 years will be about 8500 Scottish students. "Universities and colleges will find themselves having to compete with employers to attract able school-leavers." The professor added that institutes would need to offer more flexible learning arrangements to adapt to people’s work and family commitments if they were to keep up student numbers. "The implication is that there will be more work-based and workplace learning and possibly more so-called blended learning, with face-to-face and online learning. (0) comments Friday, August 13, 2004
Delivering Online Examinations: A Case Study - Jason HOWARTH, John MESSING, Irfan ALTAS; TOJDE
....Students in these courses are geographically dispersed, located throughout Australia and overseas from Canada and the USA to the United Arab Emirates. Conducting conventional examinations under these conditions brings with it a host of challenges. Synchronizing examination times across a number of time zones becomes impossible when the time differences are more than a few hours. Students enrolled in these courses often find it difficult to balance work commitments against the need to sit an exam at a time and place nominated by the university. Significant numbers of students are required by their employers to travel on a regular basis and at short notice. A survey conducted in 2003 revealed that a considerable number of these students would prefer online testing to paper-based assessment. (0) comments
New £12m programme to support regional e-Learning networks - Public Technology
The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) has announced a new programme which aims to bring the benefits of e-learning to learners and teachers across England. Starting in September, the Distributed e-Learning programme will establish links between schools, colleges and universities to encourage progression into higher education, supporting Government targets for widening participation. The new programme will also exploit and reinforce the increasingly regional dimension of Higher Education as Government-sponsored activities encourage closer working between schools, colleges, universities and the business sector across the regions of the UK. (0) comments
WIRED TO A LEARNING EXPERIENCE - Khaleej Times
The future of education lies in virtual schools according to Dr Milad Fares Sebaaly, provost and founder of the first MENA Virtual University.... "E-learning must become a lifestyle because no one can afford to leave their employment for the sake of studies. Employees, students, and housewives can benefit from e-learning." "Managers will benefit from e-learning to upgrade their skills," he added. Top academic institutions like Harvard, Cornell, New York Institute of Technology, Sheffield Hallam University and York University are all available online. With a computer connected to the Internet anyone can learn from anywhere by linking to the treasure of knowledge from world-class universities." (0) comments Thursday, August 12, 2004
A Holistic Perspective on the Student Dropout Problem with Special Attention to e-Learning - Zane L. Berge and Yi-Ping Haung, DEOS NEWS
This article introduces a comprehensive model to assist institutions in planning for interventions to address student dropout and to increase student retention. The model is the result of an extensive review, analysis, and synthesis of research and theoretical studies. It is flexible and represents a comprehensive set of factors related to student retention, categorized in meaningful ways, and can be used at multiple levels: institutional, departmental or program, by individual faculty, or by students. The need for a model of this kind has long been recognized because, as Woodley and Parlet (1983, cited in Cookson 1989) stated, there is a systematic problem involving the institution as a whole. The problem involving retention of students is not due to an isolated factor that can be “fixed,” but rather imagination and care must be used to carefully select interventions that are needed at various points throughout the organization. (0) comments
Web Survey Guidelines - Malcolm Conway, Learning Circuits
Although the jury is still out, several studies indicate that Web surveys produce response rates comparable with, if not better than, traditional paper surveys and telephone interviews. For example, in their paper “From Mail to Web: Improving Response Rates and Data Collection Efficiencies,” Scott Crawford and others conducted a Web survey among university students on the topic of student drug and alcohol use. Two randomly selected samples were assigned to complete either a Web survey or a mail (paper) survey. The response rate for the Web mode was 20 percent higher than for the mail mode. The overall costs for each mode showed that the Web data collection mode is more efficient than the paper mode when used with an established technology infrastructure. (0) comments
ARTyFACTS: Designing an online learning environment for art objects - John Cook, Claire Bradley, Peter Oriogun, Kathleen Henderson and Anne Baker
Abstract: This paper describes work that has the goal of developing an Internet-based learning environment for enabling the remote engagement with art objects. Our aim was to provide a multisensory experience, incorporating information, sound, media, images, data and hyperlinks relating to art objects, in order to provide a richer sense of the artifact to remote users. To help us achieve our goal we have employed software engineering techniques and developed the Customisable Multisensory toolkit (CM toolkit), an authoring system for creating environments. The paper describes the design considerations for the learning environment, the selection of technologies and system design of the CM toolkit. We then describe the prototype learning environment that was created using the toolkit, 'ARTyFACTS'. This prototype was evaluated with 2 groups of users, and the results of this evaluation is presented and discussed. We conclude the paper by outlining areas for further development work, and some of the considerable challenges that remain if we are to develop full multisensory systems for remote learning and engagement with art objects. (0) comments Wednesday, August 11, 2004
The Next Generation of Educational Engagement - Diana G. Oblinger, JIME
Abstract: Games are no longer just for fun; they offer potentially powerful learning environments. Today's students have grown up with computer games. In addition, their constant exposure to the Internet and other digital media has shaped how they receive information and how they learn. There are many attributes of games that make them pedagogically sound learning environments. An increasing number of faculty are using games as enhancements to the traditional learning environment with encouraging results. While the interactivity and engagement of games are highly positive a number of questions remain about how games will be developed, deployed and accepted in higher education. (0) comments
Online classes offer convenience to students - Akron Beacon Journal
If you're eager to get ahead in your field but don't have time to commute to take courses, consider classes online. Taking courses online lets you learn at your own pace and study from your home or office. You may also pay less money per credit than for most college courses. Be sure to check the credibility and credentials of programs before signing up. Not every advertised online learning opportunity is a sound one; scam artists have been known to lure victims with promises of quick degrees for little or no work. (0) comments
PBS Campus Previews: Live and Learn... - Candice Kramer, PBS
67% of colleges and universities agree that online education is a critical, long-term strategy for their institution. Could online education be a critical strategy in your life? [SOURCE: The Sloan Consortium] (Online) Degree or Certificate? When you stop to think about it, it's amazing how much can be learned just doing your job. However, there comes a time when it's necessary to learn more. Perhaps you've been working for awhile in an area you like, but notice that people with a bit more learning are being promoted past you. (0) comments Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Will the Semantic Web Change Education? - Kendall Clark, Bijan Parsia, and Jim Hendler, JIME
To say that the Web has affected many societies and cultures is to understate its impact along several dimensions. The Web is a technology which not only affects, but in some sense encompasses societies, cultures, and certainly institutions. Higher education -- at least in the cluster of ways in which it is practiced in the US, the EU, and Japan -- is one such bundle of social institutions affected and encompassed by the Web. While it is possible to overstate or mis-state the Web's effect, whether on higher education or on other institutional clusters, the encompassing reach of the technology, used in every country on Earth by literally tens of millions of users, makes it clear that the Web truly has a revolutionary effect. However, exploring what the Web has affected and continues to effect is a necessary element of any accurate estimation of how the newly emerging Semantic Web may, in its turn, affect societies, cultures, and institutional clusters like higher education. (0) comments
UMassOnline Revenue Grows 47% and Enrollments Grow 30% in the 2004 Academic Year - TMCNet
UMassOnline, the University of Massachusetts' web-based learning division, today announced that online education program revenues and enrollments grew 47 percent and 30 percent, respectively, in the 2004 academic year (September 1, 2003 - August 31, 2004). Revenues from the University of Massachusetts system's online programs were $14 million, up from $9.7 million in AY 2003, while enrollments reached 15,741, up from 12,131 in the same period. More than 90 percent of the revenues are retained by the UMass campuses to support education and research programs. "At UMassOnline, we measure success by the extent to which we broaden access to a UMass education," said David Gray, UMassOnline CEO. "While there is no single or simple explanation for our rapid growth, I attribute it largely to bringing the right products to the marketplace." (0) comments
Harris hooks up with BGSU to complete diploma online - RYAN E. SMITH, Toledo Blade
Josh Harris passed his way into the school record books last year as a quarterback for Bowling Green State University, but he wasn't about to pass on his diploma. So when he decided to pursue his dream of playing pro football, he had to figure out how to continue his education while preparing to play for the Baltimore Ravens, who picked him in the sixth round of the NFL draft in April. Like an increasing number of college students, Mr. Harris found the answer online. (0) comments Monday, August 09, 2004
Iowa's universities hope to boost online education - Associated Press
Iowa's three public universities are overhauling how students can learn online, hoping to fend off a new competitor and make online programs more available. The universities are expected to unveil a new five-year strategic plan for online education to the state Board of Regents this fall. A recent development has added a sense of urgency to that planning. During a meeting this week, the regents noted that the University of Phoenix, a private company, plans to open a campus in Des Moines in September.... Tammy Fernandez, a regional director of marketing and enrollment for the University of Phoenix, said the Des Moines site will feature courses with faculty lecturing on campus for the first and fifth weeks of a course, and students doing mostly online interaction with faculty and classmates during the middle three weeks. (0) comments
A Peek into the Life of Online Learning Discussion Forums: Implications for Web-Based Distance Learning - Mary Allan, IRRODL
Abstract: Supporting quality learning in online discussion forums is an intricate task, particularly for e-tutors aspiring to facilitate vigorous interactive learning environments. I argue that the key to successful online discussion forums is the ability of e-tutors to provide learners with feedback well informed in the meaning making and knowledge advancement processes emanating from learner interactions. In this paper, a newly developed concept of providing e-tutors with the information they require is explored, exhibiting the Event Centre (EC) concept, through which tutors are able to obtain periodic “snapshots” of the occurrences throughout discussion forums, which highlight processes of meaning construction and knowledge advancement. The EC concept provides e-tutors with visual images that depict the links and routes through which participants using text messages convey meaning, construct knowledge, and create Socio-Informational networks within discussion forums. (0) comments
College degrees, courses available online but skeptics remain - Associated Press
It's becoming easier to earn college credit in Ohio without attending class. Forty-six of the more than 130 colleges and universities in the state will offer some classes online this year. Some schools, including Wright State University and the University of Dayton, allow students to complete graduate degrees entirely online. Ohioans also are using the Internet to earn degrees from institutions in other states. (0) comments Sunday, August 08, 2004
Online Learning: Social Interaction and the Creation of a Sense of Community - Joanne M McInnerney & Tim S Roberts, ETS
ABSTRACT This paper centres on the sense of isolation that online study may engender among learners, a factor often ignored by many educators, but one that may make the difference between a successful and an unsuccessful online learning environment for many students. The importance of a proper appreciation of the learners’ social context is stressed, as is the concept of the ‘virtual self’ that individual learners may choose to portray during online communication. The authors suggest three protocols that can be built into the fabric of online courses in order that a sense of community may be enabled to exist, and productive social interaction can occur. These are (1) the greater use of synchronous communication facilities (in addition to, rather than instead of, asynchronous ones), (2) the deliberate design and inclusion of a ‘forming’ stage, or ‘warm-up’ period, incorporated as an essential component into the course structure, and (3) a much greater emphasis on the provision of (and adherence to) guidelines for successful online communication. The paper concludes by suggesting that by creating an online sense of ‘self’, the participants of an online course can alleviate feelings of isolation, and create an online community that assists the learning process. (0) comments
Web-slingers e-learn together - KYRA HOGGAN, CALGARY SUN
Spider-Man isn't the only one taking advantage of opportunities on the Web, as e-learners continue to swing along the course of life-long education. "There has been a definite growth in the e-learning field," says Sue Madsen of Mount Royal College. "We've seen an increase in online and distance education, both province-wide and across the country. "Each year, we're expanding our course offerings." Madsen says the appeal is, in large part, the flexibility of online programming. (0) comments
Higher Education Researchers Meet at Microsoft Summit - Syllabus
Bill Gates gave the opening keynote Monday at Microsoft Research's 6th annual Faculty Summit, and participated in an exclusive Q&A along with Rick Rashid, senior VP of Microsoft Research and Sailesh Chutani, director of Microsoft University Relations. Nearly 400 faculty invited from 135 higher education institutions in 20 countries met on Microsoft1s Redmond campus for the full event August 2-5.... Several project teams and Microsoft Research staff presented sessions at the summit, representing current research initiatives and programs in areas as diverse as wireless sensor networks, Web services architecture for online labs, grid computing, interactive photos and video, and gender equity in IT. (0) comments Online Learning News Blog Archives OTEL - Ray's Home Page - Notebook - UIS Online - U of I Online - UIS Home Fair Use |
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