Techno-News Blog

by Matthew Lynch, tech Edvocate

Remember back in high school or college when you would drink a bunch of caffeine and stay up all night to prepare for a test? Now imagine a room full of programmers, coders, and creatives doing the same thing for an entire day or even a week. Instead of cramming, they are competing to create prototypes that innovate on a theme or improve upon an existing project. It’s called a hackathon, and it is has become a regular part of how technology companies and organizations do business. In fact, the power of the hackathon has extended beyond the tech industry into many other sectors.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/what-is-a-hackathon/

by Mariel Tishma, Chief Learning Officer

Darren Shimkus, general manager of online learning provider Udemy for Business, said that when millennial workers are given the choice between better learning opportunities and other incentives like vacation time or higher pay, “The millennial worker today overwhelmingly chooses the chance to build … skills.”  Udemy’s “2018 Learning Index Report,” which analyzed 18 million learners and polled 263 learning and development managers, discusses various key topics to pay attention to this year. According to the report, teams are learning skills across traditional boundaries. Soft skills like communication and public speaking have remained consistently important. “People seek out, at all levels: How do I become better at presenting my point of view?” Shimkus said. Technology teams are accessing content to brush up on soft skills, while those in soft skills positions are pursuing hard tech knowledge to better serve their clients.

http://www.clomedia.com/2018/02/15/trend-2018-learning-flexibility/

By Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed
Syracuse University College of Law has won approval from the American Bar Association’s accreditation division to offer a J.D. program in which roughly two-thirds of the course work will be completed online — although about half of the credits completed at a distance will be conducted live, in real time, school officials note. The ABA has been cautious in permitting law schools to educate students via the internet, and before Syracuse, the bar association had approved two institutions to offer more than 15 of their credits online, its current limit (though an increase is under review).

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2018/02/15/syracuse-law-gains-approval-mostly-online-jd

By Mary Grush, Campus Technology

Oklahoma State University’s first inaugural “Virtual + Augmented Reality Hackathon” hosted January 26-27 by the Mixed Reality Lab in the university’s College of Human Sciences gave students and the community a chance to tackle real-world problems using augmented and virtual reality tools, while offering researchers a glimpse into the ways teams work with digital media tools. Campus Technology asked Dr. Tilanka Chandrasekera, an assistant professor in the department of Design, Housing and Merchandising at Oklahoma State University about the hackathon and how it fits into the school’s broader goals.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/02/12/hacking-real-world-problems-with-virtual-and-augmented-reality.aspx

by Elizabeth Kilpatrick, Daily Targum

While most Rutgers students take a bus to class and sit in a lecture hall, others enroll in classes that take place miles away from campus.  Online courses present students who cannot take traditional classes an opportunity to earn their degree. They benefit students with strong writing skills, said Ian Dunham, a doctoral student in the School of Arts and Sciences. “That’s 98 percent of the way I interact with students online,” he said. Considering that all assignments are written submissions in his class, this is a crucial area to do well in, Dunham said. There is also less emphasis on class-like participation, since there is no face-to-face contact.

http://www.dailytargum.com/article/2018/02/online-classes-help-alleviate-social-anxiety-among-other-perks-for-students

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

In addition to keeping track of student information, the LMS of the future will also be a tool for analysis. It will be able to collect and analyze imperative information helping educators see where students need more help. Through interconnected features, such as state standards, this analysis will prove helpful in planning.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/will-lms-future-look-like/

by Purdue University

Purdue University’s Online Writing Lab provides students with a guide to help them successfully complete writing assignments not only in writing classes, but also in STEM coursework and multimedia presentations. “As more high school and college students participate in online courses, they are more likely to find OWL helpful,” says Tammy Conard-Salvo, associate director of the Writing Lab. “The same is also true as students are producing non-traditional writing projects.” OWL provides students of all ages with information on the basics of writing, grammar and mechanics, writer’s block, conducting research and more. It also provides students with many subject-specific resources. These resources include presentations on how to write an engineering report, how to write an experimental report in psychology and how to write as a professional nurse. One of the most popular features on the site is the style guides for how to write academic papers.

http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2018/Q1/online-writing-resource-helps-students-in-all-areas-of-study.html

BY ANNE TRUMBORE, the Hill

by Shalina Chatlani, Education Dive
Lou Pugliese, senior innovation fellow and managing director for the Technology Innovation Action Lab at Arizona State University, and Kate Smith, vice president of academic affairs at Rio Salado College revealed four conclusions of an extensive research project on the topic: take a strategic portfolio approach to digital learning; build capabilities and expertise to design for quality in the digital realm; provide the differential student support to succeed in fully online learning; and engage faculty as true partners, equipping them for success. Smith and Pugliese offered insight into the online learning models of their institutions to discuss some of the key aspects of the ASU report that focuses on three main components, including defining what return on investment in digital learning formats really means and developing common shared metrics for the industry to create benchmarks of comparison.

https://www.educationdive.com/news/how-to-effectively-scale-a-digital-learning-model/515936/

by Adam Gordon, Forbes
The future shape of graduate and executive education is coming into focus with the surge of “MicroMasters” certificate programs on edX, to which 1.7 million students have registered in a year. The number of programs on offer has exploded from one to 46 during this time. This is the kind of extraordinary exponential growth that rips apart and rebuilds industries. MicroMasters certificates (MMs) are online, examined and graded, credit-eligible graduate-level courses that involve about a quarter of the coursework of a traditional Masters degree. At edX they cost about $1,000.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamgordon/2018/02/13/voice-of-employers-rings-out-as-moocs-go-from-education-to-qualification/#4caabd2c564b

by Mark Lieberman, Inside Higher Ed

Presidents of six small liberal arts colleges in rural Michigan have been talking for a decade about the possibility of adopting a consortium model to facilitate sharing courses and other resources. Online programs are increasingly popular solutions to this issue in higher education, but they don’t necessarily meet the small-classroom characteristics of a liberal arts education. Last fall, at long last, a surprising path forward emerged. Just three months later, at lightning speed for a cross-college collaboration, three of those institutions — Alma, Albion and Calvin Colleges — have begun a pilot course-sharing program that makes use of Google hardware, including its brand-new Jamboard for interactive videoconferencing.

https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2018/02/14/michigan-liberal-arts-colleges-use-google-share-courses

By Dian Schaffhauser, THE Journal

Middle schoolers did better with science lessons when they could learn online, watching videos, playing educational games, running virtual experiments and collaborating with classmates. Under-achievers did especially well, with access to pop-up vocabulary definitions, interactive diagrams, digital note-taking, watching videos with captions and access to text-to-speech that allowed them to hear information read aloud to them. That’s what a research project found when it introduced four interactive web-based science units to 2,303 students and 71 teachers who had access to computers or tablets in 13 middle schools in three school districts in Oregon and Georgia.

https://thejournal.com/articles/2018/02/12/web-based-interactive-learning-helps-middle-schoolers-excel-in-science.aspx

By Cait Etherington, e-Learning Inside

If you watched the Olympics, you have likely already wondered how all those young people keep up with their studies while training several hours per day and traveling around the world to attend competitions. In the past, many athletes had to put their studies on hold or count on the flexibility and kindness of their teachers and professors. Over the past decade, online education has made chasing gold medals and degrees simultaneously just a bit easier. Indeed, early gold medalists at the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, including Canada’s Kaetlyn Osmand and the United States’ Red Gerard, are both currently enrolled in online programs.

Chasing Gold Medals and Degrees: Olympians Benefit from eLearning

By Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed

The American Bar Association panel that accredits law schools has proposed loosening its restrictions on online education. Currently, the rules of the Council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar say that no more than 15 of an ABA-accredited law school’s required credits can be completed in distance learning courses, defined as those in which at least a third of the course work is done online. Most law school programs include between 83 and 90 credits over all. The ABA has in recent years granted (and rejected) several law schools’ requests for variances from the restriction on online courses. Under the proposal initially approved by the ABA council last week, students could earn up to a third of their credits (between 28 and 30) in distance courses. The ABA proposal would also allow first-year law students to take up to 10 credits online; law schools are now barred from offering distance education to first-year students.

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2018/02/13/law-school-accreditor-proposes-easing-limits-online-education

by Thomas Nugent, Business Because

At the MERIT Higher Education Summit in Lisbon last month, change was in the air. As executives and business school representatives mingled over Pastéis de Nata and espresso pods aplenty, the conversation was geared towards one thing: lifelong learning and the future of work. Online learning and technology, it seems, will impact heavily on the executive education space in the coming years, revolutionizing the way we approach the development of our personal and professional skills. For Carlo Giardinetti, associate dean of Business School Lausanne, that raises an important question.: “How do we redesign the on-campus experience knowing that the importance of technology and off-campus learning will continue to grow?”

https://www.businessbecause.com/news/emba/5069/technology-online-learning-future-executive-education

BY MARIA MENDEZ, Daily Texan
The UT System’s Institute for Transformational Learning was supposed to pioneer an online brand for UT, but it shut down two weeks ago. After investing a total of $75 million in the institute, the UT System decided the institute’s five-year revenue of $1 million was not enough for it to continue operating, according to the Texas Tribune. Francisco Cigarroa, former UT System chancellor, first allocated the institute with $50 million in 2011 from the UT System’s $20 billion Permanent University Fund. The institute was intended to make a UT education more accessible, UT System spokesperson Karen Adler said.

http://dailytexanonline.com/2018/02/12/ut-system-pulls-the-plug-on-75-million-online-learning-institute

By Elizabeth Hernandez, Daily Camera

Jane Goodall, known worldwide for her research on the relationship between chimpanzees and humans, will lead a new massive, open online course for the University of Colorado about developing compassionate leaders. The noted scientist and conservationist is holding the free course kicking off this summer through a partnership between CU and the Jane Goodall Institute’s youth program, Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots, according to a CU news release. “There are many reasons to be hopeful for the future of our planet but perhaps most inspiring is the energy, commitment, and hard work of young people who we can empower as they grow to be better, more compassionate decision-makers within their society,” said Goodall, founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and UN Messenger of Peace.

http://www.dailycamera.com/cu-news/ci_31661507/jane-goodall-lead-new-cu-boulder-online-course

By Tabitha Prisinzano, Columbia College of Missouri

Online education is the way of the future and employers are viewing online education more favorably in recent years.  Since more and more jobs have entered the digital realm, studies show that employers increasingly view online degrees favorably, as opposed to just a few years ago. Increasingly, nonprofit, brick-and-mortar schools have started offering distance-learning programs, and at some point, most students enrolled in conventional college programs will take at least one class online. Plus, even as the stigma of online education continues to fade, the benefits of a computer-based classroom are becoming increasingly apparent. In fact, online classes teach students skills and learning techniques that are invaluable in a digital workplace, yet often go untaught in traditional classroom settings.

4 Ways Online Classes Can Make You More Attractive to Employers

By Meredith Roaten, the Hatchet

After a report raised questions about unequal standards and oversight of courses taught online, Provost Forrest Maltzman defended the quality of the University’s online learning programs in a presentation to the Faculty Senate Friday. Maltzman insisted the University’s online offerings are equally as strong as traditional classes, citing data showing that programs have high student satisfaction and often outperform peers in national rankings. But he also recommended departments and programs act to increase monitoring of those courses using surveys and retaining lectures. “There is no reasonable examination of this that anyone can walk away and say our online programs are worse than our other programs,” Maltzman told the Faculty Senate.

Maltzman defends online learning programs after report raises concern

by Jordan Friedman, US News

Students in online science classes should check how much time they must commit to coursework each week, especially if there’s a lab requirement. Between lab requirements and the use of classroom equipment to conduct research, the hard sciences – biology, chemistry and physics, to name a few – may not initially seem suited for the online format. But some schools have found ways for students to explore these fields remotely.Experts say online courses in the hard sciences may also attract nondegree students taking classes for general interest or to fulfill prerequisites before transferring elsewhere. Whatever their goals may be, here are six questions experts recommend prospective or incoming students ask as they research online science courses and speak with their academic or enrollment advisers.

https://www.usnews.com/higher-education/online-education/articles/2018-02-12/ask-6-questions-to-choose-an-online-science-course

By Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology

Northeastern University has created a new Micro Credential program for working professionals in California’s Bay Area looking to hone their skills in computer science. The program was created in partnership with mobile security company Lookout and is an extension of Northeastern’s Silicon Valley campus. Students who complete three courses can earn a Micro Credential in computer science. The credential will also count as credit toward earning a master’s degree in computer science at Northeastern.

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2018/02/09/northeastern-university-launches-micro-credential-program-in-computer-science.aspx