How Should School Districts Measure ROI

by Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

In education, ROI (Return On Investment) is a big deal. Resources are finite, and whenever they’re spent those holding the purse strings want to know if the investment is justified. When it comes to new technologies and innovative approaches, ROI can be difficult to calculate; which can put edtech in an awkward position when it comes to justifying the expenditure. It’s important that educators and administrators have a sense of what they hope to accomplish with edtech: what are the goals which edtech can help achieve? Progress towards these goals needs to be tracked wherever possible, as this is the most straightforward way of presenting a case regarding ROI.

http://www.thetechedvocate.org/school-districts-measure-ed-techs-return-investment/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=31299

Andrew Ng’s Next Trick: Training a Million AI Experts

by Will Knight, MIT Technology Review
Andrew Ng, one of the world’s best-known artificial-intelligence experts, is launching an online effort to create millions more AI experts across a range of industries. Ng, an early pioneer in online learning, hopes his new deep-learning course on Coursera will train people to use the most powerful idea to have emerged in AI in recent years. The thing that really excites me today is building a new AI-powered society. Even though a lot of the buzz in AI has been around large tech companies—and clearly the large tech companies are creating huge amounts of value with AI through better Web search, online advertising, better maps, better payment systems, and so on—if you look across an entire economy, really any Fortune 500 company can create a lot of value with AI as well.

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608573/andrew-ngs-next-trick-training-a-million-ai-experts/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=31289

How to stay human in the digital age

by Leslie Barker, Dallas Morning News

George Siemens knows all about tug-of-war between social and technological networks. As executive director of the Learning Innovation & Networked Knowledge (LINK) Research Lab at the University of Texas at Arlington, he studies it, along with researcher Catherine Spann and their team. They live it. They ponder it. And in this swirling juxtaposition of person and machine, this question guides them: What does it mean to be human in the digital age? To help answer that question, or at least contemplate its implications, UTA has teamed with the Free Life People School of Yoga in Arlington — where Spann, Siemens and other LINK colleagues have taken classes — to offer a six-week course beginning Oct. 16.

https://www.dallasnews.com/life/healthy-living/2017/08/25/stay-human-digital-age

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=31279

Homeschooling: DIY learning works

by Jocelyn R. Uy, Inquirer.net

In the Mendoza household, learning knows no age and boundaries. When he was nine, 10-year-old Edan started exploring basic botany his way: he grew and cared for small carnivorous plants that he was curious about. Around the same time, his now 13-year-old brother, Elijah, signed up for a free online course on coding that taught him how to program, build and design websites and applications. He also built a stock portfolio and joined his dad in giving financial seminars. The brothers, as well as their three other siblings—aged eight, six and three—are homeschoolers.

http://lifestyle.inquirer.net/236458/homeschooling-diy-learning-works

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=17773

St. John’s E-Learning Academy offers another option to continue school

By Anita Hymel, NOLA.com

School has started, and St. John the Baptist school district plans to help everyone with desire and determination to work to further their education. The district is seeking students between the ages of 16 and 21 who are no longer enrolled in school in the parish for a new e-Learning Academy. This includes students who have dropped out of the system or who have chosen to be homeschooled. There is no cost to enroll in the academy. It’s never too late for school, and this district is making it simple for all to succeed.

http://blog.nola.com/river/2016/08/st_johns_e-learning_academy_of.html

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=17765

StudySoup raises $1.7M to help students buy and sell class notes

by Lucia Maffei, Tech Crunch

San Francisco-based education startup StudySoup, which calls itself “a peer-to-peer learning marketplace,” announced it has raised $1.7 million in seed funding. The company works as an online study group where students can sell or purchase class notes and study guides. “We realized that a lot of students come to college on very different levels,” Sieva Kozinsky, 26, co-founder and CEO, said in a phone interview with TechCrunch. “They’re all expected to hit the ground running and to get on the same page, and unfortunately it leads to a lot of failures, because people are totally unprepared and there isn’t the right support there.”

https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/26/studysoup-raises-1-7m-to-help-students-buy-and-sell-class-notes/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=17753

Robots tighten gap in distance learning

By KIRK PINHO, Crain’s Detroit

Christine Greenhow, assistant professor of counseling, educational psychology and special education at Michigan State University’s College of Education is bringing the concept of telecommuting to the academy using robotic technology. During a spring course in the Educational Psychology and Educational Technology Ph.D. program, 13 of 15 students participated using iPads affixed on top of either a stationary robot that swivels to interact with another student or a robot that moves around the classroom to do the same. Greenhow, who used the robot technology that was developed by the College of Educational Psychology and Special Education/College of Education Design Studio, said she saw the need for a virtual classroom after Ph.D. students taking most of their classes online “felt a sense of distance” between themselves and the teacher, as well as their fellow students. “Online and on-campus students recorded that when their colleagues were in robot form, each group felt more physically there.”

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20150830/NEWS/308309996/robots-tighten-gap-in-distance-learning

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=13708

Student success in open, distance and e-learning

by Karen MacGregor, University World News

Student success is crucial to the purposes of open, distance and e-learning – but challenging to achieve compared with selective post-secondary systems – a study for the International Council for Open and Distance Education, or ICDE, found. Good practices include whole-institution strategies for student success and the mitigation of drop-out at course, qualification and institutional levels, solid data, honest admissions policies and accountability. Student Success in Open, Distance and e-Learning was published in April and draws on research findings from a survey of 53 ICDE member institutions. It was produced by a task group led by Professor Alan Tait of The Open University, UK.

http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20150828121436196

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=13705

Report: How Millennials Use Mobile Devices at College

by D. Frank Smith, EdTech

A new study on the mobile device habits of college students shows they’re leaving their desktops behind and venturing out into an increasingly mobile landscape — one in which higher ed infrastructure will have to evolve to accommodate. The survey from cloud provider Domo polled 2,228 higher ed students to see how they’re using their mobile devices on campuses. Although the survey found that millennials spend more time browsing the Internet on their mobile phone than on their desktop, cellphone web surfing won by only a 2 percent margin (45.7 percent versus 43.4 percent for laptops or desktops).

http://www.edtechmagazine.com/higher/article/2015/08/report-how-millennials-use-mobile-devices-college

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=13702

Inspiring Creativity With No-Tech, Low-Tech and High-Tech Tools

By Dan Gordon, THE Journal

One of the things I’m a big proponent of is making kids see that they are creators, not simply consumers, on their devices. They can make materials that others can absorb and explore. Particularly for children up to age 10 like the ones I work with, technology can make your work look better. If you write something by hand, people can tell you’re 10 years old from the handwriting. But if you type it and put it into an interactive book, you could be 50 years old and no one knows the difference. So it levels the playing field for children in a way that traditional media can’t do.

http://thejournal.com/articles/2014/08/28/innovator-todd-burleson.aspx

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/ZpO5V1aByeo/

How Open Badges Could Really Work In Education

By LindsayH, Edudemic

Higher education institutions are abuzz with the concept of Open Badges. Defined as a symbol or indicator of an accomplishment, skill, quality or interest, Open Badges are not only a hot topic as of late, but are also debated by some critics as the latest threat to higher education. A closer look at this emerging trend reveals benefits for traditional institutions and alternative learning programs alike. Some advocates have suggested that badges representing learning and skills acquired outside the classroom, or even in Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), will soon supplant diplomas and course credits.

http://www.edudemic.com/open-badges-in-education/

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from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/c03DmMlHs2Q/