For-Credit MOOC: Best of Both Worlds at MIT?

by By Nick Roll, Inside Higher Ed

MIT students reported that taking course online — instead of same course on campus — was less stressful than their in-person classes. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s catalog of publicly available massive open online courses is typically marketed toward the non-MIT public. Last fall, however, the university experimented by offering the MOOC version of a popular class for on-campus students, for credit, in an attempt to help students facing scheduling issues. A recently released study of the class found students not only performed well but also — at an institution known for its rigor — reported feeling less stress and having more flexibility.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/06/15/credit-mooc-proves-popular-among-mit-students

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29157

School’s effort to stay safe online rewarded

by Tanya Yilmaz, Swindon Advertiser

Making pupils aware of the importance of staying safe online has saw one Swindon school be presented with a prestigious award. Rodbourne Cheney Primary School has been gifted the online safety award by 360 Degree Safe for all of their efforts at promoting e-learning and e-safety with students. From making up e-safety songs in reception to creating scenarios for children to ponder over in the older years, the school has continually strived to put online safety at the forefront of their work and on Thursday, the school found out about the exciting news – much to the delight of the school’s e-safety ambassadors.

http://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/15352957.School_s_effort_to_stay_safe_online_rewarded/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29149

Missouri Online Summer School Offers Innovative Education for More Students

by Meghan Bogardus Cortez, EdTech

Forget summer brain drain for K–12 students in Missouri. They have access to more than 100 free online classes thanks to the Missouri Online Summer Institute, a program open to students in grades 7–12, K12 Inc. reports in a press release. Class offerings range from required electives to Advanced Placement courses and career readiness classes, such as Introduction to Agriscience, Engineering Design and Web Design. K12 Inc. reports that MOSI began as a summer course offering from Grandview R–2 School District and expanded quickly, with enrollment ready to surpass 1,000 this year. “This program allows students to attend summer school on their own schedule,” says MOSI Coordinator Mike Brown. “They can take part in family vacations and summer sporting activities yet still continue their studies online to achieve their academic goals and satisfy graduation requirements.”

https://edtechmagazine.com/k12/article/2017/06/missouri-online-summer-school-offers-innovative-education-more-students

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29137

​Artificial intelligence and privacy engineering: Why it matters NOW

By Michael Krigsman, ZD Net

As artificial intelligence proliferates, companies and governments are aggregating enormous data sets to feed their AI initiatives. Although privacy is not a new concept in computing, the growth of aggregated data magnifies privacy challenges and leads to extreme ethical risks such as unintentionally building biased AI systems, among many others. Privacy and artificial intelligence are both complex topics. There are no easy or simple answers because solutions lie at the shifting and conflicted intersection of technology, commercial profit, public policy, and even individual and cultural attitudes.

http://www.zdnet.com/article/artificial-intelligence-and-privacy-engineering-why-it-matters-now/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29113

Supercomputing Top500: US knocked out of ‘top three most powerful’ list

By Liam Tung, ZD Net

A Cray system in Switzerland is now the world’s third most powerful supercomputer, behind two Chinese systems. That means for the first time in 21 years a US high-performance computing system is not one of the world’s top three supercomputers, according to the June 2017 rankings by the supercomputer benchmarking project Top500. The only other time a US supercomputer had failed to make Top500’s top three ranking was in 1996, when the US was edged out by three Japanese supercomputers.

http://www.zdnet.com/article/supercomputing-top500-us-knocked-out-of-top-three-most-powerful-list/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29101

Why I’m Optimistic About the Next Wave of Education Technology

By Jason Palmer, EdSurge

My bet is that by 2040, our children will look back on this period between 2015 and 2030 in education technology much the same way internet historians look to the period 1995 to 2010 as the birth of the commercial web. The new millennium started with the dot-com crash which decimated 78 percent of the value of the NASDAQ and hundreds of first-wave internet startups went bankrupt. But during that same fifteen-year period, we also witnessed the birth and growth of highly influential firms like Google, Amazon, Facebook, Tencent and Alibaba. Edtech, I believe, is going through a similar rebuilding moment powered by three trends: widely available infrastructure, the catalytic impact of spending by both the government and philanthropy in education, and—finally—the embrace of edtech by educational institutions and educators themselves. Not yet convinced? Join me on a quick tour of the past quarter century in education technology history.

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2017-06-18-why-i-m-optimistic-about-the-next-wave-of-education-technology

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29125

What administrators can expect from regulation roll back on for-profit colleges

by Shalina Chatlani, Education Dive

The Department of Education is stepping back from two Obama era policies intended to make for-profit colleges more accountable for how they treat students. For one, it is completely withdrawing from the borrower-defense-to-repayment regulation, which provided relief to students who feel they were misled or defrauded by their institution. And, it is rolling back the gainful employment regulation, which holds institutions responsible for whether graduates find work, reports the Chronicle of Higher Education. U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos is establishing a rulemaking committee to rework the gainful-employment rule, because “it became clear that, as written, it is overly burdensome and confusing for institutions of higher education,” according to the Department’s press release.

http://www.educationdive.com/news/what-administrators-can-expect-from-regulation-roll-back-on-for-profit-coll/445017/

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from Educational Technology http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/?p=29093