Published by rwatstein November 23rd, 2008
in education.
U.S. News & World Report is proud to publish our first ever World’s Best Colleges and Universities rankings. These rankings are based on data from the THE-QS World University Rankings, which were produced in association with QS Quacquarelli Symonds. QS Quacquarelli Symonds, one of the world’s leading networks for careers and education, has been publishing world rankings since 2004. These rankings have obtained increasing influence among academics worldwide and have a growing impact among prospective students and government policymakers. The U.S. News World’s Best Colleges and Universities rankings enable our readers to understand more fully how well American institutions perform when compared with other institutions of higher learning around the world. The bottom line is that they perform very well: Nearly 60 schools in the Top 200 Universities Worldwide are in the United States.
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Columbia University’s Rick J. Block, an adjunct at both the Pratt Institute and Palmer School of Library and Information Science, is the 2008 winner of the ProQuest-sponsored LJ Teaching Award. Come meet him.
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Published by rwatstein November 15th, 2008
in education and storytelling.
After nearly two years in development, Mrs. P, a free children’s entertainment and educational website celebrating books and reading, officially launched November 10. In a nod to Cinderella, the site debuted at the stroke of midnight, featuring 15 classic fairy tales read by Mrs. P from her “Magic Library.” The interactive site features actress Kathy Kinney, who played Mimi on The Drew Carey Show, as a globe-trotting, redheaded Irishwoman who brings classic children’s stories to life with her own brand of quirky humor.
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Published by rwatstein November 15th, 2008
in education, technology and Apple.
Students now expect to use interactive, Web2.0 applications in their education environments. As part of a strategy to meet such expectations, Delta College in Michigan launched an online Delta iTunes U environment this fall.
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Published by rwatstein November 15th, 2008
in education and technology.
Today’s wired student, bud in ear, studies on an ever-evolving campus, one where administrators continually roll out services for the internet-immersed. Over the years, distance learning, podcasts, and high-tech classrooms have transformed academics and the way students learn. But the innovations also have had a wider reach, affecting aspects of everyday campus life — from allowing freshman to pick their own roommates through a web-based social network to changing the way they do laundry.
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Published by rwatstein November 15th, 2008
in education and microblogging.
Microblogging redefines synchronous communication in learning. While conventional distance education has explored the uses of chat tools in this regard for several years and particularly the benefits of synchronous communication over asynchronous communication in support of specific learning goals, this level of immediacy is faster-paced and more direct.
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Published by rwatstein November 9th, 2008
in education and collections.
Rare books and manuscripts, once restricted to scholars and graduate students in white gloves, are being incorporated into undergraduate courses at institutions like the University of Iowa, Smith College, the University of Washington, and Harvard. Last academic year, almost 200 classes and student tours visited the rare-books collection of the University of Pennsylvania. Students today often blindly grant authority to the online world. Curators want to reconnect them with original sources and teach them to question those sources.
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Published by rwatstein November 9th, 2008
in libraries, education and library services.
As a way to reach out and serve area schools, many public libraries offer a service commonly termed Assignment Alert. The idea is to give teachers and school librarians an easy online way to get help from the public library in identifying resources such as booklists, Websites, movies and books to support curriculum - but how much are assignment alert services used?
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Published by rwatstein November 9th, 2008
in education and technology.
We all know the routine–all the world has changed but the classroom is the same as it was a millennium ago. Faculty feel guilty but don’t know what to do… Ideas are powerful, especially when they have become beliefs and have been unquestioned for generations. Three in particular may be standing in the way of more faculty using our new learning tools in enlightened ways.
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Published by rwatstein November 9th, 2008
in education, government and politics.
Many higher education leaders had hoped to see college issues, or education generally, emerge as a major issue in the 2008 race. That never quite happened. And with the war in Iraq and the collapse of the economy, that may not be surprising. But over the course of two years leading up to his election, Sen. Barack Obama has given many policy addresses and issued many proposals about education that may guide his work in office — at least after he deals with the economy, Iraq and Afghanistan. Here are some of the highlights.
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Marcia Mardis writes: “The findings of the AASL longitudinal study suggest that Web 2.0 tools are gaining popularity in schools across the United States. These tools are enabling forms of communication, collaboration, and learning never seen in K–12 education. This is exciting because it signals the timely, if not prescient, nature of the Standards for the 21st-Century Learner.”
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Published by rwatstein November 9th, 2008
in education and virtual worlds.
One of the problems with this area is that there is a plethora of virtual worlds available and practitioners do not always know which one to use and in which contexts. In order to help practitioners to identify the worlds that are the most relevant for their particular learning context, the report presents an overview of the available virtual worlds, describing in particular the serious virtual worlds that have educational potential or have been used in education and training settings. However, stepping beyond this traditional mode of teacher and learner, the report also aims to foreground how learners themselves are becoming a more central component in the use of immersive worlds, creating learning experiences for themselves and adopting a more exploratory mode of learning.
The aim of the report then is two-fold: to provide a context for learning practitioners and policy makers, aiding with their understanding of virtual worlds and how they can be selected and used in tertiary education; and to highlight how learners, through greater empowerment, may play a different and enriched role in the process of forming collaborative learning experiences and engaging in activities which may support their own learning and meta-reflection.
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Char Booth writes: “The skills that are becoming essential to the increasingly demanding, complex, and collaborative world of librarianship should be better addressed by the education we receive. Systemic reform of the LIS curriculum is critical if libraries are to survive, beginning with aggressive adoption and progressive interpretation of the newly revised 2008 ALA accreditation standards. In order to create a more vibrant and resilient profession, the students of library and information studies programs should be entitled to the following rights.”
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Published by rwatstein November 2nd, 2008
in education and technology.
In its fifth study of undergraduate students and information technology, the EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research (ECAR) seeks to more fully understand today’s undergraduate students’ varied use of skills and experiences with IT. The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2008 analyzes the responses of 27,317 freshmen, seniors and community college students at 98 colleges and universities from a Web-based survey, as well as findings from focus group discussions. Among the findings: Respondents report spending an average 19.6 hours per week actively doing online activities for work, school or recreation, and 7.4 percent spend more than 40 hours per week doing so. Almost all students surveyed use the college or university library Web site (93.4 percent) and presentation software (91.9 percent). Also used by most students are spreadsheets (85.9 percent), social networking sites (85.2 percent), text messaging (83.6 percent) and course management systems (82.3 percent).
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Published by rwatstein November 2nd, 2008
in blogs and education.
Hugh McGuire writes: “I’m taking a Media Theory course at Concordia in their media studies master’s program, which involves a fair bit of reading. I’ve come to the conclusion that all academics should blog. Here’s why.” Reason no. 2: “Some of your ideas are dumb. The sooner you get called out on bad ideas, the better. When you have a good idea, you’ll hear about it; when you have an incomplete idea, and some others chip in with suggestions, you’ll get a better-formed idea.”
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Published by rwatstein November 2nd, 2008
in users, education and video.
Torley writes: “Making screencasts (also known as video tutorials) is already easy, and becomes easier with better tools and broadband proliferation. However, no tech is complete without a human who dives in, does experiments, and discerns best practices from the results. I’ve made over 200 video tutorials, mostly for the virtual world of Second Life. If a picture’s worth 1,000 words, then a video is a lot more. Through such experience, these are tips and tricks I’m sure you’ll find practical and applicable to your further forays into the video fields.”
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Published by rwatstein November 2nd, 2008
in education, search and image.
The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) has published a free online tutorial called Internet for Image Searching. The tutorial is designed to help staff and students in universities and colleges to find digital images for their learning and teaching.
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See the tutorial here
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Published by rwatstein November 2nd, 2008
in education, plagiarism and United Kingdom.
A survey shows 49% of undergraduates have plagiarized work while studying at Cambridge University, with law students being the worst offenders. The university is now planning to introduce special plagiarism detection software to tackle the problem.
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Published by rwatstein October 25th, 2008
in education.
Eight new courses in history, economics, literature and biomedical engineering taught by leading faculty have been added to “Open Yale Courses,” the University’s free online education initiative. The courses, which were recorded in their entirety as they were taught to Yale College students in the classroom, are available in video and audio formats. Closed captioning is offered for each course, and that feature has been added to the seven courses that were made available when the award-winning Open Yale Courses was launched in December 2007. In addition to complete, searchable transcripts, the Internet courses include syllabi, reading assignments, problem sets and other materials.
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Published by rwatstein October 25th, 2008
in education.
The credit crunch has officially arrived on campus. In a new survey, private colleges report their students are finding it significantly harder to secure the private loans they need to pay tuition bills. More alarmingly, nearly half of colleges say some students have been forced to take time off or go part-time as a result.
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in education and politics.
In a collection of letters addressed to the next president of the United States, leaders of higher education offer their views on the critical issues facing higher education in the coming four years and suggest what role the next president might play in addressing them.
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in education, books and reading.
Think it’s hard to get a 6th-grade class excited about reading Shakespeare? Or maybe push the high school freshmen through Beowulf? If you’re old enough to remember the Classics Illustrated comic books, you’ll be glad to know that they’re back, along with a whole army of other graphic novel lines that promise to encourage readers to get into, and through, the classics.
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in education and gaming.
Microsoft is teaming up with a consortium of universities to study how best to use computer games to teach middle-school students math and science. The interdisciplinary research project, which is to be announced today, will involve New York University and a consortium of other institutions — the City University of New York, Columbia University, Dartmouth College, Parsons the New School for Design, and the Rochester Institute of Technology. Columbia’s Teachers College and NYU’s Polytechnic Institute are also involved. In middle school, many students “become discouraged or uninterested and pour their time at home into gaming,” said Ken Perlin, an NYU professor of computer science, in a statement. “We think gaming is our starting point to draw them into math, science, and technology-based programs.”
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in education and instant messages.
The idea of using chat as a communication tool with students is widely accepted in education. Using the same tool to progress critical thinking is not often discussed - yet this tool has the potential to get students fully engaged in thinking together rather than simply chatting.
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in web 2.0, education and technology.
We are seeing trends in higher education, good and maybe otherwise, that reflect the re-structuring of knowledge systems that seem to come with a point in time we’re calling Web 2.0. Educational leadership in this environment means reform at an institutional level, not just technology adoption.
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Published by rwatstein October 19th, 2008
in education and technology.
Students see campus technology is a key factor in selecting a college or university and consider it critical for their professional development. Yet higher education institutions on the whole aren’t keeping up with student needs in this area, according to a new report released by CDW Government (CDW-G).
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Published by rwatstein October 12th, 2008
in education and wi-fi.
Wi-Fi is an integral part of today’s college experience, changing the way students study, interact with professors, and socialize. In a survey released today by the Wi-Fi Alliance and Wakefield Research, nine out of 10 college students in the United States say Wi-Fi access is as essential to education as classrooms and computers, and nearly three in five say they wouldn’t go to a college that doesn’t have free Wi-Fi. What’s more, fully 79 percent said that without Wi-Fi access, college would be a lot harder. “Wi-Fi has become a universal expectation among college students, and their attitudes towards technology are a good indicator of broad changes underway in how we as a society learn, work and communicate,” said Edgar Figueroa, executive director of the Wi-Fi Alliance, the global trade organization representing the Wi-Fi industry. “Young adults expect access to information with unprecedented immediacy. Whether they are chasing a detail that will help them look smart in the middle of a class discussion, or are looking up a new friend on the Internet within minutes of meeting them - Wi-Fi enables the flexibility and freedom to access information from just about anywhere.”
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Published by rwatstein October 12th, 2008
in education and technology.
It may be getting at least a little harder for students to plagiarize from websites, text-message answers to friends during tests, or get others to do their homework, as professors are using new technologies to detect or prevent cheating.
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Published by rwatstein October 5th, 2008
in education, politics and economics.
Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain have offered similar campaign pronouncements: a college education should be affordable to anyone, and the process of getting federal aid is more complicated than it should be — but there are differences in how each would tackle the problem.
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Published by rwatstein October 5th, 2008
in blogs and education.
Blogging can be an effective tool for learning, but its benefits shouldn’t be taken for granted. It takes careful planning and skillful management to make it work in an educational setting. Here are five of the most common mistakes for instructors to avoid when incorporating blogs into instruction.
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Published by rwatstein October 5th, 2008
in education and books.
Nine months ago, the Manchester, Connecticut, school system began navigating the choppy waters of teaching Twain’s most admired and vilified book, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. One parent complained, and the book was removed from the reading list. Now after months of study, the school system is training 11 high school teachers in how to teach the novel in a broader context that includes discussions of Twain’s era, satire, white privilege, diversity, and social change. The teachers are to receive two days of training before bringing the book back to classes next month.
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Published by rwatstein October 5th, 2008
in education and economics.
With digital technologies and Web 2.0 surrounding us, information — and knowledge generation — is abundant as never before. This creates some big changes for higher education: With no scarcity of information or collaboration opportunities, “seat time” in a classroom is no longer just about delivering content. Trent Batson asks, “How does a teacher reclaim the value of students coming to class in this time?”
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education and e-books.
Initial observations from the UK’s national e-book observatory are already challenging assumptions about how students use e-books. According to Lorraine Estelle CEO of JISC Collections, in the first user survey, which received over 22,000 responses, 62 per cent of students reported that they read online whilst only 6 per cent said that they print to read. The survey also indicated that interactivity may not be as important to students as anticipated. ‘Students say that the main attraction is that e-books within an academic setting, are more accessible than print books, meaning that users can get at them wherever they are and at whatever time they like,’ explained Estelle
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education.
A new University of Wisconsin study suggests a “clear preference” among undergraduates for “lecture capture,” the technology that records, streams, and stores what happens in the classroom for concurrent or later viewing. When provided with the option to view lectures online, rather than just in person, a full 82 percent of undergraduates kindly offered that they’d be willing to entertain an alternative to showing up to class and paying attention in real time.
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education, trends and career.
Dual-career issues are increasingly important in higher education today. We discovered that over 70 percent of faculty are in dual-career relationships; more than a third are partnered with another academic. This trend is particularly strong among women scientists and people in assistant professor positions. As the number of women receiving Ph.D.s continues to rise, U.S. universities will see an increasing number of high quality candidates for faculty positions partnered with another academic. This presents universities with a challenge, but also a great opportunity to access new candidates and diversify their faculty.
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education and web sites.
The U.S. Department of Education recently unveiled College.gov, a new website that aims to motivate students with inspirational stories and information about planning, preparing and paying for college. Designed with students’ input and participation, College.gov was created by the U.S. Department of Education to be a go-to online resource for credible information about college that also provides real life experiences of peers who are already attending college. U.S. Under Secretary of Education Sara Martinez Tucker unveiled the website during a discussion with students at The David A. Stein Riverdale/ Kingsbridge Academy MS/HS 141 in Bronx, N.Y.
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education and social networking.
A warning for college applicants: you’re Facebook page is showing. Facebook or MySpace pages could count against you in college admissions. High school seniors already have a lot to worry about when applying for colleges like good grades and high test scores. And now a new survey of 500 top colleges found that 10 percent of admissions officers acknowledged looking at social-networking sites to evaluate applicants.
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Published by rwatstein September 27th, 2008
in education and technology.
Looking to produce their next generation of employees (and customers), technology giants such as Cisco Systems, Intel, and Microsoft are setting their sights beyond just the United States and are investing heavily in global education reform initiatives. Developing nations such as India, Jordan, and Kenya are among the beneficiaries of these efforts, which underscore the need for U.S. schools to prepare their students for an increasingly global, information-based workforce.
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Published by rwatstein September 21st, 2008
in education and innovation.
A new website brings social networking and ad revenues to the traditional note-taking service, but the model could raise copyright issues. Knetwit, as it’s called, is a Web site that combines some familiar Web 2.0 features — user profiles, file sharing, online communities — with the goals of campus note-taking services. Its creators dropped out of Babson College to launch the service, now with backing of at least $5 million in venture capital and other funds. They have ambitions to develop it into a one-stop destination for educational content not only for students, but for professors and researchers as well.
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Published by rwatstein September 21st, 2008
in education and learning.
A recent study comparing a blended learning course to a traditional course reports that blended learning is at least as effective as traditional learning.
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Published by rwatstein September 14th, 2008
in education, books and wiki.
“Wikibooks is a Wikimedia community for creating a free library of educational textbooks that anyone can edit.” Searchable, or browse by topic, featured book, or other factors. Also includes links to Wikijunior (non-fiction books for children from birth to age 12), textbooks in “simple English,” and books in languages other than English.
Wikibooks website
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Published by rwatstein September 14th, 2008
in education, books and publishing.
Senator Dick Durbin comments on an act he authored that’s intended to make textbooks costs more manageable — but notes that the publishing industry has succeeded in postponing the act’s implementation until July 2010.
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Published by rwatstein August 31st, 2008
in podcasts, education, video and Apple.
Columbia University has been beta testing its content through iTunes U, Apple’s education-focused portal within its popular iTunes digital media player. The New York-based university expects to go live with its release at the start of the fall semester. Columbia on iTunes U will allow students, instructors, and the public to search, download, and play content on computers or iPods. The site, accessible via the Web site, ccnmtl.columbia.edu/itunesu/, contains audio and video podcasts of course lectures, course media and campus events.
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Published by rwatstein August 31st, 2008
in education.
Distance learning offers cost-effective, flexible access to lifelong education. You can now study in your own time, at your own pace. The benefits are clear for all, from University students to working adults or stay-at-home parents wanting to return to a career after having children. With a wealth of supporting resources available online, there has never been a better time to get the degree you always wanted. However, self-study does come with unique challenges. You will probably never see or meet your teacher or classmates. Restrictions like these can make it hard to stay motivated. We have put together 10 top tips on how ensure your course is a success.
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Published by rwatstein August 31st, 2008
in education and VoIP.
Two Pennsylvania teaching colleagues with an interest in music and technology are bringing remote experts into classrooms at almost no cost, using Skype’s free videoconferencing technology. Joseph Pisano, a music professor and conductor at Grove City College, and Travis Weller, a composer, instrumental music instructor, and director of bands for grades 7-12 at Mercer Area Middle School and High School, are working together to explore the teaching potential in Skype, the well known Internet communication tool owned by eBay. Using Skype, both educators have invited experts in the music industry into the classroom for two-way conversations from remote locations.
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A growing number of students are replacing introductory phone calls to potential college roommates with visits to social networking Web sites. Within seconds of signing onto a site, you can find answers to questions you may be unwilling to ask during an initial conversation. Political parties, church affiliations, pictures and friend lists are plentiful on MySpace and Facebook, and students are reading up on and making judgments about their prospective roommates before ever hearing their voices. “If they don’t like what they see, they’ll request a roommate change,” said Lorinda Krhut, director of student housing and residence life at the University of Mississippi.
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Published by rwatstein August 31st, 2008
in web 2.0 and education.
New ways of using the Web mean change is on the horizon for schools, as well as students. Web 2.0 has raised its fair share of security questions. Also, the amount of bandwidth a school needs to support has grown, as teachers use tools like video-sharing and blogging to communicate with students. The enhanced degree of communication that Web 2.0 utilities enable is changing the corporate world, for good or for ill, as enterprises decide whether to reject or embrace concepts like wikis, blogs, social networks and video-sharing. The trend has touched the academic world in similar ways. Web 2.0 utilities have raised concerns about security in nearly all IT fields, and educational institutions are no exception. “The biggest worries schools have are hackers getting into the Web site,” Steve Yin, vice president of global marketing and sales for Web security appliance firm St.
Bernard, told TechNewsWorld.
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Published by rwatstein August 31st, 2008
in education, environment and green.
More campuses in the United States have shifted their focus to environmental and sustainability programs, but funding and staffing issues have prevented them from implementing green initiatives on the scale campus administrators would like, according to a new report released recently by the National Wildlife Federation.
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Read the full study Campus Environment 2008: A National Report Card on Sustainability in Higher Education here
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Published by rwatstein July 19th, 2008
in education.
As part of its Innovative Digital Education and Learning initiative (IDEAL-NM), New Mexico is launching a statewide program to standardize on a single electronic learning platform–Blackboard–spanning K-12, higher education, adult education, and government. The initiative will also support a new statewide virtual high school.
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Published by rwatstein July 19th, 2008
in education, economics and publishing.
College students, already struggling with soaring tuition bills and expenses, are encountering yet another financial hit: Publishers and schools are working together to produce “custom” textbooks that can limit students’ use of the money-saving trade in used books. And in a controversial twist, some academic departments are sharing in the profits from these texts.
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