Plugged In | 05.21.13 | (powered by iNACOL)

A final word from the neo-liberals…

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PLUGGED IN  05.21.13 powered by iNACOL… News… Flipping classrooms increases collaboration, higher thinking News & Observer | Raleigh, NC This month Luke Miles, eighth-grade social studies teacher at Durant Road Middle School, was named Wake County Teacher of the Year and was praised for using the flipped classroom technique. Instead of giving lectures, he records short videos explaining the material that his students watch for homework. (read) Individual hearings set for District 300, others in virtual charter school appeal Northwest Herald | Crystal Lake, IL A state commission’s recent decision to grant individual appeal hearings for all Fox Valley school districts affected by a proposed virtual charter school was in response to a misunderstanding, said the commission’s chairman. Representatives from the 18 school districts that stand to lose tax dollars (read) Consultant tells Billerica School Committee to reorganize tech. department, add staff Billerica Minuteman | Billerica, MA Educational Technology Consultant Thomas Plati, who is also director of educational technology and assessment for the town of Lexington, presented his assessment of the technology status of the Billerica Public Schools. According to Plati’s report, “The goal of this study was to review the current (read) Distance learning at the fingertips Cape Cod Times | Hyannis, MA On a recent Monday in the online learning classroom at Nauset Regional High School, Parker Lang, 14, of Brewster designed a video game while 16-year-old sophomore Abby Bausch prepared for an MCAS science test. As a teacher’s voice filled her ear phones with information about parasitism, Bausch watched a (read) Kansas Virtual Academy Goes Online Next School Year Press Release Kansas families now have access to a new and innovative public school option with the announcement of the Kansas Virtual Academy (KSVA). Offered by the Spring Hill School District, the online public school will serve students statewide in grades K-6 beginning next year. “Spring Hill School District is proud to (read) Inquiry Learning Vs. Standardized Content: Can They Coexist? Mind/Shift As Common Core State Standards are incorporated from school to school across the country, educators are discussing their value. It may seem that educators are arguing over whether the CCSS will roll out as a substitute No Child Left Behind curriculum or as an innovative guide to encourage inquiry rather than (read) Study: Free Computers Don’t Close The Rich-Poor Education Gap TechCrunch According to a new study, we really don’t have to worry too much about the nearly 1 in 4 children without access to FarmVille at home. “Our results indicate that computer ownership alone is unlikely to have much of an impact on short-term schooling outcomes for low-income children,” report Robert W. Fairlie and (read) New ‘MOOC’ Teacher PD Project Enlists Prominent Museums Digital Education When Coursera begins providing “massively open online courses” focused on teacher professional development this year, the Web-based offerings on the menu will be supplied not only by schools of education, but also by a number of the country’s best-known museums. Museums have been (read) EdX Expands xConsortium to Asia and Doubles in Size with Addition of 15 New Global Institutions Press Release EdX, the not-for-profit online learning initiative composed of the leading global institutions of the xConsortium, today announced another doubling of its university membership with the addition of its first Asian institutions and further expansion in the Ivy League. The xConsortium is gaining 15 prestigious (read) What Professors Can Learn From ‘Hard Core’ MOOC Students Chronicle of Higher Education If people who sit at their computers for tens of hours each week zapping virtual monsters are hard-core gamers, then massive open online courses have led to a similarly obsessed breed of online student: the hard-core learner. Nearly 100 students using Coursera, the largest provider of MOOCs, have (read) Education Publishing Associations to Merge Marketplace K-12 The Association of Educational Publishers and the school division of the Association of American Publishers are planning to merge operations, marking the union of a pair of leading voices in the K-12 industry. The two groups said in a statement released Monday that the new alliance would combine ( read) Something missing? Send news items and other information of interest to joglesby@inacol.org… Do you know someone who should be reading Plugged In? Please share the following link and ask them to subscribe: http://www.inacol.org/news/plugged-in/ - Thank you!     Find out more about iNACOL and our mission on: Stay connected:

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Plugged In | 05.20.13 | (powered by iNACOL)

A final neo-liberal note for the day…

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PLUGGED IN  05.20.13 powered by iNACOL… Upcoming iNACOL webinars…   > 05.21 Webinar: Research in Review - Examining K-12 Online Teachers Educational Practices News… The Surprising Ways BYOD, Flipped Classrooms, and 1-to-1 Are Being Used in the Special Ed Classroom THE Journal The latest compilation from the US Department of Education (from 2010-2011) reports that about 13 percent of public school enrollment consists of students served by special education programs. That count has pretty much stayed the same for the last 13 years. What’s different now is that, as technology (read) Oklahoma Virtual Charter Academy’s first graduating class turns their tassels, earns their diplomas KJRH | Tulsa, OK The first graduating class of the Oklahoma Virtual Charter Academy accepted their diplomas in Tulsa Saturday. Thirty-one of the senior class’ 50 graduates turned their tassels and tossed their caps in front of hundreds of friends and family members at the Tulsa Event Center. The charter, established in 2011 (read) Pennsylvania cyber charter schools rally to oppose funding cuts Press Release A large contingent of PA Cyber Charter School students, parents, teachers and staff were among a thousand-plus charter school supporters who cheered speakers and swarmed through the Capitol building to speak with their legislators at the 7th annual Day on the Hill Rally on Tuesday, May 14. Elected (read) Virtual school finalist pool changes slightly The Recorder | Greenfield, MA The Greenfield School Committee will interview Tuesday seven finalists vying for spots on the town’s new cyber school’s governing board – but the pool has changed slightly with two late additions and two withdrawals. Attorney and former mayoral candidate Edward Berlin and Town Councilor Mark Maloni (read) D.C. charter school would teach all but math and English online The Examiner | Washington, DC A controversial computer-based learning model is competing with eight other proposals to be one of the next charter schools approved for the District. The proposed Nexus Academy of DC, run by a subsidiary of publishing giant Pearson, would offer grades 9 through 12 in Ward 2, eventually serving up to 600 (read) Bradley County has 4 graduates in its first Virtual School class Cleveland Daily Banner | Cleveland, TN The first class of graduates from Bradley County Virtual School walked across the stage to receive their high school diplomas on Friday. This was the first year Bradley County Schools offered the predominately online school to students. The four virtual school graduates joined Reach Adult High School and (read) Common-Core Testing Consortium Hires Tech Director Digital Education One of the two major consortia designing tests to match the Common Core State Standards has hired a technology director to try to make sure the ambitious online testing rollout and implementation goes as planned. Brandt Redd was recently named chief technology officer of Smarter Balanced Assessment (read) Commentary: Creative destruction meets higher education Washington Post | Washington, DC I was invited to weigh in during the opening general session at the Education Technology Industry Summit in San Francisco this month, hosted by the Software & Information Industry Association. The topic: “What’s Next” in education. As a technology venture capital investor and parent of both a college student and (read) Low-residency programs blend online, campus classes Boston Globe | Boston, MA Joe Lane, juggling a job and family, wanted to get an MBA, but didn’t like the idea of doing a program entirely online. Then he found a solution: Babson College’s Fast Track MBA, a program combining online learning with face-to-face classes that meet for 2½ days every seven weeks at the Wellesley campus (read) MOOCs aren’t the only kind of online course stirring debate on college campuses GigaOm Over the past couple of months, massive open online course (MOOC) providers have been the focus of dissension on some college campuses. But now online learning company 2U is getting some pushback of its own. Last fall, the company, which has partnered with several leading universities for online (read) CEOs Want Hard-Working, Decision-Making Team Players Vander Ark on Innovation A survey of chief executives indicates that 92% say education is very or the most important national competitiveness issue.  But the survey, conducted by the The Business Council and The Conference Board, isn’t a flattering picture of U.S. education. Three quarters of the CEOs think U.S. higher (read) PhillyInc: Penn’s new ed-tech incubator a bit different Philadelphia Inquirer | Philadelphia, PA Does Philadelphia have room for one more specialized business incubator? It may, indeed, if enough education- technology entrepreneurs choose to take the plunge into what the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education calls its new Education Design Studio Fund. Even the name suggests (read) Creating Adaptive, Personalized, Effective and Addictive Education System for the Next Century Forbes I suggested in my first article that our education system is not broken but has simply become obsolete. It’s doing exactly what it was designed to do but unfortunately, our needs have changed. We can’t just make incremental improvement to the current education system to somehow make it work for the next (read) Something missing? Send news items and other information of interest to joglesby@inacol.org… Do you know someone who should be reading Plugged In?  Please share the following link and ask them to subscribe: http://www.inacol.org/news/plugged-in/ - Thank you!     Find out more about iNACOL and our mission on: Stay connected:

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Distance-Educator.com e-Newsletter – 5/20/13

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FEATURED ARTICLE Planning and Managing Distance Education Systems: Building the Model Dr. Farhad (Fred) Saba Founder and Editor, Distance-Educator.com In this series of articles, I presented a hierarchical model of distance education consisting of seven interrelated nested systems levels. These systems have been present in most distance education organizations that I observed, or planned and built over the past 30 years. In the previous weeks, I discussed Hardware, Software, Telecommunications, Instructional, Educational, Societal and Global Systems Levels. Last week I started to explain the process of system modeling so that you could start the planning process for your organization. I hope that conducting the environmental scan as presented in a previous article has given you a better appreciation of the components of the technology-based educational programs in your organization and the interrelationships among such components. But before I went any further on the process of modeling itself, I explained certain important concepts in system methodology in this article and showed how these principles can be applied in this article titled Planning and Managing Distance Education Systems: Applying system dynamics. Below, you will see an example in systems modeling in detail. RESEARCH-BASED ARTICLES OF THE WEEK Access the complete current issue of the journal of the Asian Association of Open Universities Designing an online learning environment on Open Educational Resources for science education Shironica Karunanayaka, Chandana Fernando and Vajira de Silva Personalised system of instruction: The ODL way Prakash Arumugam Comparative study on the usage of an online plagiarism-detection service when presenting distance learning courses Loo Choo Hong and Tung Lai Cheng Floundering among adult learners in classrooms: Fact or fallacy? Nantha Kumar Subramaniam and Maheswari Kandasamy Determinants of students’ loyalty at Universitas Terbuka Maximus Gorky Sembiring The establishment of academic credit accumulation and transfer system: A case study of Shanghai Academic Credit Transfer and Accumulation Bank for Lifelong Education Huikang Li, Yaoting Sun, Min Yang and Zhihui Wei Faculty: A success factor in improving quality of distance learning Muhammad Zaheer Supportive role of the“CBCI Chair” at IGNOU in ODL programme development Gracious Thomas Theoretical and practical dilemma of distance learning: The case of Universitas Terbuka Indonesia Hanif Nurcholis and Ace Sriati Rachman Addressing the issues of low student enrollment: The case of the Kandy Regional Centre of the Open University of Sri Lanka P.S.D. Aluwihare and R. Manoshika Independent learning skill, competence and job performance of graduates of Universitas Terbuka: Perceptions of graduates and supervisors Dewi Juliah Ratnaningsih Unlocking Open Educational Resources (OERs) Interaction Data Each time a teacher or a learner interacts with an Open Educational Resource (OER), these interactions produce data. This “interaction data” includes “artifact data” routinely captured during any online interaction by Web server logs (e.g., users’ browsers, users’ IP addresses) and “social data” created during Web 2.0-style interactions with resources (e.g., tags, comments, ratings, favorites). Interaction data can serve a number of purposes in a period of increased interest worldwide in OERs quality and uptake. First, interaction data is a valuable source of analytics about OERs and typical audience profiles. Second, combined with metadata, interaction data can enhance searching, ranking, and recommendations of learning resources. However, obtaining this data is not always easy since OERs, in particular, are generally dispersed among different systems where the interactions between resources and their users take place. This paper describes approaches to unlocking, collecting and aggregating this interaction data. D-Lib Mabaziine Up and Away: Open Access in Portugal Portugal stands out among nations that have embraced open access to scholarly communication because of its early adoption of institutional policies, creation of a network of repositories, and effective system of governance. And, nonprofit international publishing initiatives play an important role in opening up entire runs of Portuguese academic journals. EDUCAUSE Review Online Introducing blended learning: An experience of uncertainty for students in the United Arab Emirates The cultural dimension of Uncertainty Avoidance is analysed in this study of an introduction to blended learning for international students. Content analysis was conducted on the survey narratives collected from three cohorts of management undergraduates in the United Arab Emirates. Interpretation of certainty with blended learning was found in: student skills with technology; student acknowledgement of course organisation; and student appreciation of online feedback. Uncertainty with the introduction of blended learning was found: when membership was assigned for group work, higher quality research methods were introduced; where course structure lacked detail, increased time was required for new and different online activities. These international students, from countries with a high score on Uncertainty Avoidance, exhibited that dimension when introduced to blended learning. The implications of these findings are discussed, and strategies suggested for introducing blended learning to international students. The limitations of the study are considered, and a direction for future research is suggested. This is the first study on undergraduates in the Middle East for the effects of a cultural dimension when introducing blended learning. The findings increase the body of knowledge that relates to learning technology in the international business classroom. Research in Learning Technology IN THE NEWS Embrace Moocs or face decline, warns v-c “It’s Mooc or die”, a university vice-chancellor has said, claiming that institutions must embrace the massive open online course movement and adapt their teaching methods or face a tough future. Times Higher Education Massive (But Not Open) The Georgia Institute of Technology plans to offer a $7,000 online master’s degree to 10,000 new students over the next three years without hiring much more than a handful of new instructors. Inside Higher Education Kids coding in the cloud One of the most popular online destinations on the MIT network is not a website for scientists, engineers or college students, but an online community where kids learn to code. MIT Media Lab Farhad (Fred) Saba, Ph. D. Founder and Editor Distance-Educator.com

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ProQuest/EBSCO Alerts

I started this new Sunday feature last week.  First, the ProQuest Alert for virtual school.

1.School District to launch cyber-school
Williams, Damon C. Philadelphia Tribune [Philadelphia, Pa] 23 Apr 2013: 1A,4A.

Formats:

Citation/Abstract Full text

2.Keys to Success in Distance Education and ABA Rule 306
Johnson, Andrea L. Law Technology 46. 1 (First Quarter 2013): 1,3-15.

Formats:

Citation/Abstract Full text Full text – PDF (814 KB)

Next, nothing from the ProQuest Alert for cyber school.

Moving on to the EBSCO alert for virtual school.

1. TI- School Specialty Files for Bankruptcy.
JN- Electronic Education Report
PD- 2/ 4/2013, Vol. 20 Issue 3, p1-8
PG- 4p
DT- 20130204
PT- Article
AB- The article reports on the predicament of Greenville, Wisconsin-based school supplies manufacturer School Specialty Inc. which has filed for bankruptcy protection in January 2012 and has announced plans to sell its assets to Bayside Capital Inc. It states that the firm expects the sale to be completed within two to three months, however it is possible that a higher bidder could emerge for the assets. It adds that School Specialty has secured $50 million in additional capital with its bankruptcy protection filing in the Bankruptcy Court District of Delaware. It provides a corporate profile of School Specialty which was established in 1959.
DE- CORPORATE bankruptcy
DE- BUSINESS failures
DE- BANKRUPTCY
DE- SALE of business enterprises
DE- CAPITAL
SU- UNITED States. Bankruptcy Court (Delaware)
GE- WISCONSIN
CO- SCHOOL Specialty Inc. DUNS Number: 006144026 Ticker: SCHS
CO- BAYSIDE Capital Inc.
IS- 10779949
AN- 87028326
UR- http://proxy.lib.wayne.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=87028326&site=eds-live

2. TI- Partnership Briefs…
JN- Electronic Education Report
PD- 2/ 4/2013, Vol. 20 Issue 3, p8-8
PG- 1/5p
DT- 20130204
PT- Article
AB- The article reports on the partnerships between online learning solutions provider Edmentum and professional development provider NWEA to create an individualized learning path and between Florida Virtual School and social networking site GromSocial.com to offer secure networking opportunities.
DE- PARTNERSHIP (Business)
SU- ONLINE social networks
CO- EDMENTUM (Company)
IS- 10779949
AN- 87028332
UR- http://proxy.lib.wayne.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=87028332&site=eds-live

3. TI- Financial Briefs…
JN- Electronic Education Report
PD- 2/ 4/2013, Vol. 20 Issue 3, p8-8
PG- 1/4p
DT- 20130204
PT- Article
AB- The article reports on the outlook of Pearson PLC that it will see modest revenue growth in its North American Education business when it releases its 2012 financial results and on the firm’s partnership with non-profit New Leaders to pair programs and technologies.
DE- FINANCIAL performance
DE- PARTNERSHIP (Business)
CO- PEARSON PLC DUNS Number: 042859199
IS- 10779949
AN- 87028333
UR- http://proxy.lib.wayne.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=87028333&site=eds-live

Finally, no items from the EBSCO alert for cyber school.

Plugged In | 05.17.13 | (powered by iNACOL)

And finishing the day with news from the neo-liberals…

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PLUGGED IN  05.17.13 powered by iNACOL… Upcoming iNACOL webinars… > 05.17 Webinar: How State Educational Leaders are Advancing Competency Education >  05.21 Webinar: Research in Review - Examining K-12 Online Teachers Educational Practices News… Microsoft donates $1 million to help expand ‘blended learning’ in D.C. schools Washington Post | Washington, DC Microsoft has donated $1 million to help D.C. teachers redesign their classrooms using a “blended learning” approach that combines online learning with face-to-face instruction. Blended learning has drawn both excitement and skepticism as it has exploded in popularity in recent years. Boosters believe that (read) What We Can Learn From A Dinner Controversy In The Desert Forbes A few weeks back, I had the honor to emcee the closing awards dinner at the Education Innovation Summit in Scottsdale.  The evening took a sour note though as the dinner keynote, which Andy Kessler delivered, stunned and offended the majority of the audience by essentially arguing that as digital learning rises (read) Think Swiss Cheese CompetencyWorks I think about design a lot.  Indeed, Fast Company is a monthly read. Design is an empowering, creative process. It can also help us rethink the assumptions holding us back. The way design and the design process is taking hold in education is exciting and sometimes disturbing. It’s exciting that ( read) Digital education – Schools, firms starting to integrate tablet technology into classrooms Associated Press (GA) Time is up for the 13 students in Stephanee Stephens’ eighth-grade Spanish class. For the last few minutes they’ve been conjugating verbs, each typing away on a small tablet when a message pops up on the screen: “Eyes on the Teacher.” Stephens, with tablet in hand, asks for “voluntarios o victimas” to (read) State sets hearing dates for online school proposal Chicago Tribune | Chicago, IL A state commission will hold hearings next month as it determines whether to overrule 18 suburban school districts that rejected a proposal for an online charter school. The hearings – one for each of the 18 districts affected – will take place June 19-21 and June 24 in the western suburbs. The proposed (read) Governor signs bill to tighten enrollment requirements at privately run online schools Associated Press (TN) Gov. Bill Haslam has signed into law a measure to tighten enrollment requirements at privately run online schools. The administration legislation allows beginning online schools to start with an enrollment of 1,500 and continue to expand as long as they meet performance requirements. If they fail to do so for three (read) Profession(al) Development Getting Smart The teaching profession, in its current state, is unsustainable. It is unsustainable because of the stress related to the challenges and demands of individualized learning and diverse needs among students, the implementation of new standards, the reality of decreasing school budgets, and the lack of time and (read) Cyber Academy of South Carolina (CASC) Opens Statewide Enrollment for Students Entering Grades K Through 9 Press Release Cyber Academy of South Carolina (CASC), a new full-time, tuition-free online public school option, announced that they are now enrolling students entering grades K through 9 for the 2013-2014 school year, with plans to add an additional three grade levels over the next three years. The Cyber Academy of (read) Time to ride the tsunami Clayton Christensen Institute Last week, I had the opportunity to participate in a panel discussion on HuffPost Live. The topic was massive open online courses (MOOCs), prompted specifically by Amherst College’s most recent decision to decline entering into a partnership with edX. President of Amherst, Carolyn “Biddy” Martin, was on (read) Something missing? Send news items and other information of interest to joglesby@inacol.org… Do you know someone who should be reading Plugged In?  Please share the following link and ask them to subscribe: http://www.inacol.org/news/plugged-in/ - Thank you! Find out more about iNACOL and our mission on: Stay connected:

This email was sent to: mkbarbour@gmail.com This email was sent by: North American Council for Online Learning dba International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL) 1934 Old Gallows Road, Suite 350, Vienna, VA, 22182-4040, United States We respect your right to privacy – view our policy