Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eCampus News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

University scientists join Obama’s BRAIN initiative

UC Berkeley scientists attended Obama’s BRAIN initiative announcement.

Scientists from The Rockefeller University and Stanford University are part of a “dream team” assembled to create a real-time map of the human brain after President Barack Obama asked Congress to approve $110 million in new spending for brain research, an investment he said would benefit not just science but the economy.

“Ideas are what power our economy,” Obama said April 2 in announcing the proposal. “When we invest in the best ideas before anybody else does, our businesses and our workers can make the best products and deliver the best services before anybody else.”

The “BRAIN” initiative — for Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies — would start with $110 million in the budget for fiscal year 2014 that Obama plans to unveil next week.…Read More

1 2

Cantor promotes for-profit colleges in GOP ‘rebranding’ speech

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) rehashed the education portion of the GOP platform Tuesday, promoting for-profit colleges in a speech labeled a “rebranding” of the Republican Party, the Huffington Post reports.

“Over the course of this Congress, we will also work to reform our student aid process to give students a financial incentive to finish their studies sooner,” Cantor said in his speech at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. “We will encourage entrepreneurship in higher education, including for-profit schools. And we will fix the way we subsidize education by making the costs more transparent to parents, students and the millions of taxpayers who help pay some of the bill.”

Cantor said a goal for the year is to “move heaven and earth to fix our education system for the most vulnerable,” and to “expand” choices for college. It’s those “most vulnerable” students that for-profit colleges have been accused of exploiting……Read More