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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.
Google embeds engineers as professors
Efforts to diversify Silicon Valley lead Google to pair engineers with minority students.
Howard University freshman Alanna Walton knew something was different about the professor teaching her introduction to computer science course.
First, there was her name: Professor Sabrina. She was an African American woman, kept office hours until 2 a.m. if that’s what it took to see everyone, and had an additional title: Google In Residence.
“It was an awesome class,” said Alanna who has already chosen her major at the Washington D.C.-based university: computer science.…Read More
Google hopes to boost AP computer science pass rates
RISE Up 4 CS will aid African-American high school students in college-level computer science courses and exams
As research reveals that minority students enroll in and pass high school and college STEM courses less often than their peers, efforts are emerging to encourage those student groups to pursue STEM studies.
Florida International University has been awarded the Google RISE Up 4 CS grant to help more African-American high school students pass the Advanced Placement (AP) computer science exam. The program will begin in late February 2015, and will be funded by Google and facilitated through Georgia Tech University.
Project RISE Up 4 CS attempts to motivate African-American students to study computer science and become interested in pursuing a college degree. The program helps prepare students for the AP computer science exam by providing twice-weekly webinars, and monthly in-person weekend sessions.…Read More
Google Drive’s new changes could improve classroom collaboration
Some new features and changes are hitting Google Drive, which could significantly enhance collaboration
In case you haven’t noticed the recent changes already, it’s well worth pointing out that Google is making some interesting changes to their Google Drive service.
At the heart of this overhaul, which affects both the desktop and the mobile app versions of Google Drive, are a host of minor changes that center on making the file sharing and cloud-based storage system easier to use.
Immediately, users will notice a more fluid and streamlined interface that moves Drive closer to the familiar look that most people expect from a Google product, while at the same time bridging the gap between the desktop and mobile versions in order to make the two appear more similar.…Read More
A new frame of reference through Google Glass
Roxann Riskin, a technology specialist at Fairfield University and eCampus News contributor, writes a special op-ed on the NYC Glass Museum Event which she attended on April 28
While wearing the Google Glass device, many of my experiences have focused primarily on subjective perspectives, like taking pictures, for instance.
This is mainly because that part of the Glass design feature is currently from a first-person point of view. Recently, I had an extraordinary opportunity to look at things from a different vantage point, using a newly created Glass App, at a museum event hosted in New York City.
I was excited to immerse myself in a first-of-its-kind visually augmented experience with art.…Read More
What Google won’t do anymore
Under pressure of lawsuit, Google stops scanning student eMail for keywords
Google will no longer scan student and faculty eMails for advertising keywords, the company announced this week.
The change comes on the heels of a lawsuit in California that alleged the scanning was in violation of wirtetap laws, as well as a more general public outcry about the practice.
In a blog post Wednesday, Bram Bout, director of Google for Education, said the change was being made for security purposes.…Read More
A keen-sighted CIO’s inter-view on Glass
Open-eyed and thoughtful views on Glass’ realistic usability in higher education
“OK Glass,” take a picture. It’s most likely the first thing a Google Glass Explorer will try, as I did.
Now, entering my third month, in the beta Google Glass Explorer program, I saw a need to refocus my exploring, no pun intended, on requesting an open and frank “Glass” interview with the CIO-Chief Information Officer, Paige Francis, at Fairfield University.
By accepting the invitation, Paige has already broken through many proverbial “glass ceilings,” as the first woman, Jesuit University CIO, Google Glass interviewee, represented in a Google Plus Glass community. Paige is now visible on the Google Plus Community, actively engaging in technology dialogue, via Google Glass.…Read More
5 sure-fire ways to get hired at Google
Do you think you have what it takes to work for Google? An inside look at five key traits Google looks for in employees.
While good grades and knowledge in math, computers, and coding are important skills for employment at Google, they alone do not make a candidate marketable.
In fact, Google actually prefers hiring people without a college degree.
Just what qualifications, then, does Google look for in new employees?…Read More
Job market embraces massive online courses
Big employers such as AT&T Inc. and Google Inc. are helping to design and fund the latest round of low-cost online courses, a development that providers say will open the door for students to earn inexpensive credentials with real value in the job market, The Wall Street Journal reports.
New niche certifications being offered by providers of massive open online courses, or MOOCs, are aimed at satisfying employers’ specific needs. Available at a fraction of the cost of a four-year degree, they represent the latest crack in the monopoly traditional universities have in credentialing higher education.
“The common denominator [among the new MOOC certification programs] is that there really is an interest in finding credentials that don’t require a student to buy the entire degree,” said Sebastian Thrun, the Stanford University computer-science professor who co-founded Udacity, a MOOC with 1.6 million enrolled students in 200 countries. “This is really democratizing education at its best.”…Read More
MIT’s Gmail Visualization Tool: How It Works
Ever wonder how the endless emails in your inbox are all interconnected? Or your most frequent email contact? Or how your inbox has been affected over the years by the new people in your life, Mashable reports? Last week, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Media Lab announced a new tool that uses your Gmail metadata to build a visual map of the web you’ve created with others. The tool, called Immersion, has clearly resonated with people. And due to the influx of traffic, the site even crashed the site temporarily. The team behind Immersion is billing it as a way to dive into the history of your email life. The move is part of a larger trend that enables you to visualize the data you put onto the web, such as turning your personal information into an interactive infographic with the click of a button. “If you look at the big picture, Immersion is a visual representation of the webs that you have woven with other people through email conversations,” Immersion co-creator Deepak Jagdish told Mashable via email. “It makes it very clear who your top collaborators are, and which are the clusters of people relevant in your email life at any point in time from the past to the present.”
…Read More