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.

Ed-tech leaders schooled on interoperability standards

Interoperability presents an issue for educational technology leaders who often must integrate diverse products made by different developers.

When school technology directors purchase an innovative product from one vendor and an exciting upgrade from another vendor, schools can find themselves in a tangle of incompatible formats. A primer released this spring by the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) explains how adoption of interoperability standards can streamline technology systems in K-20 education.

Interoperability, the ability of different systems to work together, presents an issue for educational technology leaders who often must integrate diverse products made by different developers. Those developers, too, must walk a fine line when trying to create products that encourage brand loyalty but also can be readily adapted to diverse systems.

SIIA’s report, titled “Primer on K-20 Education Interoperability Standards,” provides a framework for understanding interoperability standards that facilitate the exchange of content from different technology applications and systems. To provide a context for standards’ development and implementation, the primer surveys the challenges and benefits of adopting interoperability standards.…Read More

University research will evaluate physical data to gauge teacher effectiveness

GSR technology could give an advantage to 'tyrannical' teachers, Ravitch says.

A student’s physical reaction to a classroom lesson soon could be used to judge how successful—or unsuccessful—an educator is in keeping students engaged.

Researchers and Clemson University received a nearly $500,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in November to study Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) bracelets, which house sensors that measure a student’s physical reaction to learning—such as increased sweating—and uses the data as a way to grade an educator’s performance.

Wireless sensors produce readouts showing whether students are alert, anxious, bored, or excited in the classroom, and as Clemson researchers determine the reliability of this experimental technological gauge, many in education are skeptical of the GSR bracelets as a mainstream classroom tool.…Read More

Stanford doctoral student seeks peace through technology

Stanford officials and volunteers collected about 100 accounts from children in the West Bank.
Stanford officials and volunteers collected about 100 accounts from children in the West Bank.

The stories are harrowing, but Elizabeth Buckner hopes sharing accounts of the tension among Palestinians and Israelis with the help of mobile devices will offer perspective to children from both sides and promote understanding in the volatile region.

Buckner, a doctoral student at Stanford University’s School of Education, heads a group of volunteers who collect everyday stories from children who detail their experiences in disputed areas, road checkpoints, and border regions between Israel and Palestine.

The kids’ stories will be recorded and downloaded onto mobile devices that will be distributed at schools in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Buckner said the children’s stories—which range from details of family gatherings and sporting events to close calls with Israeli soldiers—soon will be available as a free iPhone application.…Read More

Ed-tech heavy hitters talk collaboration at EduComm

Higher education will focus on video technologies in coming years, EduComm speakers say.
Higher education will focus on video technologies in coming years, EduComm speakers say.

Decision makers from Cisco, Microsoft, and Google said higher education’s movement toward collaboration-friendly technologies would rely heavily on video communication, and one official had advice for faculty who stand against moving toward nontraditional, digital learning: retire.

Representatives from three of the biggest players in the education technology field spoke to about 800 college IT officials June 8 at the annual EduComm conference in Las Vegas, where attendees gathered for dozens of daily sessions covering the latest in school technology. The conference ends June 9.

Ian Temple, director of Cisco Global Education, joined Obadiah Greenberg, head of Google Apps for Education, and Cameron Evans, Microsoft Education’s chief technology officer, in a discussion about how video and cloud computing can connect educators to their teachers and peers.…Read More

Vendors link e-textbook content with LMS software

CaféScribe eBooks are available online and on more than 850 college campuses
CaféScribe eBooks are available online and used on more than 850 college campuses.

As digital textbooks become more common on higher-ed campuses, providers are making it easy for professors to share textbook notes and resources with students through their class learning management system (LMS) software. The latest provider to do so is Follett Higher Education Group, which announced May 19 that a new standards-based system would integrate its eBook material with popular sites such as Moodle, Sakai, and Blackboard.

Educators who use textbooks supplied by Follett’s CaféScribe, which also brings students together through social networking to form online study groups, can take detailed notes in the web-based format, pointing out the most important lessons to students and fellow faculty.

Until recently, those notes couldn’t be shared on a college course’s LMS, where students go to see class assignments, chat with peers and faculty members, and watch class videos online.…Read More

Ning stays free for educators, with restrictions

Free Ning groups now will be limited to 150 members.
Free Ning groups now will be limited to 150 members.

The social networking web site Ning, which many educators have used to establish online groups with similar professional interests, will remain free for educators despite moving to a fee-based model this summer, the site announced May 4. But some education technology experts believe Ning could see dwindling interest among teachers and college professors because of new limitations on group sizes and video and chat capabilities.

Ning, which has more than 46 million members and 300,000 social networks created by its contributors, unveiled its revamped pricing model last week, which includes a $2.95 monthly charge for Ning Mini, $19.95 for Ning Plus, and $49.95 a month for Ning Pro. The Ning Mini model will be available at no cost to educators. Student must be 13 or older to sign up for a Ning account, according to the company’s web site.

Ning’s new service will begin in July. The shift will mean 80 percent of Ning’s revenue will come from customers paying for one of the three options, the company announced. Jason Rosenthal, the company’s chief operating officer, wrote on Ning’s blog that basic services will remain free for education groups because a “major education company will be sponsoring Ning Mini Networks for educators in primary and secondary education.”…Read More

FCC plan could revive ‘net neutrality’

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski wants to reclassify broadband as a 'telecommunications' service, but without as much regulation.
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski wants to reclassify broadband as a 'telecommunications' service, but without as much regulation.

The head of the Federal Communications Commission thinks he has come up with a way to salvage his ambitious national broadband plans and his hope for “net neutrality,” a principle favored by many school technology advocates, without running into legal obstacles that have threatened to derail him.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said May 6 that his agency has crafted a compromise in how it regulates high-speed internet access: It will apply only narrow rules to broadband companies. The FCC chairman, a Democrat, said this delicate dance will ensure the agency has adequate authority to govern broadband providers without being too “heavy-handed.”

But his plan likely will hit legal challenges from the big phone and cable companies, and it already faces significant opposition from Republicans at the FCC and in Congress.…Read More

Ed-tech officials: Video will make schools more ‘efficient’

Retaining good students was the top priority for K-12 and college administrators.
Fifty-three percent of school officials said they would buy video technology in the next year.

More than half of education technology officials in K-12 schools and higher-education institutions said they would buy video technology in the next year to make their schools “more effective and efficient” and better prepare students for the workforce, according to a new survey from technology giant Cisco Systems.

The survey results, compiled by Washington, D.C.-based research and polling firm Clarus Research Group, come seven months after Cisco bought Tandberg, a leading video conferencing company. Observers expect Cisco’s purchase—which initially was snubbed by Tandberg stockholders, who balked at the $3 billion bid—to make the company one of the leading video providers in schools and colleges.

While 53 percent of administrators and school technology officials said their institutions “are likely” to buy video equipment sometime in the next year, more than eight in 10 survey respondents said technology plays a role in “improving how students learn,” with 82 percent agreeing that education technology will play a “large role” in “helping prepare students for the workforce of the future.”…Read More

Universities look toward data to stabilize enrollment numbers

Data mining could be one way Kansas officials address a decline in student retention.
Data mining could be one way Kansas officials address a decline in student retention.

University of Kansas officials are considering working with a data-mining company to pinpoint strategies to keep students enrolled after a recent report showed that 28.7 percent of freshmen from the fall 2007 semester have left the campus.

Five months after University Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little formed a task force that would examine ways to increase student retention and graduation rates, task force members say they might enlist the help of Virginia-based data mining company Starfish Retention Solutions, which works with 14 four-year colleges, seven two-year campuses, and two K-12 school systems.

Starfish’s retention program helps campus decision makers weed out data that identify at-risk students with consistently low grades and spotty attendance records who are not engaged in campus activities.…Read More