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• Scepticism over Google plan to replace labs with virtual reality - David Matthews, Times Higher Education
  Google and a Danish technology firm claim that they have removed the need for biology students to set foot in a laboratory by creating virtual reality simulations of experiments, clearing the way for the world’s first online-only biology degree. Arizona State is to be first university adopter of new technology, launching fully online biology degrees. The […]
• An Inside Look at Online Carding Courses for Cybercriminals - Digital Shadows, Bank Info Security
  As customers spend more and more money online each year, the opportunities for fraud increase in parallel; experts project a loss of $24 billion to payment card fraud by the end of 2018. Payment card fraudsters rely on a sophisticated ecosystem and support network that provides a wide range of credit card details, fraud tools […]
• UC should make changes to its course evaluation process to prevent bias - Daily Bruin Editorial
  Evaluations are written into the University of California’s decision-making process when it comes to academic employees. But given the lack of standardization and the heavy presence of bias in conventional course evaluations methods, it’s high time the University changed its policies to use evaluations exclusively for feedback purposes, not for its personnel matters.... A 2014 study […]
• 6 Reasons Blended Learning Works - Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology
  Research suggests that blended learning is more effective than both face-to-face and online education, according to a new e-book released by the Online Learning Consortium and academic publisher Routledge. Online & Blended Learning: Selections from the Field brings together advice and best practices from a number of scholarly publications related to online and blended learning; […]
• Ideas for Creating an Effective Syllabus for Online Learning - Danielle Geary, Faculty Focus
  Online students need to feel an instructor presence in their classes. Thorough explanations and effective communication help fulfill this need and can transform a mediocre online course into a great one—and it all starts with the syllabus. Structure and communication. That’s what I’ve found to be the keys to an effective online course syllabus. Well, that, […]
• Startup Uses AI and Human Augmentation for Video/Audio Transcription - Dian Schaffhauser, Camapus Technology
  A startup based in Israel has raised $11 million to expand the growth of its solution for doing artificial-intelligence-powered transcription. Verbit technology, according to the company, will be helpful to schools in addressing the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) regulation. The transcription process for videos and audio recordings typically relies on a combination of approaches: fully […]
• What Do Higher Ed Professional Associations Do? - Joshua Kim, Inside Higher Ed
  Yesterday I wrote about the large number of conferences and convenings competing for the attention of those interested in postsecondary learning innovation. Almost all of these events have a professional organization behind them. In today’s lingo, they are powered by an association, consortium, or company. These professional organizations do much more than put on annual, […]
• Are We At Peak Learning Innovation Conference? Thoughts as I head off to SOLA+R. - Joshua Kim, Inside Higher Ed
  This week I’m heading to the Summit for Online Learning and Administration + Roundtable (SOLA+R), hosted by the University Professional and Continuing Education Association (UPCEA). Inside Digital Learning has a good preview of the convening. With the proliferation of events that bill themselves under the umbrella of “learning innovation”, how do folks choose where to […]
• Imagining A Blockchain University - Tom Vander Ark , Forbes
  A couple of Oxford faculty imagine a different kind of university, one that is distributed and democratic. Joshua Broggi, Faculty of Philosophy, is the founder of Woolf Development, a platform startup that aims to leverage distributed ledger technology to remove higher education intermediaries, support decentralized governance structures and ensure the security of data. Blockchain, and other […]
• Harvard Hosts 60-Year Curriculum Symposium - Cait Etherington, eLearning Inside
  In a 2017 interview with the University Professional and Continuing Education Association, Dean Hunt Lambert, who leads Harvard’s Division of Continuing Education, emphasized that the 60-year curriculum recognizes that people begin their learning careers in earnest in their teens, continue learning throughout their work years, and even continue their educations during their retirements. Continuing education […]
• Here are 10 top college majors, according to Princeton Review - Ann Marie Barron, SILive
  Trying to choose a college major that'll pay off down the road? Computer science, communications and political science top the list, according to the most recent study by the Princeton Review. Research conducted by the college admission services company resulted in a list of the top 10 college majors based on a few different things, including […]
• California Universities and CCs Launch Online Course Finder with 10,000 Classes - Dian Schaffhauser, Campus Technology
  The California State University and California Community Colleges systems have teamed up to launch a new online course finder that will provide students enrolled at either set of institutions access to more than 10,000 online, transferable classes. The program is live in time for students to take summer 2018 classes. "Finish Faster," as it's called, is […]
• What 6 Colleges Learned About Improving Their Online Courses - Chronicle of Higher Ed
  “Making Digital Learning Work: Success Strategies From Six Leading Universities and Community Colleges” wades into those waters with a study of three community colleges and three public research universities, all of which have at least 20,000 students, and enroll significant percentages of Pell-eligible students and students who take online classes. The authors crunched a lot […]
• 370 Online Courses With Real College Credit That You Can Access For Free - Dhawal Shah, Class Central
  These days, more and more universities are offering for-credit programs via MOOCs or Massive Open Online Courses. What started with a small number of degree programs, such as the iMBA from the University of Illinois (Coursera) and Georgia Tech’s Online Master of Science in Computer Science (Udacity), has given way to dozens of MOOC-based programs […]
• Trump’s Crackdown on Students Who Overstay Visas Rattles Higher Education - Erica L. Green, NY Times
  The Trump administration plans to crack down on international students and visitors who overstay their visas, stoking fears in the higher education community that President Trump’s aggressive immigration policies will hinder university efforts to attract the brightest minds from overseas. In a policy memorandum, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services announced this month that it […]
• MOOC Expert Fiona Hollands Makes A Suggestion and a Prediction - Henry Kronk, eLearning Inside
  Delivering a keynote address at this week’s Open edX 2018 conference, MOOC expert Fiona Hollands made two predictions about the future of her research subject.  Hollands’ first prediction was more of a directive and a call to action. She began by describing the students for whom MOOCs work quite well and compared them with others who […]
• edX CEO Anant Agarwal Announces Ambitious Goals for 2022 - Henry Kronk. eLearning Inside
  For the most ambitious, Agarwal hopes to attract 100 million learners to edX in five years’ time. The non-profit MOOC provider has, one might argue, remained truest to the original promise of MOOCs (keeping them open and massive) when they exploded in 2011 and 2012. The platform has trained 16 million learners with courses from […]
• 99 Free Academic Journals You Can Access Online - Best Colleges Online
  Many academic journals are only available through educational institutions and by subscription, but there are also a number of journals that are completely free to access online. Whether you’re a distance learner looking for free resources or just seeking information about art, finance, or science, there’s a free academic journal out there for you. Read […]
• Amgen Foundation And Harvard Team Up To Offer Free Online Science Education Platform
  The Amgen Foundation and Harvard University have announced plans to launch a free online science education platform uniquely designed to level the playing field for aspiring scientists. The LabXchange platform, which will launch with a focus in biology, will offer digital instruction and virtual lab experiences to high school and college students, enabling them to gain meaningful […]
• What Do Online Students Want? 3 Findings From a New Survey Offer Some Clues - Goldie Blumenstyk, Chronicle for Higher Ed
  What do online students want? According to a new survey, they want to conduct more of their course activities on their mobile phones or tablets, and they’d like better career-planning services. Their biggest regrets? They all relate to not having done enough research about the college and what it would cost before they enrolled. The […]