online education

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The Thrifty Fifty Online Textbooks

Byuclafaculty

Governor Brown signed twin bills that create a mechanism for producing and distributing free online textbooks for what are described as fifty lower-division core courses at UC and CSU in cooperation with the community colleges. Exactly how these texts are going to be produced (for no royalties, if I read the new laws correctly) remains to be seen.  There do seem to be some mechanisms for payment for supplying such texts but, again, details are not clear. The twin bills are at:http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/11-12/bill/sen/sb_1051-1100/sb_1052_bill_20120905_enrolled.html andhttp://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/11-12/bill/sen/sb_1051-1100/sb_1053_bill_20120905_enrolled.html

More Online Course Takers

Byuclafaculty

An earlier post on this blog featured a story about a web service that would take online courses for students.  Inside Higher Ed seems to have picked up the story and noted that other services are jumping into the online market.  Some of these sites, such as the one above, appear to have branched out from their earlier term paper writing services.  The story is at:http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/09/21/sites-offering-take-courses-fee-pose-risk-online-ed Now we know much about these services:[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF6JMotbHYM?feature=player_detailpage]

On the Internet, No One Knows Who You Are

Byuclafaculty

In 1993, the cartoon below appeared with the caption, “On the Internet, no one knows you’re a dog,”and was widely circulated. Now that we have college courses online 29 years later, life imitates art – online – at http://www.wetakeyourclass.com/: As the song says: [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm7u25wRiV8?feature=player_detailpage] Update: Inside Higher Ed reported that the website above has been taken off line by its owner: http://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2012/09/26/we-take-your-class-goes-offline  As a later post on this blog notes, however, there are other such services still in operation.

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UC-Berkeley Joins Harvard-MIT Online Course Program

Byuclafaculty

Inside Higher Ed pointed me to a story about UC-Berkeley’s online endeavors.  A press release related to the story is below.  Below that is a link to the Inside Higher Ed article: UC BERKELEY JOINS HARVARD AND MIT NOT-FOR-PROFIT ONLINE LEARNING COLLABORATIVE; EDX BROADENS FREE COURSE OFFERINGS INTO PUBLIC HEALTH, COMPUTER SCIENCE AND SOLID-STATE CHEMISTRY; OPENS REGISTRATION (excerpts) EdX, the online learning initiative founded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and launched in May, announced today the addition of the University of California, Berkeley to its platform. UC Berkeley, ranked No. 1 among public universities in…

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Empowered to the People: Poizner-UCLA Extension Online Venture Launching

Byuclafaculty

This blog has written in the past about online education and, in particular, a venture called “Empowered” involving UCLA Extension and Steve Poizner which seems about the launch.  Poizner, some will recall, was a GOP candidate for governor in 2010, losing the nomination to Meg Whitman in the primary (who then lost to Jerry Brown).  The program offers certificates in various management and other fields with a sticker price of $12,800, although students in the first class get a reduced price of $9,800.   An iPad is thrown in “free,” however.   The launch comes with a slick video which –…

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Steve Poizner and UCLA Extension in Joint Online Venture

Byuclafaculty

Many blog readers will remember Steve Poizner, the former California insurance commissioner who ran for the Republican nomination for governor unsuccessfully in 2010. The Wall St. Journal reports that he has a joint venture now with UCLA Extension to provide online education: A Silicon Valley entrepreneur and the University of California are combining ready-made software, rented Web services and Apple Inc.’s iPad tablet computer in a high-tech effort to bring career training to baby boomers looking to upgrade their skills. Empowered Careers last week began enrolling students in 10 certificate programs to be taught by instructors at the UCLA Extension, the…

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E-Mail Detectives at U-VA

Byuclafaculty

Inside Higher Ed and other sources have gotten hold of emails involving the University of Virginia growing brouhaha that developed when U-VA’s equivalent of the Regents fired the university’s president.  The vice chair (vice rector) of that board has now resigned.  See earlier posts on this blog. From Inside Higher Ed today:E-mail messages were flying among leaders of the Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia in the weeks leading up to the ouster of Teresa A. Sullivan as president of the university. The e-mail messages show that one reason board leaders wanted to move quickly was the belief…

Online

Byuclafaculty

There is growing interest in outline higher education, as readers of this blog will know.  UC has been experimenting with it for some time.  Recently, NY Times columnist Thomas Friedman touted a new venture called coursera.org which apparently has linked to some major universities, as the picture above indicates.  His column is at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/16/opinion/friedman-come-the-revolution.html.  If the NY Times wants to charge you to look, the same column appears in the Sacramento Bee at http://www.sacbee.com/2012/05/17/4495739/online-revolution-in-higher-education.html Clearly, it’s the in thing: Indeed, NY Times columnists seem to be on a kick about this topic.  Below is David Brooks’ version (also as reprinted…

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Chancellor Block on KPCC Airtalk

Byuclafaculty

No shockers emerged from the KPCC Airtalk panel on higher ed yesterday that included Chancellor Block.  There was a fair amount of discussion of online courses and related items.  Chancellor Block spoke about the need to change the “funding model” given the state cutbacks.  However, he used philanthropy, not tuition, as the example of the change.  Description and link below: What is the future of higher education in America? Is the four-year degree model with students living on or near a campus, is the idea of creating a well-read, well-rounded cohort of critical thinkers perhaps outdated? Can the nation’s colleges…

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Ballot Initiative Offers Online Route into UC

Byuclafaculty

With a formal title and a favorable fiscal analysis in hand, backers of an initiative to broaden access to online college preparatory classes will begin gathering signatures today to qualify for the November ballot.The proposed initiative would give students the right to go elsewhere for a course required for admission to a UC or CSU campus if their school doesn’t offer it. While they could drive to a nearby district, they also could take the course online. It would establish a California Diploma, which would be awarded when a student completed the 15 required courses, known as A-G… (The sponsoring)…