From DSC: Per Wikipedia, this is a 1910 Model T that was photographed in Salt Lake City:
From DSC: The Ford Model T didn’t start out looking likea Maserati Gran Turismo from 2021!Inventions take time to develop…to be improved…for new and further innovations and experiments to take place.
Thinking of this in terms of online-based learning, please don’t think we’ve reached the end of the road for online-based learning.
The truth is, we’ve barely begun our journey.
Two last thoughts here
1 ) It took *teams* of people to get us to the point of producing a Maserati like this. It will take *teams* of people to produce the Maserati of online-based learning.
2) In terms of online-based learning, it’s hard to say how close to the Maserati that we have come because I/we don’t know how far things will go. But this I do know: We have come a looooonnnnnggggg ways from the late 1990s!If that’s what happened in the last 20 years — with many denying the value of online-based learning — what might the next 5, 10, or 20 years look like when further interest, needs, investments, etc. are added? Then add to all of that the momentum from emerging technologies like 5G, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, Virtual Reality, Artificial Intelligence, bots, algorithms, and more!
How to Maintain Peace in Your School Pod — from nytimes.com by Katherine Cusumano ‘It’s important to approach this with the idea that there’s no ideal situation. If there were, we’d all be doing it.’
Excerpt:
Most disagreements, according to Waine Tam, a founder of Selected for Families, an online service that matches families and slearning pods with qualified teachers, “tend to come up front.” Having frank discussions early on might make finding suitable podmates and forming a pod more difficult — but they can also contribute to the long-term success of the group, if you approach them with sensitivity and flexibility.
Unschooling: The New School — from risingkashmir.com The term unschooling was coined in the 1970s and used by educator John Holt, who is regarded as the father of unschooling
Unschooled kids pursue Self-Directed Learning as they are free to choose what they want to learn and who they want to learn from
Unschooling is becoming a trend in urban India with Bengaluru and Pune leading the chart
Learning is entirely interest driven not dictated or directed by an external curriculum, by teachers or by parents
Socialization, development and isolation are some of the demerits of unschooling
Unschooling community is not claiming that their education model is better than regular schools but say that the latter is fundamentally flawed
An individual’s calibre is what makes him/her a creator of circumstances or a creature of circumstances
Edmonton, Alberta, Sept. 23, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — At a time when you can personalize everything from your online shopping experience to your dating prospects, it seems only reasonable to ask: why can’t students “swipe right” on their course load? Why can’t a degree be structured around what someone wants to learn or how they learn, instead of what’s traditionally part of the program? In other words, why isn’t it possible to choose your own adventure in a university environment?
Athabasca University (AU), Canada’s Online University, recently completed a six-month rapid cloud migration project with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to construct a secure, flexible, and global infrastructure required to make personalized learning an infinitely scalable reality. With the completion of its cloud migration project, AU became the first post-secondary institution in Canada to move its entire digital operations infrastructure into its own secure AU cloud environment powered by AWS.
Why, then, in all of this recent (and needed) hand-wringing and speculating about the future of the university, post-pandemic, have we not heard many (if any) staff voices? Or for that matter, any calls for our voices to be included in any planning and restructuring? … Faculty members are the experts in their disciplines, but they do not have a monopoly of knowledge around pedagogy, programming, student success, inclusivity, equity, accessibility, among other things. We shouldn’t expect already overtaxed faculty members to be experts in everything and anything. In fact, the intense pressure that many of them are feeling lately is largely because of structures and traditions that discourage professors from collaborating with staff members who are experts in those areas.
…
With college campuses selling themselves as an entire “experience,” not just a set of courses, it’s high time for those of us responsible for that campus experience to be included in the larger conversation.
Digital transformation: 5 ways the pandemic forced change— from enterprisersproject.com by Gordon Haff The pandemic has reshaped consumer behavior and team expectations. At a recent MIT Sloan CIO Symposium event, CIOs detailed what it means for organizations, IT, and the CIO role
Excerpt:
The new CIO role: Chief Influencing Officer Zemmel says that the evolution of the role of the CIO has been accelerated as well. He sees CIOs increasingly reporting to the CEO because they increasingly have a dual mandate. In addition to their historical operational role running the IT department, they now are also customer-facing and driving revenue. That mandate is not new for forward-looking IT organizations, but the pandemic has made other organizations hyper-aware of IT’s role in driving change quickly. CIOs are becoming a sort of “chief influencing officer who is breaking down silos and driving adoption of digital products,” Zemmel adds.
Experian’s Libenson puts it this way: “The pandemic has forced us to be closer to the business than before. We had a seat at the table before. But I think we will be a better organization after this.”
NEW YORK, Sept. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — While 86% of in-house counsel surveyed said they see opportunity to modernize legal services provided to their stakeholders, Deloitte’s “2020 Legal Operations Survey” found that challenges remain. Respondents described their corporate legal departments’ maturity level for technology as just “foundational.”
Ashley Smith, Deloitte Risk & Financial Advisory managing director, Deloitte Transactions and Business Analytics LLP said, “Organizations everywhere have undergone massive change as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and related economic uncertainties. As business strategies shift and the corporate legal department is called on to do more to help organizations navigate through disruption, focusing on legal operations transformation could help in-house counsel and their teams to evolve beyond heavy manual, tactical work – into leveraging technology to offer more strategic insights and value.”
From DSC: I hesitate to post this one…but this information and the phenomenon behind it likely has impacted what’s happening in the higher education space. (Or perhaps, it’s a bit of the other way around as well.) Increasingly, higher ed is becoming out of reach for many families. Again, is this a topic for Econ classes out there? Or Poli Sci courses?
We document the cumulative effect of four decades of income growth below the growth of per capita gross national income and estimate that aggregate income for the population below the 90th percentile over this time period would have been $2.5 trillion (67 percent) higher in 2018 had income growth since 1975 remained as equitable as it was in the first two post-War decades. From 1975 to 2018, the difference between the aggregate taxable income for those below the 90th percentile and the equitable growth counterfactual totals $47 trillion.
The top 1% of Americans have taken $50 trillion from the bottom 90%—And that’s made the U.S. less secure — from Time.com by by Nick Hanauer and David Rolf [From DSC: By the way, that title likely has some link bait appeal to it.] Excerpt:
As the RAND report [whose research was funded by the Fair Work Center which co-author David Rolf is a board member of] demonstrates, a rising tide most definitely did not lift all boats. It didn’t even lift most of them, as nearly all of the benefits of growth these past 45 years were captured by those at the very top. And as the American economy grows radically unequal it is holding back economic growth itself.
Why is our death toll so high and our unemployment rate so staggeringly off the charts? Why was our nation so unprepared, and our economy so fragile? Why have we lacked the stamina and the will to contain the virus like most other advanced nations? The reason is staring us in the face: a stampede of rising inequality that has been trampling the lives and livelihoods of the vast majority of Americans, year after year after year.
Walmart just kicked off its own drone delivery pilot, a collaboration with drone delivery company Flytrex. The pilot launched today in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and is limited to select grocery and household essential items from the retailer’s local stores.
From DSC: It starts off with an army of drones from Walmart joined by another army of drones from Amazon.
Then company XYZ chimes in. Then company ABC chimes in. And so on, and so on, and so on.
Then the armies of drones change to more powerful, louder, more “capable” delivery vehicles that can handle bigger, heavier deliveries.
And suddenly, the skies are full of noise-making, sun-blocking pieces of human-made machinery that, for the most part, are convenient but not necessary.
We need to think — and act — very carefully these days.
What kind of future do we want to hand down to our children and to our grandchildren?
What will the skies look and sound like in 2030 if such armies of drones and other types of airborne delivery vehicles are released?
Are we willing to say that our kids won’t mind paying the price?
Is this the future we want to create? Not me. I, for one, appreciate a quiet walk. I appreciate being able to look up at the skies, especially when they are clear.
To the relevant engineers and C-Suites out there:
Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should.
Please take more responsibility for what’s being developed/brought to market.
Let’s shut this down — now — before the momentum gets started.Let’s follow Portland’s example by shutting down facial recognition/AI:
Portland adopts landmark facial recognition ordinances— from thehill.com by Chris Mills Rodrigo Excerpt:
“What makes Portland’s legislation stand out from other cities is that we’re prohibiting facial recognition technology use by private entities in public accommodations,” Mayor Ted Wheeler (D) said during Wednesday’s deliberations. “This is the first of its kind of legislation in the nation,” he added.
Florida Virtual School’s enrollment is up 54 percent year over year for its individual online course offerings and 64 percent for full-time programs. Public schools’ online programs managed by the for-profit provider K12 Inc. have grown from 122,000 enrollments in fall 2019 to 170,000 a year later. Applications to Connections Academy, a virtual school provider owned by Pearson, are up 61 percent.
The Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School filled up months before it usually starts receiving the bulk of new applicants. An Oklahoma virtual charter school earlier this summer was enrolling 1,000 students a day. Enrollment in virtual schools is also up in Connecticut, Ohio, and Wisconsin.
From DSC: For those folks looking for work, the article below relays some solid advice/tips to get you past the Applicant Tracking Systems out there. The last time I was searching for a position, I had no idea how prevalent these systems are out there. To quote from the article:
Because of the sheer volume, 99 percent of Fortune 500 companies use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to manage each step of the hiring process.
If you haven’t looked for a job in a while, this will blow you away. To get your resume in front of an actual human being is a major accomplishment.
5 secrets to get you past the résumé-reading robots— from fastcompany.com by Before your résumé gets to a recruiter, it’s read by an AI-driven Applicant Tracking System. A human resources exec advises how you can beat the robot.
From DSC: …and by the way, this is very much relevant for faculty members and staff members out there. Considerthis quote from Debora Spar, senior associate dean of Harvard Business School Online:
Many colleges and universities will suffer extreme financial stress; some – up to 345 colleges, according to one recent estimate– could be forced to close. Faculty are likely toface layoffsunprecedented in the history of U.S. higher education.
From DSC: Are Economics classes across the United States talking about our current situation? It seems to me that this kind of discussion would be so important, relevant, and thought-provoking. Economics is a complex subject. I know I would have appreciated learning more about the complexities, the pieces, the ingredients, the interrelationships of things in my college years. Seems like there are some solid topics for discussion board postings in here…
As the economy struggles to shake off the pandemic effects, worries are growing that the recovery could look like a K.
That would be one where growth continues but is uneven, split between sectors and income groups.
One obvious area of concern is the dichotomy of the stock market vs the real economy, especially considering that 52% of the market is owned by the top 1% of earners.
“Let’s not get lost on different letters of the alphabet,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said. “There are certainly parts of the economy that need more work.”
Current and former Google employees are forming an online program aimed at preparing students for the workforce if they’re taking time off school due to the coronavirus pandemic.
It comes as many college students defer school as universities shift learning models to mostly online amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
Google execs past and present have volunteered to mentor college students on topics ranging from career trajectory to how to stand out in virtual Zoom interviews.
Along these lines, see:
Google has a plan to disrupt the college degree— from inc.com by Justin Bariso Google’s new certificate program takes only six months to complete, and will be a fraction of the cost of college. Excerpt:
Google recently made a huge announcement that could change the future of work and higher education: It’s launching a selection of professional courses that teach candidates how to perform in-demand jobs. These courses, which the company is calling Google Career Certificates, teach foundational skills that can help job-seekers immediately find employment. However, instead of taking years to finish like a traditional university degree, these courses are designed to be completed in about six months.
From DSC: Also, to see some more changes to the learning ecosystems out there, set up a Google Alert (or something similar in Feedly or via another tool) for “Learning Pods,” “Pandemic Pods,” and/or the “growth of homeschooling.” Here’s but one recent example:
Life can be very hard for autistic, gifted and special needs learners. Autistic and gifted learners often times struggle in school because they learn very differently than their peers. These special learners need a personalized approach to their education that allows them to learn in their own way at their own pace.
Many times parents and students feel as if they are the only ones like them in the world. This can often times lead to isolation and frustration. It is important for all autistic, gifted and special needs to unite in order to support one another. We are named Academic Warriors because all our students are superheroes in a world that doesn’t always understand and/or appreciate them. We help our students to become strong, independent and positive learners despite what the world may think of them.
It is the mission of Academic Warriors to help create positive learning experiences and communities throughout the United States for autistic, gifted and special needs learners. We offer online courses, programs, private school and in person events that foster an unique learning environment that promotes unity among all our students and families. We strive to create online and in person learning communities in every state that will provide educational opportunities for all families of autistic, gifted and special needs students. Together we can create a better world for the autistic, gifted and special needs learner.
From DSC: As part of a homeschooling-based situation, my wife received the following item for one of our daughters (who needs additional/personalized assistance to learn). Simultaneously, she and our daughter sent them a Michigan Exchange Box. Very cool.
I believe my wife found this out at the following group in Facebook:
Some channels out on Youtube that have to do with learning: (and by the way, according to Jane Hart’s recent Top 200 Tools for Learning, YouTube is in the #1 spot for the 5th year in a row!)
“Horse Sense Tutoring Services is a unique resource that combines the power of Equine Assisted Learning with evidence-based reading and math strategies that engage the mind, body, and emotions in learning.We use the principles of discovery, experience, movement, reflection, and connection in partnership with our horse friends.
…
Based at The Barn for Equine Learning…my program offers targeted reading, math, and basic horsemanship tutoring for students in grades K – 8. Horses become teaching and learning partners as students experience academics and social-emotional learning in a whole new way.
If you are looking for a unique tutoring and confidence-building experience for your child, PM for more information.Sessions are held outdoors and/or in an open barn setting.
(Small group field trips with an introduction to basic horsemanship skills are also available).
From DSC:
So these are just a few examples of how the learning ecosystems are changing out there! Surely, there will be more changes coming down the pike.
