You no longer need a college degree to work at these 7 companies — from businessinsider.com by Ethan Dodd
Key points:
Also relevant/see:
A Spotify model of personalised higher education — from timeshighereducation.com by Michael Rosemann and Martin Betts
With technology offering greater potential for a personalised approach to higher education, Michael Rosemann and Martin Betts look at what universities can learn from the ubiquitous music platform Spotify
Excerpts (emphasis DSC):
Selection, or the P(upil)-route as educationalist Dan Buckley calls it, means personalisation driven by the learner. This is the fastest-moving form of personalised learning. Not only do students benefit from true omnichannel education – choosing between face to face and online – they also independently navigate the internet’s resources and online databases in search of the knowledge that will help them to achieve their learning targets.
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Automation, or the A-route, is the new enabler of personalised learning. As with personalised medicine, finance or entertainment, education is starting to use digital technologies to unlock new models of tailored engagement. While for most universities, AI-driven, personalised education is not an option as the required capabilities are missing and significant investments would be necessary, there is a range of alternative forms of automated personalised learning. For this, we look to providers outside the sector for inspiration.
Here are Spotify-inspired ideas that universities ambitious enough to provide personalised learning could explore.
From DSC:
Rosemann & Betts use the term “omnichannel education” — I like that term. Very nice.
Houses of worship to move streaming from social media to dedicated platforms — from inavateonthenet.net
Excerpt:
A report by Pushpay, with data from over 1,700 organisations has found that while 91% of churches currently livestream worship services on social media, only 47% plan to do the same in the upcoming year.
The report, entitled ‘State of Church Tech 2023 is available to download here.
The reason cited for this shift is organisations’ lack of control on social media platforms to maintain engagement, as users are bombarded with pop-up windows, notifications, status updates, and more.
This is driving a rise in custom video players, website embeds, mobile app streaming, and other platforms that are better suited to maintain engagement.
Policy by Waivers Won’t Boost School Innovation — by Michael B. Horn
“Permissionless” beats having to ask for an okay
Excerpt:
In recent conversations, educators and state policymakers have expressed shock to me that district schools aren’t innovating more. With microschools growing and test scores floundering, why aren’t districts seeking permission to reinvent themselves?
As evidence of the opportunities to innovate, many bureaucrats and think tanks point to the vast number of waivers that states offer. The opportunities to move beyond traditional structures and processes do exist, the argument goes.
Yet waivers help far less than most policymakers believe. Until regulators create frameworks where innovation in pursuit of student outcomes is the default and doesn’t require permission, don’t expect a sea change.
From DSC:
TrimTab Groups. That’s what we need more of within K-12 and higher education.
Research shows the only way an organization can truly reinvent itself is to launch a separate organization that has the autonomy to rethink its value proposition, resources, processes, and financial formula.
Below is a graphic I created a while back, but with traditional institutions of higher education in mind.
HOW DUOLINGO’S AI LEARNS WHAT YOU NEED TO LEARN — from spectrum.ieee.org by Klinton Bicknell, Claire Brust, and Burr Settles
The AI that powers the language-learning app today could disrupt education tomorrow
Excerpt:
It’s lunchtime when your phone pings you with a green owl who cheerily reminds you to “Keep Duo Happy!” It’s a nudge from Duolingo, the popular language-learning app, whose algorithms know you’re most likely to do your 5 minutes of Spanish practice at this time of day. The app chooses its notification words based on what has worked for you in the past and the specifics of your recent achievements, adding a dash of attention-catching novelty. When you open the app, the lesson that’s queued up is calibrated for your skill level, and it includes a review of some words and concepts you flubbed during your last session.
The AI systems we continue to refine are necessary to scale the learning experience beyond the more than 50 million active learners who currently complete about 1 billion exercises per day on the platform.
Although Duolingo is known as a language-learning app, the company’s ambitions go further. We recently launched apps covering childhood literacy and third-grade mathematics, and these expansions are just the beginning. We hope that anyone who wants help with academic learning will one day be able to turn to the friendly green owl in their pocket who hoots at them, “Ready for your daily lesson?”
Also relevant/see:
Duolingo turned to OpenAI’s GPT-4 to advance the product with two new features: Role Play, an AI conversation partner, and Explain my Answer, which breaks down the rules when you make a mistake, in a new subscription tier called Duolingo Max.
“We wanted AI-powered features that were deeply integrated into the app and leveraged the gamified aspect of Duolingo that our learners love,” says Bodge.
Also relevant/see:
The following is a quote from Donald Clark’s posting on LinkedIn.com today:
The whole idea of AI as a useful teacher is here. Honestly it’s astounding. They have provided a Socratic approach to an algebra problem that is totally on point. Most people learn in the absence of a teacher or lecturer. They need constant scaffolding, someone to help them move forward, with feedback. This changes our whole relationship with what we need to know, and how we get to know it. Its reasoning ability is also off the scale.
We now have human teachers, human learners but also AI teachers and AI that learns. It used to be a diad, it is now a tetrad – that is the basis of the new pedAIgogy.
Personalised, tutor-led learning, in any subject, anywhere, at any time for anyone. That has suddenly become real.
Also relevant/see:
Introducing Duolingo Max, a learning experience powered by GPT-4 — from blog.duolingo.com
Excerpts:
We believe that AI and education make a great duo, and we’ve leveraged AI to help us deliver highly-personalized language lessons, affordable and accessible English proficiency testing, and more. Our mission to make high-quality education available to everyone in the world is made possible by advanced AI technology.
Explain My Answer offers learners the chance to learn more about their response in a lesson (whether their answer was correct or incorrect!)
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Roleplay allows learners to practice real-world conversation skills with world characters in the app.
Exploring generative AI and the implications for universities — from universityworldnews.com
Excerpt:
This is part of a weekly University World News special report series on ‘AI and higher education’. The focus is on how universities are engaging with ChatGPT and other generative artificial intelligence tools. The articles from academics and our journalists around the world are exploring developments and university work in AI that have implications for higher education institutions and systems, students and staff, and teaching, learning and research.
Fostering sustainable learning ecosystems — from linkedin.com by Patrick Blessinger
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
Learning ecosystems
As today’s global knowledge society becomes increasingly interconnected and begins to morph into a global learning society, it is likely that formal, nonformal, and informal learning will become increasingly interconnected. For instance, there has been an explosion of new self-directed e-learning platforms such as Khan Academy, Open Courseware, and YouTube, among others, that help educate billions of people around the world.
A learning ecosystem includes all the elements that contribute to a learner’s overall learning experience. The components of a learning ecosystem are numerous, including people, technology platforms, knowledge bases, culture, governance, strategy, and other internal and external elements that have an impact on learning. Therefore, moving forward, it is crucial to integrate learning across formal, nonformal, and informal learning processes and activities in a more strategic way.
What’s It Like to Leave the Classroom for a Job in Edtech? — from edsurge.com by Nadia Tamez-Robledo
Excerpt:
Our recent analysis of teacher representation in edtech leadership revealed that former educators held a variety of top roles in the companies we sampled, heading teams that handled pedagogy, curriculum, product, marketing and sales.
Former educators told us they had moved on to become UX designers, part of sales teams and founders of their own edtech companies.
Transitioning to edtech would have been much harder about five years ago, she believes, because there weren’t as many resources available to help teachers get started. Now job seekers can turn to podcasts or TikTok’s #transitioningteachers community for advice on approaching the edtech job search.
