Learning Ecosystems

“To Fix U.S. Education, Free Our Teachers” [Busteed] + other items re: the K12 learning ecosystem

On 03/05/2024, in assessment, career development, change, changing business models, collaboration, education, education reform, engagement / engaging students, K-12 related, leadership, learning ecosystem, legislatures / government / legal, new business models, strategy, teachers, telemedicine / telehealth / virtual health, by Daniel Christian

To Fix U.S. Education, Free Our Teachers — from www-forbes-com.cdn.ampproject.org by Brandon Busteed

Teachers are the least empowered, most[-] disrespected, stressed and burned-out of all professions in the U.S. IMAGED CREATED BY DALL-E FOR BRANDON BUSTEED

If your goal was to create a miserable work environment where employees are stressed, burned out, disrespected and given no say in their job just look to U.S. schools for inspiration. They are our ‘best practice of miserable workplaces.’ And if you were looking for one major fix to education in America, you’d do everything in your power to ensure teachers are empowered.

Teacher engagement and empowerment may be the single most important national objective for improving education. Yet years of failed education policy combined with maligned attitudes about teaching have rendered teachers as among the least empowered and most disrespected professions in the country. This is a tragedy of unimaginable proportions. After all, teachers are the gateways to every profession because they are the ones we have tasked with teaching and motivating every young person in the country.

We need to free our teachers to do what they do best – to teach and inspire. Well-intentioned yet failed education policies that have overemphasized standardized testing and driven national and state-level ‘standardized’ curriculum have led to teacher disempowerment.

Transforming Communities Into K-12 Classrooms — from forbes.com by Kate Cassada

Putting The Public Back In Education
CommunityShare is an interesting nonprofit organization that has found a way to promote vibrant educational experiences by connecting students and educators to the skills, knowledge, and life experiences of community members.
…
Founded in 2015 in Tucson, Arizona, CommunityShare aims to reimagine the relationship between schools and communities. The organization’s vision is “a world where everyone sees themselves as a learner and educator working together to develop their community’s potential.”

Through CommunityShare, teachers and community partners, from artists to astronauts, co-design enriched learning projects that tap into students’ creativity, cultivate real-world skills, and expose students to available community assets.

An unexpected way to fight chronic absenteeism — from hechingerreport.org by Javeria Salman
School districts are having some success with using telemedicine and teletherapy to ensure more kids stay in school

The telemedicine clinic is also a way to relieve the burden on working parents, Oakley said: Many parents in the district’s Title I schools work hourly wage jobs and rely on public transportation, making it difficult to pick up a sick child at school quickly.

How HBCUs are building a stronger Black teacher pipeline — from k12.dive.com by Anna Merod
As HBCUs produce 50% of all Black educators nationwide, a UNCF report illustrates best practices for recruitment efforts.

Dive Brief:

Amid ongoing efforts to diversify the K-12 teacher workforce, a United Negro College Fund report finds some historically Black colleges and universities are working to get Black students in the teacher pipeline by tapping into faculty networks, establishing relationships with school districts and using financial aid as a recruitment tool.
Additionally, HBCUs leveraged long-standing connections with their local Black church communities to promote teacher prep programs and financial aid offerings during religious services.
UNCF suggested higher ed institutions develop pipelines for Black educators beginning in high school by offering students opportunities to work with children and then maintaining relationships with them through their matriculation into college and eventual completion of a teacher certification.

How AI Is Already Transforming the News Business — from politico.com by Jack Shafer
An expert explains the promise and peril of artificial intelligence.

The early vibrations of AI have already been shaking the newsroom. One downside of the new technology surfaced at CNET and Sports Illustrated, where editors let AI run amok with disastrous results. Elsewhere in news media, AI is already writing headlines, managing paywalls to increase subscriptions, performing transcriptions, turning stories in audio feeds, discovering emerging stories, fact checking, copy editing and more.

Felix M. Simon, a doctoral candidate at Oxford, recently published a white paper about AI’s journalistic future that eclipses many early studies. Swinging a bat from a crouch that is neither doomer nor Utopian, Simon heralds both the downsides and promise of AI’s introduction into the newsroom and the publisher’s suite.

Unlike earlier technological revolutions, AI is poised to change the business at every level. It will become — if it already isn’t — the beginning of most story assignments and will become, for some, the new assignment editor. Used effectively, it promises to make news more accurate and timely. Used frivolously, it will spawn an ocean of spam. Wherever the production and distribution of news can be automated or made “smarter,” AI will surely step up. But the future has not yet been written, Simon counsels. AI in the newsroom will be only as bad or good as its developers and users make it.

Also see:

Artificial Intelligence in the News: How AI Retools, Rationalizes, and Reshapes Journalism and the Public Arena — from cjr.org by Felix Simon

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Nvidia just launched Chat with RTX

It leaves ChatGPT in the dust.

Here are 7 incredible things RTX can do: pic.twitter.com/H6K4oJtNcH

— Poonam Soni (@CodeByPoonam) March 2, 2024

EMO: Emote Portrait Alive – Generating Expressive Portrait Videos with Audio2Video Diffusion Model under Weak Conditions — from humanaigc.github.io Linrui Tian, Qi Wang, Bang Zhang, and Liefeng Bo

We proposed EMO, an expressive audio-driven portrait-video generation framework. Input a single reference image and the vocal audio, e.g. talking and singing, our method can generate vocal avatar videos with expressive facial expressions, and various head poses, meanwhile, we can generate videos with any duration depending on the length of input video.

Adobe previews new cutting-edge generative AI tools for crafting and editing custom audio — from blog.adobe.com by the Adobe Research Team

New experimental work from Adobe Research is set to change how people create and edit custom audio and music. An early-stage generative AI music generation and editing tool, Project Music GenAI Control allows creators to generate music from text prompts, and then have fine-grained control to edit that audio for their precise needs.

“With Project Music GenAI Control, generative AI becomes your co-creator. It helps people craft music for their projects, whether they’re broadcasters, or podcasters, or anyone else who needs audio that’s just the right mood, tone, and length,” says Nicholas Bryan, Senior Research Scientist at Adobe Research and one of the creators of the technologies.

How AI copyright lawsuits could make the whole industry go extinct — from theverge.com by Nilay Patel
The New York Times’ lawsuit against OpenAI is part of a broader, industry-shaking copyright challenge that could define the future of AI.

There’s a lot going on in the world of generative AI, but maybe the biggest is the increasing number of copyright lawsuits being filed against AI companies like OpenAI and Stability AI. So for this episode, we brought on Verge features editor Sarah Jeong, who’s a former lawyer just like me, and we’re going to talk about those cases and the main defense the AI companies are relying on in those copyright cases: an idea called fair use.

FCC officially declares AI-voiced robocalls illegal — from techcrunch.com by Devom Coldewey

The FCC’s war on robocalls has gained a new weapon in its arsenal with the declaration of AI-generated voices as “artificial” and therefore definitely against the law when used in automated calling scams. It may not stop the flood of fake Joe Bidens that will almost certainly trouble our phones this election season, but it won’t hurt, either.

The new rule, contemplated for months and telegraphed last week, isn’t actually a new rule — the FCC can’t just invent them with no due process. Robocalls are just a new term for something largely already prohibited under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act: artificial and pre-recorded messages being sent out willy-nilly to every number in the phone book (something that still existed when they drafted the law).

EIEIO…Chips Ahoy! — from dashmedia.co by Michael Moe, Brent Peus, and Owen Ritz

Here Come the AI Worms — from wired.com by Matt Burgess
Security researchers created an AI worm in a test environment that can automatically spread between generative AI agents—potentially stealing data and sending spam emails along the way.

Now, in a demonstration of the risks of connected, autonomous AI ecosystems, a group of researchers have created one of what they claim are the first generative AI worms—which can spread from one system to another, potentially stealing data or deploying malware in the process. “It basically means that now you have the ability to conduct or to perform a new kind of cyberattack that hasn’t been seen before,” says Ben Nassi, a Cornell Tech researcher behind the research.

“Building Better Civil Justice Systems Isn’t Just About The Funding” [Lu & Chandler]

On 03/05/2024, in 21st century, emerging technologies, Europe, innovation, law schools, legal reform, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, vendors, by Daniel Christian

Building Better Civil Justice Systems Isn’t Just About The Funding — from lawnext.com by Jess Lu and Mark Chandler

Justice tech — legal tech that helps low-income folks with no or some ability to pay, that assists the lawyers who serve those folks, and that makes the courts more efficient and effective — must contend with a higher hurdle than wooing Silicon Valley VCs: the civil justice system itself.

A checkerboard of technology systems and data infrastructures across thousands of local court jurisdictions makes it nearly impossible to develop tools with the scale needed to be sustainable. Courts are themselves a key part of the access to justice problem: opaque, duplicative and confusing court forms and burdensome filing processes make accessing the civil justice system deeply inefficient for the sophisticated, and an impenetrable maze for the 70+% of civil litigants who don’t have a lawyer.

Speaking of legaltech, also see:

“Noxtua,” Europe’s first sovereign legal AI — from eureporter.co

Noxtua, the first sovereign European legal AI with its proprietary Language Model, allows lawyers in corporations and law firms to benefit securely from the advantages of generative AI. The Berlin-based AI startup Xayn and the largest German business law firm CMS are developing Noxtua as a Legal AI with its own Legal Large Language Model and AI assistant. Lawyers from corporations and law firms can use the Noxtua chat to ask questions about legal documents, analyze them, check them for compliance with company guidelines, (re)formulate texts, and have summaries written. The Legal Copilot, which specializes in legal texts, stands out as an independent and secure alternative from Europe to the existing US offerings.

Generative AI in the legal industry: The 3 waves set to change how the business works — from thomsonreuters.com by Tom Shepherd and Stephanie Lomax

Gen AI is game-changing technology, directly impacting the way legal work is done and the current law firm-client business model; and while much remains unsettled, within 10 years, Gen AI is likely to change corporate legal departments and law firms in profound and unique ways

Generative artificial intelligence (Gen AI) isn’t a futuristic technology — it’s here now, and it’s already impacting the legal industry in many ways.

Hmmmm….on this next one…

New legal AI venture promises to show how judges think — from reuters.com by Sara Merken

Feb 29 (Reuters) – A new venture by a legal technology entrepreneur and a former Kirkland & Ellis partner says it can use artificial intelligence to help lawyers understand how individual judges think, allowing them to tailor their arguments and improve their courtroom results.

The Toronto-based legal research startup, Bench IQ, was founded by Jimoh Ovbiagele, the co-founder of now-shuttered legal research company ROSS Intelligence, alongside former ROSS senior software engineer Maxim Isakov and former Kirkland bankruptcy partner Jeffrey Gettleman.

Wisdom from scripture

On 03/03/2024, in Daniel S. Christian, Emotion, faith, global / globalization, hearts -- matters of the heart, relationships, religion, by Daniel Christian

1 John 3:18 (New International Version)

Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

Psalm 120:1 (New International Version)

A song of ascents.
I call on the Lord in my distress, and he answers me.

From DSC:
Given this need…

We need to take more of the research from learning science and apply it in our learning spaces.
…I’m highlighting the following resources:

How Learning Happens — from edutopia.org
In this series, we explore how educators can guide all students, regardless of their developmental starting points, to become productive and engaged learners.

These techniques have resonated with educators everywhere: They are focused on taking advantage of the incredible opportunity to help children reach their full potential by creating positive relationships, experiences, and environments in which every student can thrive. In fact, the science is beginning to hint at even more dramatic outcomes. Practices explicitly designed to integrate social, emotional, and cognitive skills in the classroom, the research suggests, can reverse the damages wrought by childhood trauma and stress—while serving the needs of all students and moving them onto a positive developmental and academic path.

Also from edutopia.org recently, see:

How to Introduce Journaling to Young Children — from edutopia.org by Connie Morris
Students in preschool through second grade can benefit from drawing or writing to explore their thoughts and feelings.

The symbiotic relationship between reading and writing can help our youngest students grow their emergent literacy skills. The idea of teaching writing at an early age can seem daunting. However, meeting children where they are developmentally can make a journaling activity become a magical experience—and they don’t have to write words but can convey thoughts in pictures.

7 Digital Tools That Help Bring History to Life — from edutopia.org by Daniel Leonard
Challenging games, fun projects, and a healthy dose of AI tools round out our top picks for breathing new life into history lessons.

We’ve compiled a list of seven teacher-tested tools, and we lay out how educators are using them both to enhance their lessons and to bring history closer to the present than ever.

Integrating Technology Into Collaborative Professional Learning — from edutopia.org by Roxi Thompson
Incorporating digital collaboration into PD gives teachers a model to replicate when setting up tech activities for students.

Adobe previews new cutting-edge generative AI tools for crafting and editing custom audio

On 02/29/2024, in Adobe, digital audio, drama/theater, media/film, multimedia, music, tools, vendors, by Daniel Christian

Adobe previews new cutting-edge generative AI tools for crafting and editing custom audio — from blog.adobe.com by Adobe Research Team

New experimental work from Adobe Research is set to change how people create and edit custom audio and music. An early-stage generative AI music generation and editing tool, Project Music GenAI Control allows creators to generate music from text prompts, and then have fine-grained control to edit that audio for their precise needs.

World’s largest projection mapping snags Guinness World Record

On 02/29/2024, in A/V -- audio/visual, Asia, by Daniel Christian

World’s largest projection mapping snags Guinness World Record — from inavateonthenet.net
A nightly projection mapping display at the Tokyo metropolitan government headquarters has been recognised by Guinness World Records as the largest in the world.

[For student teachers out there] This Teaching Routine Takes Just 5 Minutes. Its Impact Lasts Much Longer [Heubeck]

On 02/29/2024, in digital learning, education, Emotion, hearts -- matters of the heart, history, K-12 related, Learning Experience Design, pedagogy, relationships, student teaching/teacher education, student-related, teachers, writing, by Daniel Christian

This Teaching Routine Takes Just 5 Minutes. Its Impact Lasts Much Longer — from edweek.org by Elizabeth Heubeck

Second grade teacher Kaylee Hutcheson greets her students as they enter their classroom to start their day at Hawthorne Elementary School in Mexico, Mo., on Feb. 14, 2024. |Lisa Krantz for Education Week

Teachers, what if someone told you that engaging in a daily classroom ritual with your students that takes less than five minutes and requires little to no training could improve your students’ mood and behavior immediately, make them more likely to engage in learning, and maybe even elevate your own teaching skills?

Yes, it sounds like a gimmick. But it’s not.

It’s a simple practice that involves greeting each student individually as they walk through the classroom door.

How a Hollywood Director Uses AI to Make Movies — from every.to by Dan Shipper
Dave Clarke shows us the future of AI filmmaking

Dave told me that he couldn’t have made Borrowing Time without AI—it’s an expensive project that traditional Hollywood studios would never bankroll. But after Dave’s short went viral, major production houses approached him to make it a full-length movie. I think this is an excellent example of how AI is changing the art of filmmaking, and I came out of this interview convinced that we are on the brink of a new creative age.

We dive deep into the world of AI tools for image and video generation, discussing how aspiring filmmakers can use them to validate their ideas, and potentially even secure funding if they get traction. Dave walks me through how he has integrated AI into his movie-making process, and as we talk, we make a short film featuring Nicolas Cage using a haunted roulette ball to resurrect his dead movie career, live on the show.

Online Teaching Is Improving In-Person Instruction on Campus — from edsurge.com by Robert Ubell (Columnist)

In fact a slew of research over the past two decades has found that teaching online makes professors better teachers in their classrooms, so much so that one 2009 study recommended that “faculty should be trained in distance education methods and technologies and should be encouraged to use those methods back in the classroom.”

It’s a message I’ve been arguing for a while. But now that so many educators and students have had direct experience with online formats, it’s a narrative that seems to be sinking in.

Now is the time to fully embrace how physical classrooms can be improved by online techniques.

When professors teaching face-to-face adopt online pedagogy, the classroom is transformed into a “blended” experience, moving from conventional to active learning. And that helps students turn from passive to engaged participants in their own intellectual excursions.

Ecosystems for the future of learning — from thebigidea.education-reimagined.org by Education Reimagined and the History Co:Lab

The intent of this report is to help communities build their capacity for transformation of education, advancing toward what our society needs most—a system that works for young people. It draws on the experiences and insights of innovators across the United States who are already answering this challenge—creating learner-centered, community-based ecosystems.
…
This report includes:

a landscape analysis of select communities creating learning ecosystems;
a framework that emerged from the analysis and can be used by communities to consider their readiness and appetite for this transformation;
an invitation to communities to explore and discover their own path for reimagining education; and
a call for national and regional institutions to listen, learn from, and create the conditions for communities to pursue their visions.

From DSC:
The above items was accessed via the article below:

Where Does Work to Imagine a Learner-Centered Ecosystem Begin? — from gettingsmart.com by Alin Bennett

Key Points

The Norris School District in Wisconsin exemplifies how learner profiles and community connections can enhance authentic learning experiences for young people, fostering a culture of belonging and responsibility.
Purdue Polytechnic High School demonstrates the importance of enabling conditions, such as creating microschools with access to shared services, to support a learner-centered approach while ensuring scalability and access to a variety of resources.

Career-Connected Learning: Preparing Students for a Dynamic Future [Vander Ark & Andrews]

On 02/28/2024, in apprenticeships, career development, collaboration, education, education reform, engagement / engaging students, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, project-based learning, real-world assignments, skills, student-related, teachers, workplace, youth, by Daniel Christian

Career-Connected Learning: Preparing Students for a Dynamic Future — from gettingsmart.com by Tom Vander Ark and Victoria Andrews

Key Points

Connecting young people with career awareness needs to start at an early age to provide them with the necessary landscape view of opportunity and skills.
Whether young people engage client-focused opportunities, internships, or endure academically challenging coursework, career-connected learning is an environment to cultivate a sense of self-awareness, determination, and direction, essential for their success in both education and life.

Also from Getting Smart, see:

CHILD: A Microschool Unlocking the Potential for Unique Learners — by Maureen O’Shaughnessy

Key Points

The success of adaptive learning is not solely based on the program, but rather on the people behind it.
Clarity on “who you serve” is critical to success.

Two items from Derek Bruff re: teaching and learning in higher education

On 02/28/2024, in adjunct faculty, colleges, community colleges, digital learning, education technology, faculty, higher education, instructional design, IT in HE, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, pedagogy, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, teaching & learning, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Programs, Services, and More: A Map of CTL Tactics — from derekbruff.org

My colleagues and I at the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) have been reading and discussing Mary C. Wright’s new book Centers for Teaching and Learning: The New Landscape in Higher Education (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023). Wright identified all the centers for teaching and learning (CTLs) in the United States and then did a content analysis of their websites to see what they were all about. For someone like me, who has spent his career working in CTLs, Wright’s work is a fascinating look at my own field and how it represents itself through mission statements, listings of programs and services, and annual reports.

Also from Derek, see:

Recap: Study skills, flipped learning, and more at spring STEM teaching lunches — from umcetl.substack.com
With the final spring STEM teaching lunch coming up on March 4th, here’s a recap of what you missed at the first two lunches.

- February 8th – Helping students learn how to learn
- February 20th – Reconsidering class time through flipped learning

Using Generative AI throughout the Institution — from aiedusimplified.substack.com by Lance Eaton
8 lightning talk on generative AI and how to use it through higher education

The magic of AI to help educators with saving time. — from magicschool.ai; via Mrs. Kendall Sajdak

Getting Better Results out of Generative AI — from aiedusimplified.substack.com by Lance Eaton
The prompt to use before you prompt generative AI

Last month, I discussed a GPT that I had created around enhancing prompts. Since then, I have been actively using my Prompt Enhancer GPT to much more effective outputs. Last week, I did a series of mini-talks on generative AI in different parts of higher education (faculty development, human resources, grants, executive leadership, etc) and structured it as “5 tips”. I included a final bonus tip in all of them—a tip that I heard from many afterwards was probably the most useful tip—especially because you can only access the Prompt Enhancer GPT if you are paying for ChatGPT.

Exploring the Opportunities and Challenges with Generative AI — from er.educause.edu by Veronica Diaz

Effectively integrating generative AI into higher education requires policy development, cross-functional engagement, ethical principles, risk assessments, collaboration with other institutions, and an exploration of diverse use cases.

Creating Guidelines for the Use of Gen AI Across Campus — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly
The University of Kentucky has taken a transdisciplinary approach to developing guidelines and recommendations around generative AI, incorporating input from stakeholders across all areas of the institution. Here, the director of UK’s Center for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching breaks down the structure and thinking behind that process.

That resulted in a set of instructional guidelines that we released in August of 2023 and updated in December of 2023. We’re also looking at guidelines for researchers at UK, and we’re currently in the process of working with our colleagues in the healthcare enterprise, UK Healthcare, to comb through the additional complexities of this technology in clinical care and to offer guidance and recommendations around those issues.

From Mean Drafts to Keen Emails — from automatedteach.com by Graham Clay

My experiences match with the results of the above studies. The second study cited above found that 83% of those students who haven’t used AI tools are “not interested in using them,” so it is no surprise that many students have little awareness of their nature. The third study cited above found that, “apart from 12% of students identifying as daily users,” most students’ use cases were “relatively unsophisticated” like summarizing or paraphrasing text.

For those of us in the AI-curious bubble, we need to continually work to stay current, but we also need to recognize that what we take to be “common knowledge” is far from common outside of the bubble.

What do superintendents need to know about artificial intelligence? — from k12dive.com by Roger Riddell
District leaders shared strategies and advice on ethics, responsible use, and the technology’s limitations at the National Conference on Education.

Despite general familiarity, however, technical knowledge shouldn’t be assumed for district leaders or others in the school community. For instance, it’s critical that any materials related to AI not be written in “techy talk” so they can be clearly understood, said Ann McMullan, project director for the Consortium for School Networking’s EmpowerED Superintendents Initiative.

To that end, CoSN, a nonprofit that promotes technological innovation in K-12, has released an array of AI resources to help superintendents stay ahead of the curve, including a one-page explainer that details definitions and guidelines to keep in mind as schools work with the emerging technology.

Affordability and Microcredentials — from the-job.beehiiv.com by Paul Fain
Cutting costs for short-term credentials with course sharing and, perhaps, federal money.

‘Bespoke, e-Commerce-Enabled Storefronts’
Demand for nondegree credentials has risen. But it can be expensive and tricky for colleges to create their own workforce-relevant courses and certifications. Homegrown microcredentials also may be more likely to fall flat with students and employers, particularly in competition with professional certificates from big brands like Salesforce or AWS.

Acadeum, an online course-sharing company, is betting that a networked marketplace will be a better option for its 460 college and university partners, which include a growing number of community colleges. Beginning last month, those colleges can tap into 380+ online certificates, certifications, and skills-training courses.

“Skills Marketplace lowers the barrier of entry for institutions to self-select only the certifications that align their program offerings to meet student and workforce demand,” says David Daniels, Acadeum’s president and CEO.

Learning Ecosystems

“Building Better Civil Justice Systems Isn’t Just About The Funding” [Lu & Chandler]

Wisdom from scripture

Adobe previews new cutting-edge generative AI tools for crafting and editing custom audio

World’s largest projection mapping snags Guinness World Record

For storytellers and filmakers: How a Hollywood Director Uses AI to Make Movies [Shipper]

Online Teaching Is Improving In-Person Instruction on Campus [Ubell]

Two items from Derek Bruff re: teaching and learning in higher education

A networked marketplace offering 380+ online certificates, certifications, & skills-training courses [Fain]

Greetings!

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