Category: 21st Century Learning

21st Century Learning, highered1 Comment

Disruption in the Force of Higher Education

Laura Gekeler

When online degrees by the commercial entity University of Phoenix began in 1989, it introduced a new market segment. When Your Town Community College began offering online courses, it was a new revenue stream. When Your State University added an online component of its face-to-face courses in order to optimize its use of brick and mortar classrooms by reducing the number of classroom meeting times per course, it was cost effective. Now It’s Online and Free The real disruption, which David Brooks last Thursday likened to that which has already overtaken newspapers and magazines, is about to happen to the … Continue reading Disruption in the Force of Higher Education

21st Century Learning, Teaching and Learning5 Comments

Blackboard Open Enrollment Announcement

Laura Gekeler

In another move following Blackboard’s March 26th announcement (aggregated responses on e-Literate site), yesterday Blackboard announced that Instructors using their CourseSites™ can make their courses available for enrollment by anyone, effectively supporting an open courseware model. It means individuals can set up open teaching initiatives, community outreach and volunteer training, as well as collaborative research programs. Of course, Sakai Project Sites also support these activities, but Sakai servers are not usually set up outside institutions. Instructure Canvas is another company that also supports these activities, with their “Free for Teachers” version. I don’t know whether it supports open enrollment. Yet. … Continue reading Blackboard Open Enrollment Announcement

21st Century Learning, Here at Notre Dame, Teaching and Learning

Observations on Entrepreneurialism, Startups and Education

Laura Gekeler

Normally I write about higher ed and educational technology of some sort. This post is about the startup weekend I attended at Innovation Park, Notre Dame’s entrepreneurial incubator. Bear with me there *is* a connection. The competition’s finalists all presented evidence of their proposition’s value addition to the marketplace. This included the ideas which, as solutions, were “solutions” to pretty trivial problems in the grand scheme of things. One of the finalists, for example, will be launching a smartphone app which creates a connection between you and the clubs you attend – effectively moving you to the head of long … Continue reading Observations on Entrepreneurialism, Startups and Education