EDUCATION NEWS
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WIRELESS RESPONSE TECHNOLOGY IN COLLEGE CLASSROOMS
Recent advances in wireless technology provide interesting and effective solutions to two perennial problems in large-classroom teaching. The first of these is how to encourage students to participate actively. The second problem is how to monitor student comprehension.
http://64.124.14.173/default.asp?show=article&id=1045
 
A REVOLUTION IN KNOWLEDGE SHARING
The pressure to transform our institutions of learning continues. Virtually every enterprise and institution is grappling with the disruptions and opportunities caused by Web-enabled infrastructures and practices. New best practices, business models, innovations, and strategies are emerging, including new ways to acquire, assimilate, and share knowledge. Using technologies that are already developed or that will be deployed over the next five years, best practices in knowledge sharing not only are diffusing rapidly but will be substantially reinvented in all settings: educational institutions, corporations, government organizations, associations, and nonprofits. But institutions of learning are in a unique position to benefit from an added opportunity: providing leadership in e-knowledge. [PDF]
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0350.pdf
 
NEW MODELS FOR ONLINE LEARNING
Every college and university in the United States is discovering exciting new ways of using information technology to enhance the process of teaching and learning and to extend access to new populations of students. For most institutions, however, new technologies represent a black hole of additional expense. Most campuses have simply bolted new technologies onto a fixed plant, a fixed faculty, and a fixed notion of classroom instruction. Under these circumstances, technology becomes part of the problem of rising costs rather than part of the solution. In addition, comparative research studies show that rather than improving quality, most technology-based courses produce learning outcomes that are simply “as good as” their traditional counterparts—in what is often referred to as the “no significant difference” phenomenon.1 By and large, colleges and universities have not yet begun to realize the promise of technology to improve the quality of student learning and reduce the costs of instruction. [PDF]
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0352.pdf
 
THE BENEFITS OF BULLETIN BOARD DISCUSSION IN A LITERATURE OF JOURNALISM COURSE
In this article, I describe how the literature of journalism offering evolved from a face-to-face course to a blended course that took advantage of the Internet and student suggestions for improvement. I also outline the ways in which technology enabled me and other instructors to engage students more completely in the subject matter.
http://64.124.14.173/default.asp?show=article&id=1036
 
SHARE AND SHARE ALIKE: THE E-KNOWLEDGE TRANSFORMATION COMES TO CAMPUS
The concept is simple. Suppose all of the knowledge content and context currently embedded in texts, course materials and notes, insights on workplace application, and other proprietary knowledge silos could be digitized, tagged, and arrayed in digital marketplaces where it could be stored, repurposed, combined, metered, and exchanged, with due credit given. Suppose vertical knowledge silos could be penetrated by horizontal marketplaces that enable content and context to be shared, combined, and used by current faculty and learners and by new users. What would that world be like? [PDF]
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0351.pdf
 
FROM THE NET TO NURSING IN ONE YEAR
Put down this paper, get to a computer, go to Google.com and type in Accelerated Online Nursing Program. The first and only hit you will find is a UW-Oshkosh address for the fast pace online nursing program, which may be the first in the nation. Some UW-Oshkosh nursing faculty members created the accelerated online nursing program to get nursing students into the field sooner and hopefully increase the low nursing rate.
http://at.mio.uwosh.edu/story.asp?issue=11001&story=2398
 
ONLINE LEARNING IS AS GOOD AS BEING THERE
From the Ivy League to tiny community colleges, a majority of institutes of higher education say online learning is just as good as traditional, face-to-face classroom instruction. Nearly three out of four academic leaders say learning online may be better within three years. A comprehensive survey released today by Babson College and the Sloan Consortium concludes that online learning is at historically high levels and will continue to grow at a rate of nearly 20%.
http://www.sloan-c.org/resources/survey.asp
 
LEARNING WITH TABLET PCS: TRUE LEARNING TOOLS OR TRENDY DEVICES
Tablet PCs have arrived on our campuses: appealing, lightweight devices that have all the features of laptops plus the option of pen-based or keyboard entry. But even with their obvious potential for mobile computing applications, their best uses in classrooms are yet to be defined.
http://www.syllabus.com/article.asp?id=8106
 
IS INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN BECOMING A COMMODITY?
The ascension of Learning Content Management Systems (LCMS) and their increasingly automated authoring processes may be marginalizing the craft, if not the science, of instructional design. All the templates, wizards, and other productivity tools that come bundled into the leading LCMS platforms have certainly made it easier to assemble and deploy structured learning content. But will we see better online learning, or simply more?
http://www.elearnmag.org/index.cfm
 
THE STANDARDS APPROACH: PLANNING FOR EXCELLENCE IN DISTANCE EDUCATION
Many groups have generated standards for distance education. Despite the many formats and expressions of these efforts, taken together they offer a “form for quality” and a foundation for building the next generation of distance education spaces.
http://www.syllabus.com/article.asp?id=8109
 

TECHNOLOGY NEWS
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A MAC-STYLE SUPERCOMPUTER
Virginia Tech is tying 1,100 G5s together to achieve top-dollar performance for a relative bargain, a ringing endorsement for Apple's latest machine. Here's a groundbreaker in computing, one that Apple can't take credit for: A group of scientists at Virginia Tech has figured out how to build the world's next supercomputer--on the cheap no less--using Macs. And they're in the process of doing it.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2003/tc20030910_7427_tc056.htm
 
MICROSOFT TO OPEN OFFICE DOORS EARLY
Microsoft said Friday that it would allow some of its business customers to download its new Office desktop application bundle about two weeks sooner than originally planned. The software giant said Office 2003 and Microsoft OneNote applications would be released to those signed up for its Enterprise Agreement and Software Assurance licensing plans. The company will also allow subscribers to the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) to download the software.
http://news.com.com/2100-1016_3-5075418.html
 
INTEL PERSONAL SERVER RESEARCH: MOBILE COMPUTING IN THE PALM OF YOUR HAND
Imagine how much more productive employees could be if they always had the information they needed right at their fingertips and could access that information from any workstation, anywhere in the world. Intel researchers are working to make this vision a reality by pioneering an exciting new class of mobile computers called Personal Servers that utilize advances in processing, storage, and communication technologies.
http://linuxdevices.com/articles/AT5772921353.html
 
WOZ OK'S APPLE I RESURRECTION
Apple's co-founder Steve Wozniak has given his blessing to the production of a replica of the Apple I -- the legendary machine that launched Apple. Woz has given the go-ahead to Vince Briel, a computer technician, who plans to sell $200 replicas of the Apple I from his garage in suburban Cleveland, Ohio. Limited production of the hand-built machines will begin shipping next month. Briel is taking orders through his Replica I website.
http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,60329,00.html
 
SHARP UNVEILS NOTEBOOK WITH 3-D DISPLAY
Sharp Corp. has unveiled a notebook computer with a display that gives the illusion of depth and can display objects in three dimensions without the use of special glasses. The new notebook is scheduled to be on sale in Japan and the U.S. before the end of this year. The PC-RD3D is the first computing product from Sharp to feature the 3-D LCD technology.
http://ts.mivu.org/default.asp?show=article&id=1033
 
BARNES & NOBLE SHELVES E-BOOKS
Barnes&Noble.com has discontinued sales of e-books, according to a statement on the company's Web site. Customers using Microsoft's eBook reader have until Dec. 9 to access downloads purchased from the store, while Adobe Reader customers have 90 days to retrieve any outstanding files, according to a notice posted on the site. Meanwhile thousands of e-book titles were listed as unavailable. "B&N.com no longer sells eBooks," the statement noted.
http://news.com.com/2100-1019_3-5073796.html
 
NEW OFFICE LOCKS DOWN DOCUMENTS
As digital media publishers scramble to devise a foolproof method of copy protection, Microsoft is ready to push digital rights management into a whole new arena--your desktop. Office 2003, the upcoming update of the company's market-dominating productivity package, for the first time will include tools for restricting access to documents created with the software. Office workers can specify who can read or alter a spreadsheet, block it from copying or printing, and set an expiration date.
http://news.com.com/2100-1012_3-5069246.html
 
SUN MULLS JOINING JAVA ECLIPSE EFFORT
In an about-face that could have a dramatic impact in the Java tools space, Sun Microsystems Inc. has indicated it might be willing to join the IBM-sponsored Eclipse open-source development platform effort—but only if momentum to spin off the effort into an independent organization continues. Eclipse already seems to be moving from an IBM-led organization to an independent one. The inclusion of Sun in the Eclipse group would be a major move in the Java development space, bringing the two largest Java development organizations together. It would also bolster the Java community against Microsoft Corp.'s .Net architecture and Visual Studio .Net development tools.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1236132,00.asp
 
MICROSOFT ISSUES OFFICE SECURITY WARNINGS
Microsoft Corp. warned of several flaws in its ubiquitous Office products, the most serious of which could allow an attacker to take control of a user's computer. Deemed "critical" is a flaw in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), a technology that is part of Microsoft Office products and used to run customized applications on top of Office. A flaw exists in the way VBA checks the properties of a document when it is opened in an Office application, potentially allowing an attacker to run code on a victim's computer, Microsoft said.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/09/04/HNmsofficewarning_1.html
 
NATIONS TO DEVELOP NON-WINDOWS SOFTWARE
Japan, China and South Korea have agreed to cooperate in a project to boost research and development of software for operating systems other than industry leader Microsoft Corp.'s Windows, a Japanese trade ministry official said. The project, proposed by Japan's Trade Minister Takeo Hiranuma at a conference in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, is intended to bolster the popularity of Windows' rivals, such as Linux, and boost their share in such markets as digital cameras, mobile phones and car navigation systems.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,4149,1252634,00.asp
 
NEW DEVICE SENDS DIGITAL PHOTOS TO TV
It's a way to get your photos from your digital camera to your TV screen without using a computer as a go-between. Digital storage company San Disk has released a digital photo viewer that allows users to plug in the storage card from just about any digital camera and relays the images to a television screen. The device is designed to plug into the audio jack of a TV set.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=562&ncid=738&e=7&u=/ap/20030904/ap_on_hi_te/photo_viewer
 
 
INTERNET/WIRELESS RELATED
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RIAA SEEKS TO ALTER FILE-TRADING CULTURE
The Recording Industry Association of America has an ambitious goal with its first wave of lawsuits against file swappers: trying to change an anarchic, deeply rooted online culture. As yet, evidence is mixed as to whether the group's attempts are succeeding. According to several Net monitoring groups, traffic on file-swapping networks fell throughout the period of impending lawsuits. But the file-trading companies themselves, and other independent statistics, show that downloads of the software remain high.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5073786.html
 
FROM "PAPERLESS CLASSROOM" TO "DEEP READING": FIVE STAGES IN INTERNET PEDAGOGY
I began using the Internet in my literature classes in 1992, before the advent of the World Wide Web. Over the past 11 years, my use of the Internet for pedagogical purposes has passed through four major stages, and has recently emerged into a fifth stage that I call "Deep Reading." In this article, I outline and illustrate this progression, with primary emphasis on the latest stage.
http://ts.mivu.org/default.asp?show=article&id=1033
 
MICROSOFT DEBUTS OFFICE ONLINE
Like the highly-popular Office Tools on the Web, Office Online is intended as a comprehensive repository of Microsoft Office user resources. One of the biggest changes, according to Microsoft, is a new live connection that will allow Office 2003 users to access the site's resources directly from within their applications.
http://www.internetnews.com/xSP/article.php/3073871
 
COLLEGES MOVE TO THWART INTERNET VIRUSES
Still recovering from a summer of Internet infections, colleges are taking unusually aggressive steps to protect campus computer networks from virus outbreaks. Students returning to classes are finding themselves summarily unplugged if their computers are infected. Oberlin College in Ohio is threatening to fine students $25 for inadvertently spreading a virus.
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20030904/D7TBQM200.html
 
COLLEGES MAKING DENT IN CAMPUS P2P
From teaching incoming freshmen about the legal and ethical issues of file trading to starting up trial projects offering campus-sponsored digital music services, colleges are beginning to make inroads against student copyright infringement, representatives of a year-old education and entertainment industry alliance said. The group, dubbed the Joint Committee of the Higher Education and Entertainment Communities, includes universities, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).
http://rss.com.com/2100-1027_3-5070407.html
 
TECH FIRMS BAND TOGETHER ON ID THEFT
Some of the biggest names in e-commerce, including Amazon.com, eBay and Microsoft, have formed a coalition to curb online identity theft. The Coalition on Online Identity Theft said it plans to launch a public education campaign and encourage its members to work more closely with law enforcement officials in an effort to fight a crime that has emerged as a major concern among politicians and consumers in recent years. The group is being organized by the Information Technology Association of America, a trade group representing the high-tech industry.
http://news.com.com/2100-1019_3-5070601.html
 
 
 
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[NOTE: The selections above are from the Academic ADL Co-Lab News Report, a limited-distribution, weekly executive summary of trends, strategies, and innovations influencing the future of learning and technology in higher education. It is prepared by the University of Wisconsin System Office of Learning and Information Technology (OLIT) in coordination with the Co-Lab. Collegebuys.org/schoolbuys.org is using these selections with permission. The selections from the weekly summaries were selected and edited by David Stuart of collegebuys.org/schoolbuys.org.]
 
[NOTE: This information is provided for information purposes only. Mention or discussion of a product, company, or person does not represent any official endorsement or criticism of the same. All authors and organizations retain complete copyright.]
 
[SOURCE MATERIAL: The reference as specific as possible is provided to a source for each summary. When using an online link, ensure the URL has not been broken with a carriage return.]
 
[ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Judy Brown is the Emerging Technology Analyst for the University of Wisconsin System, OLIT. Brown conducts research and consults for the 15-institution UW System. She is Director of the Academic ADL Co-Laboratory at The Pyle Center in Madison, WI. Until recently she coordinated the WTCS Hardware and Software Purchasing Consortium and other statewide technology initiatives for 16 technical college districts comprised of 47 campuses. Brown was named one of the Top 100 women in computing by McGraw Hill's Open Computing magazine (December 1994). She writes a business technology column for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and is the coordinator of eWEEK's Corporate Partner Program.]
 
[COMMENTS & CONTRIBUTIONS: If you want to offer material, or if you want to comment on the contents, contact Judy Brown at judy@academiccolab.org