Senna El Bakri, 17, was struggling in school. So, her mother started to home school her. For a while that was fine, but El Bakri said it “just wasn’t something that I wanted, I’m a social person and I needed something else.” For her an alternative option was to enroll in an online school. El Bakri, a Coon Rapids resident, enrolled in the Minnesota Center of Online Learning (MCoOL), a public,

As area colleges prepare to begin fall classes, Anne Arundel Community College is increasing its online courses and expanding its weekend program in an attempt to help students accommodate their hectic schedules.Academic counselors will be available on weekends, college officials said, and the cashier's window, the bookstore and the child care center will be open on Saturdays and Sundays. "It

n continuing technology's slow erosion of brick and mortar restraints, Payson students' opportunities for virtual learning expanded Monday night. The school board approved a partnership with Mesa Unified School District to provide online classes, while saving Payson money. Payson schools lost $140,000 in revenue last year from students taking online classes, said Superintendent Casey O'Brien.

Digital technology is transforming colleges, students and learning according to the Summer 2008 issue of The New England Journal of Higher Education (NEJHE). The Summer 2008 issue, published in July, features a "Going Digital" forum with articles examining today's "Digital Natives," the role of Web 2.0 technologies in teaching, admissions and student services, and new ways that digital

University may be the time to reinvent yourself, but go to one with a campus in Second Life and you can have a total body refit. The internet-based 3D virtual world, where you choose your gender, age, colour and appearance and live out a parallel animated existence, is becoming the playground - and study space - of British universities. Latest figures estimate that three-quarters of British

Between shuttling her two kids to school, working full time and sitting in rush-hour traffic to and from Pearl City, Kammie Wilson barely had time to think about going back to school, let alone spend hours in a classroom each day." They have classes all over the island, but I think it's good when you can be at home in your home clothes," said the 26-year-old receptionist and single mom.... With

Proponents of the open textbook movement have long envisioned a world of free (or almost free) educational materials, available to print or download, written by experts for others to read, share, improve or modify as they see fit. Connexions, a prominent online “open educational resources” hub based at Rice University, announced Monday that it has published a statistics textbook online that’s

Mobile computing and mobility have, for many people, meant laptop computers and dedicated wireless networks. Increasingly though, to the upcoming generation, mobile computing is literally in their hip pocket. This paper examines the evolving landscape of mobility with particular attention to the intersection with learning and education.

Thousands of schools are taking a walk in the clouds with Google. More than one dozen new universities are integrating Google cloud computing into their education infrastructure. These universities are using the company's Internet hosted office suite that includes e-mail, calendaring and docs, for information sharing and studying. Cloud computing is an Internet-based development for the use of

For more than twenty years, we educational technologists have talked about "integrating information technology into higher education." We have claimed, "It's not about the technology, it's about teaching and learning." And, we have assured faculty members, "They [the machines] are just tools." In all cases, the implication was that education would stay the same and information technology would

According to the National Association of College Stores in a 2007 survey, the average cost of a new college textbook was $53. The founders of Flat World Knowledge, which launches with its first run of college textbooks this fall, consider that too high--so high, in fact, that they'll be offering textbooks for free, at least in versions that can be read online. If the student wants to buy a

Higher salary potential drives many adults back to campus to get or complete a degree.Adults are returning to college in record numbers. Americans with a bachelor's degree make an average of $51,554 a year, compared with just $28,645 for those who didn't go past high school, according to the Census Bureau. If you're planning or thinking about returning, the key to taking advantage of all that's

When StateSuperintendent for Public Instruction Michael P. Flanagan addressed a group of Michigan Virtual School online teachers Thursday he praised them for their pioneering spirit and challenged them to stay aheadof the curve. Flanagan said changes to the educational system to allow alternative methods of learning, like the online learning courses MVS provides to middle and high school

Kylee Patterson graduated from high school with a full year of college completed — a move that saved her $15,000 on tuition and books. While attending Scotland High School of Math, Science and Technology in Laurinburg, the 17-year-old began her day at Richmond Community College in Hamlet and earned other credits in an online course. Now she’s got college friends and college credits, and a head

Dodie Gildea sat behind a laptop in a Scottsdale resort conference room Wednesday waiting for potential students to check out the virtual classroom she had to offer. It was a presentation Gildea had to drive more than 200 miles to give - the demonstration may have been in Scottsdale, but Gildea was recruiting for Havasuonline, the Lake Havasu Unified School District's foray into online education.

A faculty development survey analyzed what faculty want and need to be successful teaching online. The number of courses offered online grows every year, resulting in an increasing number of higher education faculty entering a virtual classroom for the first time.1 It has been well documented that faculty need training and assistance to make the transition from teaching in a traditional

Technological skills and understanding how to employ Web 2.0 tools to successfully support pedagogy are vital for foreign language faculty today.Along with extensive teaching experience and promises of excellent scholarship, foreign language job candidates are asked by an increasing number of higher education institutions to have proficiency in instructional technologies. A keyword search for the

Of the many compelling genres of new media that currently vie for faculty attention, none seems more risky to the traditional academic than gaming. (By "gaming" I refer primarily to immersive computer-based video games such as The Sims, Civilization IV, and World of Warcraft.) Although digital storytelling, podcasting, blogging, and collaborative writing with wikis are each revolutionary in their

All Alabama high schools will soon be outfitted with technology that enables a student in one end of the state to take classes being taught in the other end. Beginning in the 2009-10 school year it won’t matter as much whether a high school is in a rural Alabama district struggling to employ enough teachers or if it’s in a bustling metropolis — the playing field will be a bit more level all

Educators and innovators are looking ahead to see how emerging technologies and philosophies will assure that a wired education system is a prepared one. Looking ahead to a learning environment that blends new technologies and traditional teaching methods, educators and entrepreneurs are blazing a path forward toward planetwide education and information access. In addition to the idea of