There’s a curious little bit of information out today amid the results of a new survey by Eduventures. Apparently, most people trying to find college and university continuing and professional education courses are finding that it’s pretty hard to find good information about tuition on most college websites. Hmm…is that an accident? Most smart marketers know that you don’t want to wave the price in front of a customer too soon in the sales process. Maybe schools in the increasingly cut throat world of online education are a little more shrewd than we thought about marketing.
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In spite of all you read about the fierce competition among students to get into ivy league schools, the overall learning picture in American high schools is pretty dismal. Consider this: according to the U.S. Department of Education, a full forty per cent of all students entering U.S. colleges today need to take at least one “remedial” course to bring them up to a level where they can handle college-level learning. Companies like Blackboard and some state universities are trying to respond to this by making more college courses available over the internet to high school kids, to try and get them into educational “shape” for college.

The Sloan Consortium is probably the most respected academic group in the online education field. They just released the list of top online learning award winners for this year, and it’s interesting that very few of them are among the schools that spend a ton of money in marketing to attract students. As there’s little explanation on Sloan’s website of exactly why each of these people were chosen, I hope to find out more and fill you in on another blog post soon.  For the moment, though, the list of winners includes Michelle Pacansky-Brock of Sierra College, for “Excellence in Online Teaching,” Maryland Online, for “Excellence in Faculty Development for Online Teaching” and both St. Petersburg College and Stevens Institute of Technology for the “Most Outstanding Online Teaching and Learning Program.”

High school kids all over America (and their parents) have a long history of dreading the SAT. Millions are spent on prep courses from Princeton and other companies to get students ready to get a high number on this all-important test. But the SAT has long been criticized for favoring rich kids, and even for being totally irrelevant. Here’s an article by a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who says that even though he got into Harvard because of a high SAT score, it’s time to abolish the test. Read More…

Online education is a blessing to many students who can’t take a degree program at a traditional college. But it’s also a huge business that’s attracted lots of scam artists on the internet. When you’re looking for an online degree you want to make sure the school you go to is accredited (read our article on accreditation at http://www.successdegrees.com/online-accredited-courses.html ) and that the program is run by people with experience in e-learning. A new online guide called directoryofschools.com has just come out to help you weed out the fake degree program when you’re searching for a school online.
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“Give it away, give it away, give it away” has long been the war cry of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Well, it sounds like alot of schools, including Yale University, have been listening. More and more of them are starting to produce videos of their undergrad classes and make them available to the public free of charge. The schools have basically decided that the power this approach has to attract more students outweights the downside that some people will get their best course content for free. What makes it even more interesting is that Apple Inc. has gotten involved in this effort to “democratize” higher education through technology. Is Steve Jobs about to do to the distance learning business what he did to the recording industry?
Check out this very interesting article from eschool news online

“Give it away, give it away, give it away” has long been the war cry of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Well, it sounds like alot of schools, including Yale University, have been listening. More and more of them are starting to produce videos of their undergrad classes and make them available to the public free of charge. The schools have basically decided that the power this approach has to attract more students outweights the downside that some people will get their best course content for free. What makes it even more interesting is that Apple Inc. has gotten involved in this effort to “democratize” higher education through technology. Is Steve Jobs about to do to the distance learning business what he did to the recording industry?
Check out this very interesting article from eschool news online

“Give it away, give it away, give it away” has long been the war cry of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Well, it sounds like alot of schools, including Yale University, have been listening. More and more of them are starting to produce videos of their undergrad classes and make them available to the public free of charge. The schools have basically decided that the power this approach has to attract more students outweights the downside that some people will get their best course content for free. What makes it even more interesting is that Apple Inc. has gotten involved in this effort to “democratize” higher education through technology. Is Steve Jobs about to do to the distance learning business what he did to the recording industry?
Check out this very interesting article from eschool news online

A professor at MIT decided to show that the SAT writing exam gives marks to students based on how strictly they follow certain formulas, not on whether or not their writing makes any sense. One student he coached to write a hoax essay on FDR full of nonsensical drivel on ”the communist threat of success” and misquotes like “the only thing we have to fear is itself” got high marks on the SAT. The College Board, which gives the tests, looks pretty foolish on this one.
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