Ten years ago today, I wrote my first blog post on e-Literate. At the time, my only real ambitions were to learn about blogging and use the fact that I was writing in public to force myself to think more clearly about what I believed about educational technologies. I never could have imagined that, not […]
Starbucks Paying for Employees Tuition at ASU Online
This is a big deal: Starbucks will provide a free online college education to thousands of its workers, without requiring that they remain with the company, through an unusual arrangement with Arizona State University, the company and the university will announce on Monday. The program is open to any of the company’s 135,000 United States […]
It’s Official: Unizin Is Real
A giant deity from the confines of space and time, Unizin has orbited the Earth like a comet, appearing once every twelve years of Christmas Eve. One man by the name of Dr. Kori wanted to study Unizin after seeing the monster himself when he was a boy. Even though he was called a […]
Why Unizin is a Threat to edX
In the week since we published our Unizin exposé, there has been nary a peep from the group to us, or apparently to the traditional news outlets either. When we ran the piece, we emailed Indiana University CIO Brad Wheeler to request comment or corrections. We have not heard back from him yet. Brad, if […]
The IMS Is More Important Than You Think It Is
I have long argued that the development of technical interoperability standards for education are absolutely critical for enabling innovation and personalized learning environments. Note that I usually avoid those sorts of buzzwords—“innovation” and “personalized learning”—so when I use them here, I really mean them. If there are two fundamental lessons we have learned in the […]
Unizin: Indiana University’s Secret New “Learning Ecosystem” Coalition
Indiana University has been the driving force behind the creation of a new organization to develop a “learning ecosystem”. At least ten schools are being quietly asked to contribute $1 million each over a three-year period to join the consortium. The details of what that $1 million buys are unclear at this point. The centerpiece for the […]
New e-Literate TV Series on MOOCs
If 2013 was the year that MOOC mania peaked in the Gartner hype cycle, then surely 2014 is the year in which they have entered the trough of disillusionment. And just as it was important last year to push back on the inflated expectations, it will be equally important this year to make sure […]