The push to solve education’s problems through providing better tech is a little like trying to invent the pharmaceutical industry in absence of a modern medical profession. In this post, we imagine what that might have looked like. (Spoiler alert: It wouldn’t have worked.)
Big Picture
The "Big Picture" category covers larger trends and topics that influence both the problems that technology can help address in education as well as the barriers to implementing high-quality technology-supported education. This includes research-based topics such as learning science and program effectiveness studies, philosophical discussions such as outcomes definitions, and macro-forces such as government policy, markets, and business models.
Recommended Reading: IHE coverage of NBER paper and critiques
Two good pieces in Inside Higher Ed look into Caroline Hoxby’s controversial NBER report. Neither of them is vindicating.
One More Thing on NBER Report: Where did pre-2011 data come from?
The closer we look, the worse it seems.
New NBER Study on Online Education is Deeply Flawed
Caroline Hoxby from Stanford University just published a working paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) claiming to analyze “The Returns to Online Postsecondary Education”. This report is a hot mess that that conflates online students, enrollments, programs, institutions and uses a bizarre and misleading data set for its analysis.
Understanding Learning Science and Its Value to Educators
We interviewed real, live learning scientists from Carnegie Mellon University to get a better sense of what’s real and how the research can impact classroom teaching. And you know what? They weren’t scary at all!
Improved NAU Student Success in Subsequent Courses After Math Emporium
Northern Arizona University appears to be getting good results with their math emporium model, based on their internal analysis. The study isn’t water-tight, but it is fairly compelling.
Winter Is Here: EdTech investments and M&A dropped significantly in 2016
With the long-term rise in Ed Tech investments – starting in roughly 2007 – many analysts have been predicting a fall for several years. Maybe not a bubble burst like we saw in 2001, but a real drop in activity and volume. Now we also find out that there is also a 70% drop in mergers and acquisition […]