Nontraditional students achieve their dreams, graduate from college

Aaron Besecker writes, "Going back to college meant Christopher L. Post spent a lot of late nights with his head buried in books.
But devoting all that time to furthering his education also meant more chores around the house for his kids, no family vacations and asking his wife and family to cut back without his regular income.

Photo: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 Post’s story of heading back to college later in life plays out routinely at places like Empire State College, the State University of New York’s liberal arts college that caters to what are considered “nontraditional” students. That definition is typically based on a student’s age and part-time status. And it turns out that there are now more college students like Post than the traditional, 18- to 22-year-olds.

In 2011, more people in the United States enrolled as part-time college students who were age 25 and above than entered college for the first time as a full-time student, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Post had once enrolled at St. Bonaventure University and also attended Jamestown Community College, but he didn’t get his degree when he was younger. He took a break from school, moved to Florida and then began careers in the restaurant and retail business.

When his employer closed in 2010, he decided it was time to go back to college. On Saturday, he received a master’s degree in teaching and served as the graduate student speaker during the ceremony.
Read more...

Source: The Buffalo News

Nontraditional students achieve their dreams, graduate from college

Aaron Besecker writes, "Going back to college meant Christopher L. Post spent a lot of late nights with his head buried in books.
But devoting all that time to furthering his education also meant more chores around the house for his kids, no family vacations and asking his wife and family to cut back without his regular income.

Photo: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 Post’s story of heading back to college later in life plays out routinely at places like Empire State College, the State University of New York’s liberal arts college that caters to what are considered “nontraditional” students. That definition is typically based on a student’s age and part-time status. And it turns out that there are now more college students like Post than the traditional, 18- to 22-year-olds.

In 2011, more people in the United States enrolled as part-time college students who were age 25 and above than entered college for the first time as a full-time student, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Post had once enrolled at St. Bonaventure University and also attended Jamestown Community College, but he didn’t get his degree when he was younger. He took a break from school, moved to Florida and then began careers in the restaurant and retail business.

When his employer closed in 2010, he decided it was time to go back to college. On Saturday, he received a master’s degree in teaching and served as the graduate student speaker during the ceremony.
Read more...

Source: The Buffalo News

Stanford Report Shares Snapshot of Online Learning

Campus Technology summarizes, "A new report from Stanford University examining the use of online technologies and methods for delivering education says that 1.9 million people around the world have registered for one or more of the public courses taught by the California university's faculty."

According to "Stanford Online: 2013 in Review," since fall 2012 four million hours of instruction have been delivered. That delivery of massive open online courses (MOOCs) takes place on three platforms: Coursera, NovoEd and Stanford OpenEdX.

"Stanford's vision is much broader than MOOCs," said Vice Provost John Mitchell, who directs VPOL. "We're thinking about how we will best educate students for generations to come."

That exploration, he added, moves the focus away from MOOC "completion rates," and towards how participants engage with the material. "In the process, we are asking important questions: How can we help students learn more effectively? How can we better leverage classroom time? How can technology enable educators to better meet the needs of particular learners?"
Read more...

Source: Campus Technology

Stanford Report Shares Snapshot of Online Learning

Campus Technology summarizes, "A new report from Stanford University examining the use of online technologies and methods for delivering education says that 1.9 million people around the world have registered for one or more of the public courses taught by the California university's faculty."

According to "Stanford Online: 2013 in Review," since fall 2012 four million hours of instruction have been delivered. That delivery of massive open online courses (MOOCs) takes place on three platforms: Coursera, NovoEd and Stanford OpenEdX.

"Stanford's vision is much broader than MOOCs," said Vice Provost John Mitchell, who directs VPOL. "We're thinking about how we will best educate students for generations to come."

That exploration, he added, moves the focus away from MOOC "completion rates," and towards how participants engage with the material. "In the process, we are asking important questions: How can we help students learn more effectively? How can we better leverage classroom time? How can technology enable educators to better meet the needs of particular learners?"
Read more...

Source: Campus Technology

Upcoming Free Webinar

Check out this FREE online webinar below. 

Anytime, Anywhere: Flexible Learning for the Workplace of Tomorrow

Date: Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Time: 10:00AM Pacific / 1:00PM Eastern (60-Minute Session)
Cost: $ 0.00

Discover from industry leaders Health Care Service Corporation and American InterContinental University how self-directed, blended, and virtual learning experiences can help you meet those challenges to deliver flexible, adaptive, and most importantly effective learning programs. 

Register

Enjoy this free webinar!

Upcoming Free Webinar

Check out this FREE online webinar below. 

Anytime, Anywhere: Flexible Learning for the Workplace of Tomorrow

Date: Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Time: 10:00AM Pacific / 1:00PM Eastern (60-Minute Session)
Cost: $ 0.00

Discover from industry leaders Health Care Service Corporation and American InterContinental University how self-directed, blended, and virtual learning experiences can help you meet those challenges to deliver flexible, adaptive, and most importantly effective learning programs. 

Register

Enjoy this free webinar!

How to Reach Reluctant Learners by Nancy Barile

Nancy Barile (@nancybarile), a National Board Certified Teacher shares some practical tips she learned from a former student about helping seemingly unmotivated students.

Photo: Nancy Barile

One of my favorite things about Facebook is that it allows me to connect with my former students. However, I was surprised when one student in particular—Eddie Scofield—friended me three years ago. 

Eddie and I had a fairly contentious relationship when he was my student in senior English class in 2008. There were 35 students in that class, most of whom had a mix of behavioral and academic issues. Eddie distinguished himself almost immediately as the troublemaking ringleader. On any given day he could be argumentative, sarcastic, oppositional, sometimes lazy, and definitely mischievous.  
Read more... 

Source: Education Week Teacher

How to Reach Reluctant Learners by Nancy Barile

Nancy Barile (@nancybarile), a National Board Certified Teacher shares some practical tips she learned from a former student about helping seemingly unmotivated students.

Photo: Nancy Barile

One of my favorite things about Facebook is that it allows me to connect with my former students. However, I was surprised when one student in particular—Eddie Scofield—friended me three years ago. 

Eddie and I had a fairly contentious relationship when he was my student in senior English class in 2008. There were 35 students in that class, most of whom had a mix of behavioral and academic issues. Eddie distinguished himself almost immediately as the troublemaking ringleader. On any given day he could be argumentative, sarcastic, oppositional, sometimes lazy, and definitely mischievous.  
Read more... 

Source: Education Week Teacher

Knowing what to do and where to start can help your mobile program succeed

Tweet me: Laura Devaney

Laura Devaney, Managing Editor writes, "Discover important steps in mobile initiative success."

Successful mobile learning initiatives are more and more prevalent in districts across the nation.
And while the same initiative won’t necessarily work for two different districts, mobile learning best practices repeatedly prove that successful initiatives share a number of the same steps.

Photo: eSchool News 

Here, we’ve outlined seven of those steps. These steps are broadly described, and successful mobile initiatives certainly require much more attention to detail, in-depth planning, and continued focus.
Read more... 

Source: eSchool News    

Knowing what to do and where to start can help your mobile program succeed

Tweet me: Laura Devaney

Laura Devaney, Managing Editor writes, "Discover important steps in mobile initiative success."

Successful mobile learning initiatives are more and more prevalent in districts across the nation.
And while the same initiative won’t necessarily work for two different districts, mobile learning best practices repeatedly prove that successful initiatives share a number of the same steps.

Photo: eSchool News 

Here, we’ve outlined seven of those steps. These steps are broadly described, and successful mobile initiatives certainly require much more attention to detail, in-depth planning, and continued focus.
Read more... 

Source: eSchool News