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Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

D2L is a multiple award winner — again

LONDON, UK (June 28, 2021) – D2L Brightspace has been named the Best Solution for Students with Special Needs, Best Customer Experience in EdTech, and Best Remote Learning Experience Partner K-12/Higher Education of 2021 as part of the annual SIIA CODiE Awards. The prestigious CODiE Awards recognise the companies producing the most innovative education technology products across the country and around the world.

“It’s incredibly gratifying to be recognised, once again, by SIIA with the CODiE awards,” said John Baker, President and CEO of D2L. “Our mission is to transform the way the world learns, and that’s never been more pressing than in the last year and a half, when COVID-19 demanded that we go above and beyond for learners and educators around the world. Everyone at D2L is committed to innovation and excellence, and these awards are recognition that we’re moving in the right direction, which is only going to benefit the people we’re all focused on – students.”

“Congratulations to the 2021 Ed Tech CODiE Award winners,” said SIIA President Jeff Joseph. “The COVID-19 pandemic reminds us of the importance of innovative Ed Tech products and services and this year’s class takes a special place among the many amazing products recognised across the 35-year history of the CODiE Awards.”…Read More

Rise Vision and Sharp NEC Display Solutions Partner to Offer Schools a Free Year of Digital Signage

June 22, 2021 –– Rise Vision and Sharp NEC Display Solutions of America, Inc. have partnered to offer K-12 schools and higher education institutions a free year of Rise Vision digital signage with each NEC display MediaPlayer solution they purchase. 

NEC displays enable collaboration between students and teachers, keeping the classroom connected and driving student engagement in an interactive way. With up to 4K UHD resolution and sizes up to 98”, NEC displays are large enough for classrooms that need to maintain social distancing. Implementing the right technology with the flexibility for various learning options ensures all students, whether remote or in the classroom, can learn effectively.

As part of this partnership Rise Vision has integrated their solution with the NEC MediaPlayer via the pre-installed Raspberry Pi® Compute Module 3 or Compute Module 4. Schools can simply select the Rise Vision CMS in the MediaPlayer settings and have their digital signage up and running in minutes. This greatly simplifies the installation process, eliminating the need for an external media player, and reduces the cost of digital signage.…Read More

4 ways private LTE supports learning today–and tomorrow

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has led to the disruption of a range of uniquely vital vertical sectors. This is especially true for K-12 and higher education as schools, colleges, and universities have been forced to close in order to slow the spread of the virus and find alternative, but technologically accessible, ways to reach students–literally.

With students, teachers and lecturers confined to their offices, homes, and dorm rooms to study and teach, many colleges and universities have come to realise that existing connectivity infrastructure just isn’t up to par. They may not understand why, but they know what they need. Question mark is: where to find it, and what to ask for?

Until 2019, really, the traditional means of acquiring connectivity via public or private Wi-Fi has demonstrated limitations, including an inability to efficiently cover large campuses and wide areas, and the dearth of offering security assurances schools and universities need from their networks. All this costs money. Meanwhile, costing even more money, public cellular networks are often a drain to run and, like Wi-Fi, cannot guarantee coverage, capacity, and security requirements, nor provide adequate control of network usage patterns. …Read More

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Kajeet Announces Launch of 2021 Digital Inclusion Grant Program

To support digital inclusion, Kajeet will provide one year of free internet connectivity hardware and patented Kajeet® managed service to equity-focused organizations

McLean, Va. – May 4, 2021 – Kajeet®, a leading provider of wireless connectivity, software and hardware solutions that deliver safe, reliable and controlled internet connectivity to enterprises, state and local governments, students and IoT solution providers, today announced the official launch of its 2021 Digital Inclusion Grant program. Open to U.S. K-12 school districts, higher education institutions, public libraries, education and career non-profits and municipalities, the program will grant winners one year of free Kajeet internet connectivity hardware and managed service on its award-winning mobile connectivity platform, Sentinel®.

While much work has been done to help close the digital divide, according to the FCC’s Eighth Broadband Report, an estimated 19 million American citizens still lack reliable broadband internet access at home. Guided by the belief that internet access has become a basic human right, Kajeet’s 2021 Digital Inclusion Grant seeks to support an equitable future for all individuals. In addition to one year of free patented Kajeet managed internet service, winners are able to select the Kajeet internet connectivity hardware solution – Kajeet SmartBus ™, Kajeet SmartSpot™ or Kajeet Connect Prime ™ – that best fits the unique needs of the communities they serve.…Read More

Getting students back on track to higher education

COVID-19 has raised a number of major questions for educators, one of which is “Why are college applications decreasing?” Higher education lost about 400,000 students this fall. Are these students taking a gap year between high school and college? If so, that might be a good thing, since data suggests that a gap year can actually help students. The most important question is, “Will students put off college for a significant period, or choose not to go to college because of financial hardship?”

Fall 2020 enrollment data shows the largest decreases falling across community colleges and public universities, especially among lower income and minority students. This last data point is perhaps the most concerning. Educators need to be especially watchful and mindful of where these students land, and how we engage them and bring them into higher education after an (unplanned) gap year. Why? Because putting off college can have a significant impact on lifetime earnings, and overall education level continues to be one of the strongest predictors of lifetime earnings.

According to the Social Security Administration, men with bachelor’s degrees earn approximately $900,000 more in median lifetime earnings than high school graduates. Women with bachelor’s degrees earn $630,000 more. Men with graduate degrees earn $1.5 million more in median lifetime earnings than high school graduates. Women with graduate degrees earn $1.1 million more.…Read More

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National Network Launches to Connect Students in Crisis

InsideTrack — the national student success nonprofit that established the use of coaching for higher education enrollment, completion and career readiness — today announced the launch of an ambitious new initiative designed to deliver emergency coaching services for students experiencing crisis situations as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. With $250,000 from ECMC Foundation and a matching grant from Strada Education Network, the Emergency Coaching Network will provide up to 5,000 students at participating institutions with support from InsideTrack coaches specially trained to assess and support across a range of challenging situations.

“From food, income and housing insecurity to feelings of isolation, post-traumatic stress, and anxiety, the pandemic has magnified many of the challenges that students were already facing in growing numbers,” said Dr. G. Brent Wallace, Chancellor of North Central Texas College, a Network member institution. “During this unprecedented time for our students and communities, it’s never been more important for us to help students navigate these challenges and build the skills to thrive. We’re grateful that organizations like ECMC Foundation and InsideTrack are collaborating to support us and other institutions in these efforts.”

In the wake of COVID-19, colleges are seeing surging demand for emergency student support services, including coaching, to help students struggling with mental health challenges, financial distress, the loss of unemployment, and concerns around personal health and safety. According to recent data from InsideTrack’s Crisis Support Services team, students seeking support to help meet basic needs such as housing, food and medicine have increased by 203 percent from 2019. The number of students requesting assistance to navigate mental health crises has also more than doubled during the same period.…Read More

Getting feedback quickly and easily

To help strengthen support to teachers, coaches, and school leaders in this time of need, Insight ADVANCE is providing its ADVANCEfeedback® video coaching tool, powered by the Vonage Video API, free of charge. As a custom-built solution, ADVANCEfeedback helps teachers, instructional coaches, and school and university leaders connect on a deeper level than off-the-shelf video conferencing tools, by using secure video for self-reflection, peer feedback, and instructional coaching. Powered by the Vonage Video API, it features both asynchronous video, and synchronous video via ADVANCElive, allowing for real-time meetings and trainings. ADVANCEfeedback helps districts, schools, and higher education institutions increase the frequency of coaching, save time and money, and drive educator growth all in one platform.

Insight ADVANCE has developed a suite of products that connects self-reflection, virtual instructional coaching and peer collaboration, and observation in one secure place to permanently impact how all educators involved in teacher growth are supported.

…Read More

Online professional learning facilitated by Dell

Dell Technologies is providing support to those affected by school closures and the move to distance learning by facilitating online professional learning on Teaching and Learning Remotely, facilitated by Dell’s K-12 and Higher Education Strategy Teams.

These webinar sessions are designed to address top of mind issues that teachers, professors, education leaders, and IT professionals are facing. The webinar sessions are organized around the following themes:

  • Learning Remotely
  • Leading Remotely
  • Family and Community
  • CIO Chats

Please visit Teaching and Learning Remotely for more information and to register to attend.…Read More

Free eTextbooks for Impacted Students

RedShelf, an edtech company that distributes digital course materials and provides an end-to-end platform for efficiently delivering those materials to students, today announced that it has collaborated with its publishing partners to offer free access to eBooks to tens of thousands of students impacted by recent campus closings nationwide.

“We have always believed in the enormous impact that digital course materials can have on affordability, access, and outcomes in higher education,” said Greg Fenton, CEO and co-founder of RedShelf. “That impact has become even more pronounced as the entire academic community grapples with COVID-19, especially for those institutions working to quickly move many or all of their courses online.”

As the COVID-19 outbreak escalated in recent weeks, countless campuses have moved their on-ground courses to an online format and, in many cases, have asked students to leave campus altogether. Many of those students simply can’t access previously-purchased materials now locked in their dorm rooms.…Read More

#4: 25 education trends for 2018

[Editor’s note: This story, originally published on January 1st of this year, was our #4 most popular story of the year. Happy holidays, and thank you for tuning into our 2018 countdown!]

Year after year, educators and those invested in education love to speculate about what will take off in the near future. And as far as riveting news goes, nothing quite piques the interest like new trends that have the potential to fundamentally change learning.

In almost all of the commentary from both educators and industry, the mention of AR and VR for 2018’s big trends were ubiquitous. So much so, we could only include just a few AR/VR pieces here in our inaugural “eSchool Media’s Annual Trends Report,” which compiles some of the most practical, forward-looking predictions from educators and industry on what will trend for the upcoming year in both K-12 and higher education.…Read More