In this week's education news, hundreds take to the streets of Chicago to protest the closure of 54 public schools; the state of New Jersey takes over control of the Camden City School District; Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg weighs a SuperPAC; Edwin Mellen Press continues to be an litigious ass; Amazon acquires Goodreads; a Boundless co-founder leaves the startup; the Wikimedia Foundation's executive director steps down; and a biology teacher in Idaho gets in trouble for saying "vagina" during a lesson on human reproduction. [...]
Click Here to Save Education: Evgeny Morozov and Ed-Tech Solutionism
My review of Evgeny Morozov's To Save Everything, Click Here. It's one of the most important critiques of technology that I've read, and as such, I'd argue it's one of the most important books about education technology to be published in recent years. Here are my attempts to tie Morozov's arguments to education. God, I hope he doesn't chew me out on Twitter... [...]
Hack Education Weekly News: Australia Gets a MOOC Platform, Chicago Closes 54 Public Schools
In this week's education news: Chicago announces its plans to close 54 public schools; Chicago also pulls the graphic novel Persepolis from some school shelves; Australia gets its own MOOC platform; Edmodo gets a new CEO; another ed-reform group issues another report card on states; Maine opens up its one-to-one laptop program to tablets; and Google launches Google Keep and we all laugh our asses off at the thought of using it. [...]
What Impact Have MOOCs Had on Open Courseware?
I caught this question on Twitter earlier this week: "What Impact Have MOOCs Had on MIT Open Courseware?" It's a great question, one that prompted a response from MIT OCW's Steve Carson but that also stirred some thoughts about the "choice" between open education and MOOCs. I do think that Mike Caulfield is right when he observes that the xMOOCs (and textbooks) are actually becoming more like courseware than like courses. But then we still need to ask about that adjective "open," don't we? [...]
2010-2011 Ed-Tech Startups: Where Are They Now?
I've been stewing about some of the data from ed-tech-startup-dom since I posted the other day about my look at Crunchbase and at the recent business history of ed-tech. A commenter on that post urged me to look at startups I covered from a few years ago, so I've done that. I think I have more questions than answers, and it's prompting me to think more about what a database for ed-tech startups might look like, as well as making me wonder how better to tell the stories of what works and why. [...]
The Ed-Tech Startup Crunch
I've been playing around with the Crunchbase API over the weekend, trying to see if there were trends I could identify regarding ed-tech investments. Truth be told, I'm curious about the startups who might be teetering on the edge of "deadpool" status -- those who raised a million or so dollars three or so years ago but who still have no revenue to speak of. So how do "we" do a better job of crunching this data? What questions can we ask? What questions can't Crunchbase answer? How do we get a better picture of the market-side of this ed-tech ecosystem -- its funding and its politics? [...]
Hack Education Weekly News: MOOCs, Badges, RSS, and Twinkies
In this week's news, California is poised to unravel public higher education as we know it -- thanks MOOCs!; a Pearson-backed startup shuts its doors; Google shutters Google Reader; Mozilla releases v1.0 of Open Badges; the same private equity who just bought the education division of McGraw-Hill bought Hostess; edX open sources some of its MOOC platform; Coursera rewrites online forums; Lore is acquired by Noodle; and other fun stuff. [...]
"And This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things..."
I've long been a huge supporter of the ed-tech startup LearnBoost, and the news last week that its co-founder Rafael Corrales has stepped down to become a VC is devastating to say the least. I can't write a eulogy for LearnBoost. It's not closing its doors. But I can make a long laundry list of how the startup did so many things "right" and how the ed-tech startup ecosystem -- that includes investors, engineers, and educators -- is doing a lot of things "wrong." [...]
Hack Education Weekly News: "Stealing School," SXSWedu, and News Corp's Education Tablet
In this week's education news, a homeless mother was sentenced to 12 years for fraudulently enrolling her child in a Norfolk public school, SXSWedu brought together 5000+ educators and entrepreneurs in Austin, News Corp launched its education tablet, AFT leader Randi Weingarten was arrested, lots of startups raised millions of dollars, two of my favorite education startup CEOs stepped down, one of my favorite professors stepped up to run the DPLA, and more. [...]
Author
Audrey Watters is an education writer, rabble-rouser, rambler, recovering academic, lifelong learner, serial dropout, part-time badass, mom.
Podcast
Hack Education Podcast with Steve HargadonLatest episode: February 11, 2013
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