I am very pleased that my most recent book, “Harnessing America’s Wasted Talent: A New Ecology of Learning” (Jossey-Bass, Jan, 2010) was published in January. Writing the book has been a journey for me: changing me in the writing and changing the book as a result of the intellectual ferment created. I have come to understand this technological revolution as more  than a set of linked events with a cumulative widespread impact on almost every facet of our lives. Indeed, I now understand it as a new ecology, a new environment for information and intellectual activity which cannot be controlled by existing hierarchical structures, such as universities and governments. continue reading

Every so often you just need to take a break to let your mind and your mouse wander around the net. Here are a few items from my recent foraging that readers of Rethinking Higher Education might find of interest. continue reading

I am excited and pleased today because I am holding my new book, Harnessing America’s Wasted Talent: A New Ecology of Learning (Jossey-Bass, Jan. 2010), in my hands. It lives up to its title, I think, describing how our technology-rich environment, populated with platforms, networks, social sites, and downloads, makes possible a level of access and completion in higher education that has been unattainable up to this point. I illustrate this point with a number of examples. Primary among them is being able to self-assess your experiential learning and then, if you wish, get it reviewed formally for academic credit , all on-line. continue reading

The razzle-dazzle around unveiling of the iPad was about much more than the potential of that device to replace the pounds/dollars of textbooks that are part of today’s college life, but there was certainly buzz about its potential to do just that.

It may. Combine what it obviously offers with the increased functionality that businesses like Scrollmotion and Inkling may add to the mix, and you begin to see realized the potential that we all know is there for eTexts. continue reading

I am sitting at the opening session of the Kaplan University Faculty Retreat in Miami, a biannual event that precedes KU’s graduation ceremonies, listening to my colleague and fellow Rethinking Higher Education blogger Peter Smith talking about his new book, Harnessing America’s Wasted Talent. I am proud to be his colleague and his friend. continue reading

Learning on Demand, the 2009 report on the state of online learning in the United states has been by published by Sloan-C. The news release digests the findings and links to the full report.

More than 25 percent of all college and university students - more than 4.6 million individuals - were taking at least one online class in the Fall 2008 semester. This is a 17 percent increase over Fall 2007. continue reading

On January 7-8, about 100 people, drawn from a wide variety of educational, technical, labor, non-profit, and business backgrounds, gathered at Cavallo Point, a conference center in Sausalito. Sponsored by the Lumina Foundation, the topic was “Envisioning the Future of Higher Education”. For this old warrior, it was a bright moment in time when principles and potential for the future of higher education were expressed clearly and honestly, without regard for whether they would go down easily with the traditional academy. continue reading

If you have not already seen it, check out Hybrid Education 2.0 at Inside Higher Education and then move over to the Open Learning Initiative page on the Carnegie Mellon University site, about which the article reports, to dig deeper into the work they are doing in web-based instruction.

For those of us who are committed to using technology more and better in higher education, there is a lot of good news and hope there as we move into 2010.

Happy New Year to all.

Amazon has released a beta version of its Kindle for PC application. Useful blog postings and reviews about it can be found at EduKindle, Teleread, and the Washington Post.

The application makes a nice presentation of a book on the PC. It’s a step forward in a number of ways, including the convenience of having the same material easily available on the Kindle device, an iPhone, and on one’s PC, with easy syncing among the different devices.

Similar functionality is available with other e-readers, including at least Barnes & Nobles’ offering and Mobipocket. Both of these options provide highlighting and notation capabilities that make them a step closer to realizing the potential of e-textbooks. No doubt these capabilities will soon be available on the Kindle for PC, as well.

Downloads of these PC reader applications are free, and there’s plenty of free content available, too. The interested and the curious should take them all for a test drive. Having knowledge and experience about how different devices and platforms work in the book space in general will be invaluable as we work toward realizing the full potential of e-texts in higher education.

Plastic Logic announced that it will unveil the “Que” at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in January. This e-reading device has considerable promise for education and e-texts, due in no small part to the fact that it will incorporate touchscreen technology. This opens up the potential for students and faculty to interact with the material on the device much more like one interacts with a paper textbook - marking it up, navigation, etc.

You can see the device and read about the Que on the company’s website. CNET, the Wall Street Journal, ZDNet, and Gizmodo were among those reporting on Plastic Logic’s announcement.