Group Nears Online Education Compact

One issue facing online learning has been finding ways for institutions to offer online programs that meet the Department of Education’s state authorization rules. Those regulations force colleges and universities that offered online programs to register in every state.

While the authorization requirement was struck down by the federal courts earlier this year, most experts believe it will be back when Congress gets around to reauthorizing the Higher Education Act next year. So, state regulators, staff from regional higher-education compacts, key stakeholders, and other experts have been meeting to draft an agreement that would make it easier to get state approval for online classes that are available to students throughout the nation.

The goal of the agreement would be to “eliminate redundancies and inefficiencies for states and higher-education institutions by establishing ‘reciprocity’ among states that sign on to the effort,” according to a report in eCampus News. The project, a joint effort by the Council of State Governments and The Presidents’ Forum, would reform the regulatory review and approval process that governs postsecondary institutions offering degrees across state lines and require each state to approve the terms of any agreement.

“I’ve looked at the authorization issue from all sides and reciprocity is still the best answer to meet everyone’s needs, especially the student,” said Russell Poulin, deputy director of research and analysis at the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education’s Cooperative for Educational Technologies.

Judge Agrees to E-Price Fixing Settlement

Despite plenty of objections, federal district court judge Denise Cote has approved the settlement reached by the Justice Department and three of the five publishing houses in the e-book price-fixing case.

The settlement mandates that Hachette, HarperCollins, and Simon & Schuster discontinue current e-book sales agreements for the next two years and pay $69 million in damages to customers who purchased e-books between April 1, 2010, and May 21, 2012. Apple has said it will appeal the judge’s decision. The ruling means retailers can set their own prices, regardless of publisher pricing.

Amazon has indicated it is ready to resume “aggressive” e-book pricing.

The judge dismissed all objections, finding those concerns to be unreasonable. However, she also sided with the NACS position that e-textbooks should not be part of the settlement.

“While disappointed that the settlement agreement was upheld, we are pleased that the judge agreed in her ruling with our opinion that e-textbooks are not covered by the final judgment,” said Charles Schmidt, director of public relations for NACS. “By making this distinction, we hope that competition and innovation in the higher education textbook market continues.”

Healthcare Programs Online

Today, enrolling in healthcare programs online to earn a degree is a great option as the healthcare industry expands. New legislation is expected to enable millions of previously uninsured Americans to seek medical attention, and the nation's aging population will require more skilled care as well in upcoming years. You can't become a doctor through an online education program, but you can earn the credentials necessary to work in lower-level skilled healthcare professions.

Here are some of the options available for earning an associate's degree through healthcare programs online. These are some of the most popular programs, because they require only an associate's degree to enter the field. Once you have earned this degree, there are always additional opportunities to advance by pursuing a higher-level degree.

• Medical Assisting
• Dental Assisting
• Medical Technology
• Physical Therapy Assisting
• Pharmacy Technology
• Veterinary Technology
• Healthcare Management
• Medical Administrative Support

As you can see, whether you are interested in administrative or clinical work, healthcare programs online offer a variety of options. The curriculum offered through online education programs is comparable to, if not even better than what is offered in a traditional ground school.

Earning a degree online offers a number of advantages to students. Above all, learning online is convenient. Many lower-level healthcare workers choose to continue their education online because they can do so while maintaining a full-time job. Online coursework can be completed at any time and from any location with Internet access. Pursuing advanced degrees allows students to advance without having to sacrifice their current job and income. As stated earlier, you can't become a doctor online, but you can earn the credentials necessary to advance if you already have an education. For example, if you're a working nurse with an associate's degree, there are healthcare programs online that can help you earn a bachelor's degree which will qualify you for a better job and more money.

What's Next with E-Book Pricing?

While Penguin, Macmillan, and Apple continue the e-book pricing fight with the Department of Justice, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Simon & Schuster have decided it’s better to pay $69 million now than risk further damage to their reputation and possibly even higher fines that could result from losing a court case.

The three agreed to give refunds in the form of account credits or checks, ranging from 25 cents for each non-bestseller sold to $1.32 for books that appeared on The New York Times bestseller list from April 1, 2010-May 21, 2012. Just don’t expect your refund any time soon.

“Consumers aren’t going to see any payouts right now,” Laura Hazard Owen, a reporter covering e-book publishing for paidContent, said to The Boston Globe. “There’s still a lot of waiting ahead.”

The Globe article goes on to predict consumers could see e-book prices drop as much as 30%. Amazon said it would lower prices when the initial settlement with the Department of Justice was announced in April and other e-tailers will likely follow suit to keep pace.

“When retailers or manufacturers conspire to set prices, consumers lose,” said Edgar Dworsky, founder of consumer resource guide ConsumerWorld.org. “So this is a good result.”

The three settling publishers also agreed to change the pricing of their e-books, but that’s where things could get a little murky, according to Billy Pidgeon, analyst at M2 Research.

“The devil is in the details,” he told the eCommerce Times. “There’s a lot of issues with the price of digital media. There are expectations that digital should be priced more cheaply as there are no manufacturers. But this really hasn’t been the case.”

iTunes U Course Manager Just Might Be Big

Apple’s iTunes U Course Manager is a web-based tool that allows instructors to create “courses” that can be downloaded and synced to the iTunes U iPad app. That could be a very big deal for higher education if the platform can jump a couple of pretty big hurdles, according to Joshua Kim in a Technology and Learning blog post.

Courses created in the platform can include documents, audio, and video files, which can be read on whatever iPad app a student chooses. The information can be viewed both online and offline, provides additional features that allow students to create and share study notes, and enables course materials to be delivered to students without going through a third-party publishing platform.

The biggest obstacle to making this work on any scale is also the most obvious: Students have to be hooked into an iOS device, preferably an iPad. The student experience on an iPad is great, according to Kim, but those students without Apple devices are out of luck.

Another concern for Kim is students will have to go outside the Apple setting at some point because the platform separates content for iOS devices from the creation of blogs and discussion boards that appear on learning management systems.

“Despite these challenges, I see the evolving Course Manager and iTunes U Courses as a compelling development,” Kim writes. “We have struggled to find a robust way to deliver a combination of text and multimedia curricular content that is organized around a course narrative to mobile devices. Apple seems to be offering us, or at least those of us in the Apple universe, a solution.”

Online Education - Ease of School From Home

Online education has been touted as the new wave of education for the future. As more and more colleges and universities hop onto this virtual bandwagon, the opportunities for students increase both in terms of quality and quantity. Nowadays, it doesn't matter whether you live in a small rural community, if you are trying to complete your education while juggling a host of other responsibilities, or even if you are looking for extremely specialized niche degree programs, online education is your best bet. As the number of students who enroll for online schools and colleges grows annually, colleges step up their efforts simultaneously to deliver the best designed degree programs that come along with a host of other benefits.

Propagating the ease of 'school at home,' online education can be your best option if:

You have other responsibilities besides your education - For stay at home parents, students who are already working, business men who travel a lot, students can study anytime, anywhere, and on their own schedule. As long as you have Internet access and a computer, you can plan your studies around your other schedule. And while it does offer great amounts of flexibility, an online education program does not mean less work. You have to be committed to take out time for your research and online lectures and fit in your assignments whenever you get the free time to do so.

You cannot physically be on campus or at a particular location - Whether this is due to prohibitive travel times or budget constraint, there is no need to commute daily to school or relocate to the city of your college of choice. You can be at home, at work, or even on the road and complete your work on time.

You do not have the money to fund an expensive college education - Online degree programs are significantly cheaper than the more traditional programs offered by colleges. You can now enjoy in your own home the benefits of an education without many of the financial hardships that are often associated with attending school. In addition, you will also save on traveling and accommodation and even childcare.

You need individual attention - Most college courses have too many students attending classes to assure any real one on one interaction with the professors. Internet education offers course material that is accessible 24 hours a day and students have the ability to re-read lectures and discussion as often as they require. Online students also have more interaction with their professors as email correspondence is vital in this method of teaching. In this way, a rapport between student and teacher builds up and proves useful in determining ones strengths and weaknesses.

You need to be up to date on a diverse range of study material - Many careers today demand recruits to be exposed to a larger field of knowledge than just their specific major. Online education offers up-to-date theory along with practical knowledge. Online healthcare programs, for example, offer on site practical training at a nearby hospital or clinic along with its theory based course material. Students also get exposed to knowledge and a broader range of content due to online access and e-content. Teachers are located all around the world and offer a world view on events and discussions that are invaluable in creating a diversified approach to education.

You want to be skilled with the latest technologies - By just using the Internet to attend class, students improve their online skills. Research and communication techniques are developed along with several other skills that prove important when applying for a job in today's competitive market.

You benefit from team learning - Online graduate programs offer chat rooms and forums for students to interact with each other. Discussions, newsgroups and emails all encourage constant communication for problem solving and instruction. Instructors are also more approachable and open to online meeting and brainstorming sessions. Many online students feel that their education experience is much richer as a result.

All in all, online degree programs offer a host of benefits to interested students. And while the traditional forms of institutions will never be totally eliminated, it's easy to understand why people are terming this type of education as the next big thing.

Coursera Turns to Student Honor Codes

Media reports have described how students are cheating in at least three Coursera classes. The charges came to light when students complained on course discussion boards about plagiarism, leading the massive online open course site to institute additional honor-code reminders students must read and sign off on before submitting assignments to be graded.

That development probably shouldn’t come as a surprise since student cheating is nothing new. In fact, a 2011 Pew survey found that 55% of college presidents responding to the poll said they'd seen a rise in plagiarism over the last 10 years and 89% of those presidents blamed it on Internet and online classes.

The real question is why bother to cheat at all since the class is free and the student doesn’t receive credit?

Torrie Bosch, editor of Future Tense, which covers emerging technologies for Slate, the New America Foundation, and Arizona State University, says she believes it has to do with the “gamification.” Some individuals are so driven to do better in everything, whether a game or an assignment, that they’ll turn to cheating when it becomes frustrating.

“Technically, using cheat codes while playing a game at home for fun or copy-pasting a couple of sentences from Wikipedia on a Coursera assignment doesn’t hurt anybody,” Bosch wrote. “But it does diminish the experience for those who are playing by the rules, as evidenced by the many Coursera students who took to their class discussion boards to complain when they uncovered instances of plagiarism.”