Dealing With Bias in Artificial Intelligence - Craig S. Smith, NY Times

Three women with extensive experience in A.I. spoke on the topic and how to confront it. Bias is an unavoidable feature of life, the result of the necessarily limited view of the world that any single person or group can achieve. But social bias can be reflected and amplified by artificial intelligence in dangerous ways, whether it be in deciding who gets a bank loan or who gets surveilled. The New York Times spoke with three prominent women in A.I. to hear how they approach bias in this powerful technology.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/19/technology/artificial-intelligence-bias.html

Preparing for the Great Enrollment Crash - Robert Massa, Don Hossler and Jerome Lucido, Inside Higher Ed

American colleges and universities have weathered severe storms throughout their history. Wartime pressure, civil unrest, demographic shifts and economic downturns have resulted in everything from a suspension of activities to temporary and sometime permanent college closings. With major demographic shifts already upon us and more to come, colleagues have recently written in this and other higher education publications about the challenges faced by many colleges to enroll new students. They predict, as we do, even tougher times ahead. For those of us who have been responsible for enrollment and net revenue, it is natural to think about what our institutions must do to survive and thrive.
https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/views/2019/11/18/colleges-need-prepare-great-enrollment-crash-opinion

How to Use Micro Learning in Your Course - LAURA LYNCH, eLearning Learning

The idea of micro learning encompasses micro content, which involves breaking large courses down into smaller pieces. Micro learning is also concerned with the way larger courses are delivered. You can create a semester-long course which you deliver in fragments, or you can incorporate micro learning moments into your normal course material. Whichever way you approach this teaching method, using it is likely to show positive results in your course. Micro learning is an effective means of reducing cognitive load, which is the limit of information a learner can absorb at one time before their short-term memory becomes over-burdened. Because of this, educators should take measures early to offer their learners micro learning opportunities in their course.

https://www.elearninglearning.com/edition/weekly-digital-industry-2019-11-09?article-id=12054881&article-title=how-to-use-micro-learning-in-your-course

Editorial: UNI looks forward with partnerships - Courier

The sands of higher education are shifting, prompting more schools to enter into partnerships and utilize distance learning to attract elusive “place-bound” students. The University of Northern Iowa took a step this month to increase its Des Moines footprint. UNI President Mark Nook and President Rob Denson of Des Moines Area Community College announced a new 2+2 partnership — earning an associate of arts degree on DMACC’s Urban Campus, then completing work through UNI for a bachelor of liberal studies degree. The UNI courses would be offered online initially with staff present to support students, beginning in fall 2020.
https://wcfcourier.com/opinion/editorial/editorial-uni-looks-forward-with-partnerships/article_738885f4-84a2-5562-97eb-4829fa389358.html

Digital Transformation Signals: Is Your Institution on the Journey? - Malcolm Brown, Betsy Reinitz and Karen Wetzel, EDUCAUSE Review

Digital transformation is a journey, not a destination. The digital transformation signals listed in this article indicate progress along the way and provide guideposts for the journey. In the context of sweeping social, economic, technological, and demographic changes, digital transformation (Dx) is a series of deep and coordinated culture, workforce, and technology shifts that enable new educational and operating models and transform an institution's business model, strategic directions, and value proposition. Dx can make institutions more resilient, flexible, and relevant as they face an array of increasingly difficult challenges that include declining student enrollment, increased public skepticism, and skyrocketing student debt.
https://er.educause.edu/blogs/2019/10/digital-transformation-signals-is-your-institution-on-the-journey

The future of employment in an age of automation: A long-read Q&A with Carl Benedikt Frey- American Enterprise Institute

Will the rise of robots and artificial intelligence deliver a prosperous economy? And what policies should we adopt to ensure that all Americans are included in this prosperity? On this episode, Carl Benedikt Frey discusses the impacts of technological progress on the economy, past and present. Dr. Frey is the Oxford Martin Citi Fellow at Oxford University, where he teaches economics and economic history. In 2013, he co-authored a widely-shared paper with Michael Osborne titled “The Future of Employment: How Susceptible Are Jobs to Computerisation?” in which he estimated that 47 percent of jobs were susceptible to automation.
https://www.aei.org/pethokoukis/carl-benedikt-frey-on-the-technology-trap/

Five Facts about Student Loans - Kadja Yilla & David Wessel, Brookings

Americans owe about $1.5 trillion on their student loans–more than they owe on their credit cards. The increase in total student debt, stories of families struggling with six-figure loans, and the response of politicians to anxiety about student debt among young voters have turned student debt into a high-profile issue. To inform that conversation, here are five facts about student loans drawn from an event – Student loans: A look at the evidence – hosted by the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at Brookings.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2019/11/12/five-facts-about-student-loans/

Fully Online Courses Are No. 1 Requirement for Many Working Learners - Rhea Kelly, Campus Technology

A recent report found that four out of five working learners do some of their learning online, and more than half (53 percent) are enrolled in courses that are entirely online. In fact, 42 percent of respondents said that "offering fully online classes and coursework" was their most important factor when choosing a school for continued education. The 2019 Working Learner Index, produced by child care and education benefits company Bright Horizons, is based on a survey of more than 31,000 workers who are going back to school while on the job.
https://campustechnology.com/articles/2019/11/07/fully-online-courses-are-no-1-requirement-for-many-working-learners.aspx

Are Colleges and Universities Meeting the Online Learning Challenge? - Elliott Levine, EdTech

Online learners deserve the same engaging experience as traditional learners — and colleges have good reason to make it happen. Statistics indicate the global online education market is expected to top more than $130 billion in the next few years. Meanwhile, on-campus enrollment is dropping, and the number of students turning to online education is steadily growing. But there is more to these trends than meets the eye.
https://edtechmagazine.com/higher/article/2019/11/are-colleges-and-universities-meeting-online-learning-challenge

5 Microlearning Myths You Need to Stop Believing - Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

Microlearning is a modern educational tool that provides learners with bite-sized pieces of content on their mobile devices, be it smartphones, tablets, or laptops. In today’s complex business environment and with technologies evolving all the time, employees must continue to learn and upskill. According to the Deloitte report The Future of Work, 47% of today’s jobs will be gone in ten years, and 67% of employees believe they must continuously reskill themselves to stay relevant in their careers. The fact that microlearning focuses on short learning content to cater to an audience whose attention span has shrunk doesn’t mean that that is all microlearning is about. Let’s clear up some misunderstandings about microlearning.
https://www.thetechedvocate.org/5-microlearning-myths-you-need-to-stop-believing/

What Is 5G? - Sascha Segan, PC Magazine

All of the US carriers have now launched some form of 5G cellular network. But what exactly is 5G, and how fast is it compared with 4G? Here are the facts we know so far. It's messy. It's very early days. And if you like new technology, it's very exciting. The early 5G rollouts are more like a public beta test than a final product. AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile are all using technologies that only travel about 800 feet from a cell site, which means there isn't much coverage. All four carriers are waiting for upgrades to their base stations that will improve coverage, speed, and reliability. Around the end of this year or the beginning of 2020, AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile all intend to launch 5G networks that use existing 4G spectrum, which will have slower speeds but broader coverage.
https://www.pcmag.com/article/345387/what-is-5g

As Pressure To Upskill Grows, 5 Models Emerge - Allison Dulin Salisbury, Forbes

Quantifying the value of a new era of educational investments starts with setting expectations about returns, and defining—with greater precision— their value in a particular corporate context. As the market evolves, we’re seeing five distinct categories—on-ramps, upskilling, reskilling, outskilling, and education as a benefit—that each have their own particular business proposition.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/allisondulinsalisbury/2019/10/28/as-pressure-to-upskill-grows-5-models-emerge/

Career Change Is the New Normal: How Does eLearning Help? - Matthew Lynch, Tech Edvocate

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, individuals born in the latter years of the baby boom era (1957-1964) change their career twelve times during their working life. Research company Gallup calls millennials the job-hopping generation. A recent Gallup report on the millennial generation reveals that 21% of millennials say they’ve changed jobs within the past year. There are many reasons why employees decide to make a career change, but whatever the reason, taking an eLearning course or two can smooth the process. Let’s discuss five ways that taking an online course can help with a career change.
https://www.thetechedvocate.org/career-change-is-the-new-normal-how-does-elearning-help/

Some College, No Degree: A 2019 Snapshot for the Nation and 50 States - National Student Clearinghouse

In the United States, approximately two million people each year enter postsecondary education for the first time. Eight years later, one-third of those who started have not earned any formal credential and are no longer enrolled.1 While it is true that more people have been going to college than ever before, the college completion rate hasn’t changed much. Because of this, we expect the number of people who start—but don’t finish—college to grow as well.
https://nscresearchcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/SCND_Report_2019.pdf

A Certificate, Then a Degree: Certificate-first programs can help tackle America’s college-completion crisis - Clark G. Gilbert and Michael B. Horn, Education Next

Helping students earn certificates upfront offers a promising path to address the dropout rate. Postsecondary institutions offer these credentials of student educational attainment in a growing variety of subjects, which run the gamut from auto mechanics to unmanned aircraft systems to finance. Although community colleges have long offered such programs, name-brand institutions also have gotten involved: the extension program at the University of California, Los Angeles, for example, provides certificates in subjects like cybersecurity and interior design, and delivers some of its programs through an app.
https://www.educationnext.org/certificate-then-degree-programs-help-tackle-college-completion-crisis/

The degrees of separation between the genders in college keep growing - Jon Marcus, Washington Post

Fifty years ago, 58 percent of U.S. college students were men. Today, 56 percent are women, Education Department estimates show. This year, for the first time, the share of college-educated women in the U.S. workforce passed the share of college-educated men, according to the Pew Research Center. It’s not just that more women opt for college. It’s that fewer men do, affecting their opportunities and lifetime earnings.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/the-degrees-of-separation-between-the-genders-in-college-keeps-growing/2019/10/25/8b2e5094-f2ab-11e9-89eb-ec56cd414732_story.html

At 69, she's still paying off $12,000 of student debt — including out of her Social Security checks. - SHANNON NAJMABADI, Texas Tribune

About 222,140 Texans ages 60 and older had student loan debt in 2017, carrying a median load of $15,754, according to government data. Costley works part time at a food bank, making $7.25 an hour, and said she stretches every dollar she has. But every month, she receives a letter in the mail saying the federal government is withholding $134 from her Social Security checks — the equivalent of 18 hours of work. Like death and taxes, Costley may be facing another certainty in life: her student loans. Although she attended college decades ago and made payments when she could, Costley’s debt has gone into default, swollen with accrued interest and been turned over to a collection company.

https://www.texastribune.org/2019/10/23/student-debt-not-just-millennial-problem/

Give Me Security, Give Me Convenience, or Give Me Both! - Joe Galanek, EDUCAUSE Review

When it comes to information security, well-informed paranoia is a good trait for everyone to cultivate.1 Security remains at the top of the EDUCAUSE list of "Top Ten IT Issues" year after year, reflecting the importance of cybersecurity and the need to foster an institutional culture of security. Even though it is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, convenience is still an important consideration, right? Why would someone bother going through extra steps for a login when a quick social login with Facebook or Google is so much more convenient?2 Do you really need a password manager if you add a symbol, dollar sign, or ampersand to your dog's birthday? (Yes!) But in an age of unprecedented convenience, don't people deserve ease, utility, and simplicity?3 In fact, aren't things like social logins and online shopping catering to the desire for convenience?
https://er.educause.edu/blogs/2019/10/give-me-security-give-me-convenience-or-give-me-both

IBM Looks Beyond the College Degree - Paul Fain, Inside Higher Ed

Citing a serious skills gap, the multinational International Business Machines Corporation is looking for different recruiting channels for its workforce of 360,000 employees. IBM's view is that “new-collar” jobs in cybersecurity, cloud computing and other high-demand fields don’t necessarily require a traditional college degree. The company also has created one of the most developed digital badge portfolios for an employer, which both its workers and those outside IBM can earn, and it is adding more and different apprenticeship opportunities as well launching its own boot camp-style offerings. At the same time, IBM continues to partner with traditional colleges, particularly through its expanded work with community colleges.
https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/10/29/interview-ibm-official-about-companys-new-collar-push-look

The role of universities in a highly technological age - Gerard A Postiglione, University World News

Universities are, however, facing the challenge of how to align their core missions with the rapid emergence of technological innovations such as artificial intelligence, big data and algorithms, facial recognition, biosensors, augmented reality, gamification, blockchain, cloud computing and other yet-to-be-created technological innovations. These can become disruptive, but they can also be tapped for their potential to improve how students are selected, how courses are offered, how student learning is programmed and evaluated, how higher finance is managed, how knowledge networks are organised, accessed and expanded, and how more graduates can be prepared for entrepreneurial jobs, smart cities and sustainable development.
https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20191023081415452

MIT Reaffirms Commitment to Open Access - Lindsay McKenzie, Inside Higher Ed

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has published its final recommendations on how to increase the open sharing of MIT publications, data, software and educational materials. An open-access task force was convened in 2017 to update and revise MIT’s open-access policies. A draft set of recommendations was released in March 2019 for public comment. “Scholarship serves humanity best when it is available to everyone,” said Hal Abelson, Class of 1922 Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, who co-chaired the task force with MIT Libraries director Chris Bourg.
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2019/10/21/mit-reaffirms-commitment-open-access

Algorithms are grading student essays across the country. Can this really teach kids how to write better? - Loren Katz, Vox

The reason it’s so hard to figure out who’s affected by AI grading is because there’s not just one program that’s being used. But they’re all made in basically the same way: First, an automated scoring company looks at how human graders behave. Then, the company trains an algorithm to make predictions as to how a human grader might score an essay based on that data. Depending on the program, those predictions can be consistently wrong in the same way. In other words, they can be biased. And once those algorithms are built, explains Reset host Arielle Duhaime-Ross, they can reproduce those biases at a huge scale.
https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/10/20/20921354/ai-algorithms-essay-writing

How does society create an ethics guide for AI? - RAMIN VATANPARAST, Venture Beat

Coined the fourth industrial revolution, the advancement of artificial intelligence and machine learning brings interesting discussion to the table. Because AI is so comprehensive and covers several industries, we find ourselves asking obscure questions such as “Do we need to legalize predictive AI policing?” or “How do we iron out biases from algorithms that determine job promotions?” With these questions arising, the key one that remains unanswered surrounds ethics. How do we ensure that AI technologies are ethically designed? To answer this question, there are essentially four aspects that dictate the result: the dilemma, the impact, adoption, and institutionalization.
https://venturebeat.com/2019/10/18/how-does-society-create-an-ethics-guide-for-ai/

Study: Less state funding has hiked college tuition by nearly 40% since 2008 crisis - Daniel Uria, UPI

Decreases in state funding have pushed the cost of higher education to historic levels over the past decade, according to a new report by a budgetary think tank. The 22-page analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said Thursday the average cost for tuition at four-year public institutions in all 50 states increased by nearly 40 percent between 2008 and 2018, or a little over $2,700. Overall funding for two- and four-year state colleges and universities, meanwhile, decreased by $6.6 billion.
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2019/10/25/Study-Less-state-funding-has-hiked-college-tuition-by-nearly-40-since-2008-crisis/6241571963849/?sl=2

How a University Took on the Textbook Industry - Rebecca Koenig, EdSurge

Some economists say OpenStax and other OER producers helped to halt the decades-long rise of textbook prices, which, along with other supplies, now set the average undergraduate back between $1,200 and $1,440 each school year, according to the College Board. Feeling squeezed, for-profit publishers are searching for new revenue by selling colleges digital homework systems that charge students up to $100 for a semester’s worth of access. Since professors typically require use of these tools to participate in class, students complain that they are essentially being charged to turn in their assignments.

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-10-24-how-a-university-took-on-the-textbook-industry

A Fresh Look at Blockchain in Higher Ed - Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed

Blockchain is advancing in higher education, as it is in all of society, with some interesting new applications and ramifications. Perhaps most importantly, blockchain will facilitate the difficult shift in higher education that we are now navigating. We are moving from a degree-centric environment in which the university is engaged in the life cycle of the student while on campus to one that is more of a supply-chain design providing lifelong learning. In the emerging mode, the university will engage the student prior to their first arrival on campus (or online) through their degree experience and far beyond.
https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/blogs/online-trending-now/fresh-look-blockchain-higher-ed

Not Future-Ready - Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed

Survey of four-year-college leaders finds they lack confidence in their institutions' ability to adapt -- and aren't planning ahead in ways that would ensure success. The report, "The Transformation-Ready Higher Education Institution," included a survey of nearly 500 senior administrators at four-year colleges and universities, roughly half of whom were presidents and chancellors. The survey sought to gauge the campus leaders' assessments of the most significant challenges awaiting their institutions in the next three to five years, how prepared they felt to respond to those pressures, and whether their institutions were structured and managed with agility and responsiveness in mind.
https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/10/22/four-year-college-leaders-not-feeling-ready-future

Report: College leaders not confident they can beat new competition - Hallie Busta, Education Dive

When it comes to strategic planning, just one in six colleges is looking a decade or more ahead, according to a new report from the American Council on Education (ACE), Huron and the Georgia Institute of Technology based on a survey of 495 leaders at four-year institutions. They cite several challenges ahead: more competition for new students, particularly from national universities investing heavily in online education; an increase in nontraditional students; less state and federal support; and declining public confidence in higher ed's value. While they say their institutions are prepared to meet students' changing needs, they are less confident in their ability to address new forms of competition or change how the public views higher ed.
https://www.educationdive.com/news/report-college-leaders-not-confident-they-can-beat-new-competition/565483/

10 Powerful Women Leaders Discuss Keeping AI Safe for Humanity - Tyler Gallagher, Entrepreneur

'History has shown that whenever a great invention gets into the wrong hands, evil tends to prevail. Right now, we're in the early stages of AI and currently exploring the many potential benefits of using AI for good.' In an effort to highlight some of the accomplished women in this sector, Authority Magazine interviewed women leaders in artificial intelligence as part of a series. Each was asked the following question: “As you know, there is an ongoing debate between prominent scientists about whether advanced AI has the future potential to pose a danger to humanity. This debate has been personified as a debate between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. What is your position about this?
https://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshow/340907

Quantum Computing Is Poised to Change Everything - Ray Schroeder, Inside Higher Ed

It is truly rare that an advancement comes along that changes every aspect of society; quantum computing is poised to do just that in the 2020s.  The supremacy challenge earlier this summer was based on a problem given to both the Summit and the Google Quantum computers to prove that a set of numbers was truly random. That’s a rather esoteric test, but it demonstrates the magnitude of superiority of quantum computing: 200 seconds compared to 10,000 years.  Do you recall Moore’s law? That’s the axiom developed by Gordon Moore some two dozen years ago that the processing power of computers would double every 18 months to two years. Now, quantum computing has ushered in Hartmut Neven’s law. His law predicting growth in quantum computing power is one that is doubly exponential. That is two to an exponent of two to a second increasing exponent. Charted on a graph, that growth rate appears to become nearly vertical.
https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/blogs/online-trending-now/quantum-computing-poised-change-everything

The Incredible Shrinking Higher Ed Industry - Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed

Higher education enrollments have been falling for years, a well-documented outcome that can be attributed to some combination of a strong U.S. economy, changes in birth rates and, perhaps, growing doubts about the value of a college degree. Another decline is also unfolding -- this one attributable to a mix of economic and political forces: the number of colleges and universities in the United States is at its lowest ebb since at least 1998. Data released by the U.S. Education Department's National Center for Education Statistics Friday included statistics on a range of topics, including total head count of enrolled students through 2017-18 and the number of colleges and universities in the most recent academic year, 2018-19.
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/10/14/higher-ed-shrinks-number-colleges-falls-lowest-point-two-decades